21 July 1999

JV: 3. Nature and politics abhor vacuums. Without a voluntary rating system self-imposed by the industry, governments will, like a trout going after a fly, leap to fill the void. Anyone who doubts that is living in a metaphysically untidy world.

Just three weeks ago on the floor of the House of Representatives, those of us who believe in the First Amendment and freedom of expression struggled to defeat an amendment which would have authorized the Federal Trade Commission to create a new movie rating system, with the full force of the government deployed to enforce the system, with criminal fines and penalties for non-enforcement.

The scary part is that 161 House members voted for the amendment! Where was this small band of rating-system trashers when political sabers were flashing unsheathed in the chamber of the House? Well, the fact is they were absent, blissfully barren of any passion to protect creative freedom when the battle to preserve the First Amendment was fiercely fought.

DP: I have no problem with any of this. And I thank you for your efforts on the behalf of the industry and on the behalf of people who love films. But playing "the devil you know vs. the devil you don't know" is a fear tactic being used against your own constituency. I admit that Washington must be taken into account. That's why I am screaming for critics of the MPAA's failure to support serious adult-oriented film to focus on changes that will pass Washington's muster. I strongly believe that a working A rating, between the NC-17 and the R would put the films in the upper 10 percent of the R-to-NC17 danger zone that actually get Rs now with minor cuts into the A category, cleaning up the R to Washington's joy and actually pulling the upper 10 percent of the PG-13-to-R zone that now gets PG-13s into the R, also pleasing legislators and parents.

And your calling to task of voices of dissent is disingenuous. If I were asked to testify in Washington, you can be damned sure I'd be there. And though I can't speak for him, I would bet every dime I have that Roger Ebert would be thrilled to be allowed to bring his voice into this fray. You are the man, Jack. No doubt. But if you need help in your fight, believe me, we'll all be there. But we won't all agree with you 100 percent.

JV: 4. This small band of Constant Whiners talk to each other, write for each other, opine with each other, and view with lacerating contempt the rubes who live Out There, west of Manhattan and east of the San Andreas Fault. The CWs think that everyone ought to view an orgy as a diurnal event, observing such goings-on with a "been there, done that" casual yawn.

Shouldn't everyone in the country glory in four-letter words ending in "k"? And why not? Since the CWs know what is right and real, then it is from them that the simpletons in Middle America should take their cues and their culture.

In their zeal to brandish the notion that they are the custodians of creative rightness, they commit intellectual nihilism, the smashing of truth and reason, exalting a smallish and relentlessly ill-humored prism through which they all see the same lunacies, which persuades them that if they can kill the movie rating system, there will be no alternative to take its place. Or to put it another way, it is the contagion of the anointed few who believe they are a huge throng.

DP: That really cuts it, JV. Working the mid-west against the coasts. Talk about "been there, done that!" That is about as cheap a tactic as there is and you should be ashamed of yourself for using it. A man who fought for the Civil Rights Movement using the size of the movement to denounce it. Really. You know better.

Are some critics of the MPAA writing overzealous diatribes that don't take the realities of your work, which is important, into account? Absolutely. But painting us all with a broad brush of nihilism ain't going to shut us up.

I'll make it simple. I don't want to kill the ratings system. I want an adult rating that allows filmmakers who are not pornographers to have their movies advertised in major newspapers and to be seen in multi-plexes in malls. That's my big demand! I don't want to shove anything down anyone's throat. I don't want to bash the Midwest. And I don't want you to keep censoring movies.

And as far as the parents and guardians of America, who you use as a human shield (thanks to Parker and Stone for that one!), give us this: I want you to give me a reason to say "no" to taking my 10-year-old nephew to South Park. I want you to give the parent who took a bunch of his little 4th grade buddies to see South Park a reason to say "no." The R just doesn't do it. Compared to certain scenes in South Park: Bigger, Longer & Uncut, the entirety of Trey Parker's Orgazmo, which you guys gave an NC-17, is a PG film. Help us, Obi-Jack. (Or is that Senator Palpa-Jack?)

JV: 5. The people who rate the movies are neither gods nor fools. They are parents. They think like parents. There are no rigidly enforced precepts. Each rater must answer this question: "Is the rating I am about to apply one that most parents in America would judge to be accurate?" They do not deal in Euclidean geometry where the formulas are bound in clarity and precision. They deal in subjectivity, where the lines are smudged and the corridors are ill-lit.

Subjectivity entices disagreement from the public. I sometimes disagree with a movie rating. But the rating system has rated more than 16,000 films since its birth in 1968. No mortal can claim perfection in such a vast, unending appraisal. But whatever errors can occur are of judgment; they are neither venal nor premeditated.

DP: I'm willing to accept that, though the bias for studio films is seemingly undeniable. I would and have suggested that even with an A rating, there will be disagreements. That I can live with. But again, right now, the system doesn't offer real options when it comes to films with non-pornographic adult content. I don't demand Euclidian geometry. I just want a world in which Eyes Wide Shut, without 5 CG covers of erection and labia-free sex, can be seen and have the opportunity to earn its $80 million. I would venture to guess that 95 percent of the audience that is going to pay to see it as an R would go to see it as an A and that anyone who found it offensive without the CG covers is finding it offensive as it is in theaters right now.

JV: 6. A few years ago, "60 Minutes" determined to test the reliability of the rating system. They recruited 11 people who matched the demographics of the rating board at that moment. They let the designated group view two films not yet released but previously appraised by the rating board. To the amazement of "60 Minutes," which aired the results, the mirror-rating board gave the films the very same ratings the real board did.

DP: The PG-13 doesn't need an overhaul. This is a small area of concern that must be addressed. For adults, not kids.

JV: 7. Ingenious producers have learned that if you bash the rating system, crying "censorship, stupidity, vacuity and just plain dumb," you gain a million dollars of free publicity by enticing the press to be manipulated into illuminating this "epiphany." Never fails.

DP: Uh, let's look at the huge box office successes in this regard. Hmmm. The Cook, The Thief, His Wife and Her Lover. Released unrated, I believe, by a Miramax spin-off company. That's about it. What did it do for South Park? Nothing. Orgazmo? Nothing. Happiness? Nothing. Henry & June? Nothing. Showgirls, which did just over $20 million? Nothing. Dogma? Nothing.

Now, do I think that some people try to use the conflict for free promotion? Absolutely. That doesn't mean that you don't have a problem.

JV: 8. In Hollywood, shibboleths about the rating system grow like kudzu. One scrawny canard is "the raters only care about sex and are easy on violence." This is so patently untrue. The fact is that the movies rated NC-17 for violence always undergo editing. All those films, by the director's own volition, not by any command of the rating board, make adjustments to get the R rating. Yet the canard, like rumor and gossip, never dies.

DP: I have three words for you: Saving Private Ryan.

A real problem movie as ratings go. The violence is as intense as has ever been photographed. On the other hand, this is a highly moral movie. Would it be an A or an R? Tough one. But not tough for the ratings board. How about Total Recall?

You know how this distinction grew, Jack? Movies like Coming Soon. Now, here you go. Collette Burson, the film's co-writer and director has spun the MPAA process for promotion. She's even telling everyone now that she has an NC-17, when a couple of months ago, she said she had cut for the R. Point for you. But the MPAA process forced her to remove a girl's fairly subtle reaction (I've seen it) to having her first orgasm in order to qualify for an R. You all may have forced a shot of Jason Biggs grinding bare-assed into a pie on his kitchen counter out of the R qualifying American Pie, but the displays of male sexuality in that film are a lot more overt than anything in Coming Soon. And there was nothing in Coming Soon that came within a country mile of the very tough nude-and-staked-to-the-ground-and-raped sequences in The General's Daughter. The work there was artfully done, but vicious and tough and enough to send many women running for the back door of the theater.

Like you say, these are real people. They are fallible. There are many subtle distinctions to be made. Fine. But that makes a system of "do what we say or you are banished to the ghetto of never earning your money back" truly troubling. When your drawing of lines really is the difference between being seen and never being seen, you have more responsibility than you take by always claiming, "We're just out here working for the parents."

JV: 9. It is a confirmable truth that people don't go to a theater to see a rating. No one wakes up in the morning and says, "Let's find an R movie to watch tonight." What they do say is "What entertaining movie is playing tonight?"

The voluntary movie rating system will be 31 years old on Nov. 1. Nothing lasts that long in this brutish, virulent marketplace unless it is providing some benefit to the people it aims to serve - in this case, the parents of America. As LBJ used to say, "Any jackass can kick a barn down, but it takes a damn good carpenter to build one."

DP: I couldn't have said it any better, Jack. Well, maybe I'll take a trick from your first paragraph and just change a few words. Any jackass can kick a movie into oblivion by tagging it with a rating that is a commercial death sentence, but it takes a damn good MPAA chief to build a system that allows for films that kids shouldn't see to have some chance to thrive, based on each film's own merits.

And by the way, happy birthday, MPAA. Your wrinkles are showing, but a nip and a tuck can fix it. Your doctor just has to be willing to do the procedure.

E ME: Sorry, no room for ROTD today. What do you think?