From: cramer@optilink.UUCP (Clayton Cramer)
Newsgroups: rec.arts.movies,rec.arts.books
Subject: Re: BOOK: Hollywood vs. America by Michael Medved
Date: 4 Nov 92 21:15:59 GMT
Organization: Optilink Corporation, Petaluma, CA

In article <1992Nov3.223136.10635@cs.ucla.edu>, reiher@ficus.cs.ucla.edu (Peter Reiher) writes:
> In article <13044@optilink.UUCP> cramer@optilink.UUCP (Clayton Cramer) writes:
> >In article <1992Oct30.182559.23340@cs.ucla.edu>, reiher@ficus.cs.ucla.edu (Peter Reiher) writes:
> >> In article <13003@optilink.UUCP> cramer@optilink.UUCP (Clayton Cramer) writes:
# ## #As for flag-burning -- it's one of the most effective ways for a
# ## #liberal to discredit himself.  Why would I interfere with a person
# ## #shooting themselves in the foot?
# ## 
# ## Well, I can't see why, either, though why it discredits someone isn't
# ## clear to me.  But a hell of a lot of other people on the right want
# ## a constitutional amendment, no less, to prevent this.  I don't hear
# #
# #They do?  George Will wrote a column about this: "Leave Mr. Madison's
# #handiwork alone."
# 
# Did Jesse Helms see the light as a result of this column, or is he still
# in favor of the anti-flagburning amendment?  Or is he, by your definitions,

I don't know.  I don't even know for sure what Helms supported on this
issue.

# a liberal?  Mr. Will is a rather sensible conservative, and I have respect
# for many of his positions.  Would that all of the right in this country
# had a similar respect for the Constitution.   For that matter, would that
# all the left, and the vast majority of those in the center, did, too.

Alas, the Constitution is just an annoying piece of paper to the
liberals that run this country.
 
# ## many liberals piping in about how good this amendment is, nor even
# ## demanding an amendment to prevent the burning of the flags of Communist
# ## countries.
# #
# #You weren't on USENET at the time, were you?  The people arguing
# #for it on USENET were liberals, like Paul Raveling.  (He may well
# #have come to his senses, eventually).
# 
# I've only been posting to various net newsgroups for about 12 years, now.
# Assuming the discussion you're talking about was since then, I must
# have missed it, since I don't follow all newsgroups.  I have never
# heard of a self-proclaimed liberal taking this position before.  I have
# heard of a lot of cowardly centrists caving in on it, and a lot of
# right wing types (led by President Bush) who thought it was a mighty fine
# idea.

How could right wing types be led by President Bush?  Bush is, at
best, a moderate.  *I* am a right-wing type.  I believe that the
government should operate under the Constitution.  That means that
you have a right to burn flags as a form of free speech.  I don't
think you've ever met a right-winger -- there are almost none left
in California.

# ## #It was "voluntary" only because the threat was government censorship.
# ## 
# ## The real threat was not national censorship, but city, state, and county
# ## censorship.  The nightmare for the studios was not that the government
# ## would tell them what they could and couldn't show, but that they might
# ## have to produce a couple hundred different versions of each film to 
# ## satisfy the desires of various censorship boards.  
# #
# #Yet, the film studios were quite willing to produce at least two
# #versions of many films, at the time: one version with black performers
# #edited out.  Clearly, there was no ideological opposition to this.
# 
# There is a big difference between 2 and 20, and a big difference between
# 20 and 200, and a big difference between 200 and 2000.  Producing 2
# versions of a film was economically feasible, particularly since it
# was easy to determine which parts of the country would want which versions.
# With state and local censorship boards, who knows how many versions you'd
# need, or where to send them?  If some granny on a film board in Detroit
# decides that films showing dogs dying are unfit to be seen, will you
# need a version of "Old Yeller" where the dog doesn't die?  If a bluenose
# in Omaha decides that more than 5 kisses in a film are indecent, are you
# going to keep track of that fact in all your films, or are you going to
# make a separate Omaha cut?  What if some film board in an anti-Catholic
# area of the country doesn't like the favorable treatment of priests in
# "Going My Way"?  What'll you do when the Boston Censorship board tells
# you that showing a gangster with a lot of money is a dangerous incitement
# making children take up a life of crime?  How about if the Tennessee
# censorship board decides that the Frankenstein monster is a thinly
# disguised version of evolutionism, and must not be shown on screen?
# What's to be done if the Seattle censors determine that you must never
# show anyone hit by a bullet?

So it was only a pragmatic objection that the film studios had to
censorship.

# ## One thing worth remembering is that this
# ## "voluntary" code was imposed by the studios on the creative artists
# ## who made the films, and those artists were never consulted.  Their statements,
# ## at the time and since, make it clear that they were largely against this
# ## code.  (To be fair, many of them were against the specific provisions of
# ## the code, and not necessarily against the concept of a code.)
# #
# #You just agreed with me in concept, though not in detail.
# 
# No, I didn't.  Many, though not all, filmmakers of the 30's and 40's 
# probably would have agreed that some form of restraint was necessary.
# They probably would have prefered their own personal self restraint, 
# but, in principle, they might have accepted a code.  However, any such
# code invariably proves more or less restrictive, and would have caused
# more or less unhappiness in artists.  The current system, which, 
# theoretically, censors nothing causes unhappiness because, in practice,
# NC-17 films are unreleasable - not because people won't go to see them,
# but for other reasons.  Abel Ferraro, Louis Malle, Jean-Pierre Annaud,

WHY are they unreleaseable?  There's no censorship.

# and several others have been complaining about the system just in the
# past few months.  My own preference is to leave the artists alone and
# let the marketplace decide.  Gee, that sounds sort of conservative, 
# doesn't it?  If Mr. Medved and Mr. Cramer believe that the studios are
# foisting garbage on the American people that they don't want to see,
# why don't they accept the classic conservative principle of letting
# the market determine what's best?

I certainly wouldn't suggest anything different.  But anytime that
I, or anyone else suggests the use of boycott, the liberals start
screaming, "Censorship!"
 
# #This comes down to a rather important question about good storytelling:
# #are snapping fingers, dismembered limbs, and explicit sex necessary
# #to tell a story well?  Now, I will agree that there are films where
# #these components may be necessary, and I am not at all comfortable
# #with the extremes of the Hayes or Breen Codes -- but for every movie
# #I've seen where something had to be explicit to tell the story well,
# #I've seen a dozen films where gratuitous violence, sex, or both,
# #were added just to drag in the teens.
# 
# This is a true point - much of what people find offensive in modern films
# is truly gratuitous.  The films would not be much the worse, and sometimes
# would be better, without it.  The number of films that show scenes of
# naked women for no particular reason, or that show graphic violence for
# no reason other than to pump up the film, is quite high.  In certain cases,
# of course, that's exactly the point - the film is violent because the
# film's attraction is to show violence; the sexual content is explicit
# because the point of the film is to show explicit sexual content.  Such
# films go on making money, because people want to see them.  And there are
# the other films, where such elements are vitally important.  My feeling is
# that I'm not willing to censor the worst for fear of destroying the best.

Who is supporting censorship?  I have repeatedly pointed to the value
of boycott.

# 		Peter Reiher


-- 
Clayton E. Cramer {uunet,pyramid}!optilink!cramer  My opinions, all mine!
October is National Quality Month.  That's why we wait until the first
Tuesday in November for national elections.