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PTC Pushes for Family Movie Act Clarification

The Parents Television Council is calling on House and Senate leaders to pass the Family Movie Act Clarification Act.

That the bill that would make it clear that digital versions of movies (the bill does not mention TV shows, though PTC said it would apply to them, too) delivered over authorized distribution platforms can be modified to remove explicit content and that circumvention of copy protection in order to do that does not violate copyright so long as there is "no demonstrated and avoidable economic injury to the copyright owner or the authorized digital transmission provider.

https://www.broadcastingcable.com/news/ ... rification

That would mean they could cut the sexually explicit while leaving the violence intact.

It's an important clarification. TV/video/streaming has always recut movies, often with a disclaimer up front stating that they have done so. The issue seems to be that copy protected files containing movies cannot be modified for commercial purposes without disabling the copy protection, which might be illegal even if authorized. It's a little thing, but given the love for litigation in This Town, it's a potentially expensive one.

In practice, sex usually goes and violence stays. Sometimes the violence actually gets worse, because they restore stuff that got snipped in the theatrical to get an R. It's OK in this culture to show people doing all kinds of terrible things to one another, but not to show them making love.

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"Our democratic institutions... seem to have been upended by frat-boy billionaires from California," remarked Canadian politician Charlie Angus. (BBC, 11/27/18)

What are the children up to now?

They gonna censor our movies now because they have the maturity level of 8 yr olds?

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"Corporate Democrat" phrase created at the same place "Angry Mob" was...People keep falling for rightwing talking points. How sad.

Why not make it simple and have those who want sexual content removed simply look-up the movie on IMDB and under the MORE tab click on the Parents Guide to see what "explicit content" the movie has. If there is something objectionable then they don't have to watch it.

From reading the article, it sounds like the legislation would apply not only to broadcast (cable and over-the-air) media but to DVDs as well. If DVDs are included, then it would be a decision upon those who own the rights to the movie whether to include or delete the explicit content. Of course, the problem becomes what is "explicit content"? For some, sex/sexual scenes would be removed while graphic violent scenes would remain and vice versa.

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When you vote Left you vote right.

I guess this means they want us to go back to the 50s when husbands and wives, on TV, slept in separate beds and the toilet was never shown. Yet, it's okay to show cowboys and Indians killing each other, movies with gladiators stabbing and killing each other, or war movies showing killing an a massive scale.

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When you vote Left you vote right.

Abortion AND birth control will be illegal nationwide if they get their way. For real.

But hey, I am just being hyperbolic again.

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"Corporate Democrat" phrase created at the same place "Angry Mob" was...People keep falling for rightwing talking points. How sad.

The puritans strike again.

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bird's theorem-"we the people" are stupid.

"No one is so foolish as to choose war over peace. In peace sons bury their fathers, in war fathers bury their sons." - Herodotus

The new motto of the USA: Unum de multis. Out of one, many.

Two issues: first is the MPAA theatrical rating system. NC-17 (formerly X) generally kills the theatrical, because the movie gets classed in with porn. They probably should have kept X for porn, since that's what everyone thinks it is, and used NC-17 for extreme violence or sex that actually has something to do with the story.

Second is that subsidiary distributions are not submitted for re-rating. It keeps the theatrical rating. They change DVDs all the time. Sometimes it's a selling point (the director's cut, or whatever). Sometimes, like in Jaws, they just put back the gross stuff they took out for the theatrical. This is too bad, because the theatrical version of Jaws worked by leaving a lot to the imagination, at least until the end. It was also a display of virtuoso editing, but the audience does not buy DVDs for that.

The cultural issue is not limited to movies, and it's a nasty one. I don't know the effect of glorifying violence and shushing sex on people growing up, but it can't be good. My own weird idea, and it is weird, is that the culture must glorify violence to its youth in case they are required to go to war.

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"Our democratic institutions... seem to have been upended by frat-boy billionaires from California," remarked Canadian politician Charlie Angus. (BBC, 11/27/18)

BTW, while I tend to discount simple naive theories about media-violence relationships (especially re video games), here's what I will say.

Hollywood films routinely seem to present a consistent theme. Lone guy can't get justice through the system, so he takes matters into his own hands. That usually means a big gun in his hands, blowing away dozens of largely faceless, nameless bad guys. Only their head honcho usually has his name in the credits. Is there a Schwarzenegger film that is NOT like this? Incidentally, do these scenes ever result in a R, usually it's a PG-13.

The point is, these films seem to routinely suggest violence is the way wrongs against you can be solved. Lots of it, with a high body count, and lots of fake blood.

Then, we wonder whether this has ANY relationship with the large amounts of mass shootings in our culture. Well, given the "cultivation theory" of media effects, I would say there is some relationship. Please note this does not mean I think watching a single violent movie makes people go out and kill people, and I am not advocating censorship. But the point I made stands.

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-- Tis an ill wind that blows no minds.
Malaclypse the Younger

You're right about that recurring theme in American movies. It's a uniquely American mythos, this thing with loners taking the law into their own hands to right supposed wrongs with mass violence. It certainly gets a lot of projects onto the screen, and puts a lot of butts in the theater seats.

I don't like it.

Sometimes, as in Rambo, the personal vendetta stands for a political sentiment that is otherwise not socially acceptable to express publicly. Theaters full of cheering masses watching us finally win Vietnam, mythologically speaking. Hey liberal college brain, you gonna let us win this time? You gonna let us win? You gonna let us win? And so it goes, as nations write an acceptable version of their past.

I don't like that either.

In general, we get the movies we deserve.

> Is there a Schwarzenegger film that is NOT like this?

Oh, maybe the Terminator franchise, where he's a robot from the future fighting other various evil robots in the present.

His very first movie was actually good, but I think it only screened at festivals and retrospectives. He plays himself, so it's less of an acting stretch.

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"Our democratic institutions... seem to have been upended by frat-boy billionaires from California," remarked Canadian politician Charlie Angus. (BBC, 11/27/18)

Well, you know the series was begging for a sequel ...

And here it is ... Rambo V. (At least he had the sense to stop being the main action in the post-Rocky Creed movies.)
https://www.cinemablend.com/news/246286 ... last-blood

According to a Screen Daily report from back in May, the fifth film finds Rambo troubled with PTSD, living in a ranch in Arizona, picking up work where he can. When longtime family friend Maria (Adriana Barraza) tells Rambo her granddaughter has gone missing after heading into Mexico for a party, Rambo joins Maria to find the girl. The film reportedly includes John Rambo going up against a deadly Mexican cartel led by Hugo Martinez (Sergio Peris-Mencheta).

[snip][end]

Stallone is 72. He's going to be taking down that Mexican Cartel by running them over with his wheelchair and whacking them with his cane, I suppose.

At least they had the sense to realize at this point it made no sense to send him back to Vietnam, again. I mean, we're practically already allies, or at least frenemies.

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-- Tis an ill wind that blows no minds.
Malaclypse the Younger

Ahhh yes, the old premise known as "Sympathetic protagonist is forced to fight and destroy [place this year's boogyman here]."

I would imagine that by now someone must have written something about how you can tell the state of a country by whatever illusory enemies it has found for itself at the moment. You could also do a great movie series for a festival or whatever.

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"Our democratic institutions... seem to have been upended by frat-boy billionaires from California," remarked Canadian politician Charlie Angus. (BBC, 11/27/18)

Don't know if other cultures/nations do this but imo it is part and parcel with American mythology. It is intriguing how that dovetails with the claims of declining morality by the religionists. Violence good, sex bad. Mixing on the concept of just war makes it even more of a mess.

_________________
bird's theorem-"we the people" are stupid.

"No one is so foolish as to choose war over peace. In peace sons bury their fathers, in war fathers bury their sons." - Herodotus

The new motto of the USA: Unum de multis. Out of one, many.

Interesting to look at the PTC website. Their advisory board has some interesting names including Meryl Streep. There is also one of my favorite asshats, Michael Medved.

_________________
bird's theorem-"we the people" are stupid.

"No one is so foolish as to choose war over peace. In peace sons bury their fathers, in war fathers bury their sons." - Herodotus

The new motto of the USA: Unum de multis. Out of one, many.