Kyle Chamaillard
Mr.Jamieson
Media Class
29/10/2009
Crossfire Assignment

Everybody watches movies. Adults, teenagers and children. But not everyone can watch the same movies. The movies that is good for your age group is told to you by the rating given to the film by the Motion Picture Association of America. In Canada, we base our ratings on how America rates their movies. But how accurately do they rate them? I don’t think that they rate movies correctly. But the MPAA insists that they are accurate in their rating system. I will be using information from the MPAA’s official page and some opinion pieces on how it is unfairly rated.

I will start off with the MPAA side of the story. The movie ratings system consists of all parents. They watch each film as a group, discuss the movie and take a vote on which rating should be given to the movie. The board uses the same criteria when rating the movies as they would with any decision that involves their children. But here is my favourite part. The members of the movie ratings system are all volunteers! They change the group who rates the movie about once a week, so it is never the same people rating all the movies you watch.

This seems like a flawed system to me. Everybody will have a separate opinion on how good/bad a movie would be for their children to watch. So what would have been a R-rated movie one week could become a PG-13 movie the next. So should you let your kids go off and rent their own movies? Or should you help pick them out by reading the information on the back?

“It is important that this film be seen by as many people as possible, as it deals with an insidious form of censorship resulting from a ratings process that has been kept secret for more than 30 years.” – Kirby Dick. This is a quote from the documentary “This Film is not Yet Rated.” This movie is dedicated to exploiting the secrets behind the movie ratings system. And his quote is very true. What happens behind closed doors at the MPAA? How come independent movies and Hollywood movies are rated different?

A movie I remember seeing and being judgemental on the rating of, was “The Ring.” When it came out, everyone was commenting on how scary it was. But how come one of the scariest movies of the year was only rated PG-13? I have done research, and can’t seem to figure it out. I have looked up clips, and thirteen year olds should not be able to rent this movie. I own a movie called “The Itty Bitty Titty Committee.” There is no rating on the back, so virtually anybody could buy this movie. I bought this movie under false pretences. I did not know when I bought the movie there would be six lesbian sex scenes. This is a very independent movie, that was probably only glanced at, and received a rating that was not fair (or visible) for the people viewing the movie. I understand the title of the movie should be self-explanatory, but I don’t think it is. There should be some kind of rating on the back of the case.

My opinion is clear. There should be a paid staff, with knowledge about at which age you should be able to see gore or nudity in movies. If a movie like “The Ring” is scary, and gives adults nightmares, it should be rated R. Not PG-13. If the movie involves some bad language, it should be rated PG-13, as long as the parents are comfortable with their kids hearing these words.

I am curious how they chose the volunteers to rate the movies. Are they just people off the street? Or do people sign up on a piece of lined paper and they get a call when it is their turn? This seems to me like a system with many flaws. Should there be protests against the movie ratings system? That seems a little extreme, but there should be some investigating about how the system really works.

In conclusion, movie ratings may be very deceiving. If you are not a fan of scary movies, and pick up a PG-13 movie assuming it won’t be bad, be prepared. If you are looking for something to watch with the family, some PG movies have some swearing and other content not meant for children under the age of 7. Always be careful when renting or buying a movie. For more information on the documentary “This Film is not Yet Rated” follow this link: http://www.chaincamera.com/thisfilmisnotyetrated/info.html