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Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf (2 Disk Special Edition): Commentary by Mike Nichols

Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf (2 Disk Special Edition): Commentary by Mike Nichols. Dir. Mike Nichols. Perf. Elizabeth Taylor, Richard Burton. DVD. Warner Home Video, 2006. The commentary track on the special edition DVD provides perhaps the most insightful perspective of the film as far as the on-set culture and interactions that occurred daily during the production of the film. Nichols gives a very in depth explanation of each scene, which includes filming techniques, lighting issues, relationships between actors and cameramen, as well as script censorship issues. For instance, Nichols explains how the studio forced them to change the explicative used by Martha as George opens the front door to greet the arriving guests. It was Nichols first feature film and was much different than the documentary style he was used to working with. It was very interesting to hear about the different challenges that the crew faced depending on the scene. Nichols also explains some of the back and forth battle that occurred between himself and the playwright Edward Albee as they attempted to adopt the Broadway play to the big screen. It is a valuable resource for examining the mindset of the filmmakers as they challenged the PCA in order to present the film as the artist intended.

tagged code film jack movies valenti woolf virginia production pca mpaa by gthurst ...on 15-APR-08

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This Film is Not Yet Rated

This Film is Not Yet Rated. Dir. Kirby Dick. Perf. Kirby Dick, Jack Valenti, Kimberly Pierce, Alison Anders, and John Waters. IFC, Netflix, and BBC, 2006. This Film Is Not Yet Rated is an independent documentary film about the Motion Picture Association of America's rating system. It is an in-depth discussion about the current rating system, adopted under Jack Valenti's tenure as president of the MPAA, and attempts to challenge the system as unfair to the artists and filmmakers of independent films. The main argument is that the review board of the MPAA is an unfair representation of the general public and that often times filmmakers receive unfair ratings that cost them millions of dollars in studio funding and box office sales. It shows how an NC-17 rating can be a dreaded rating to receive to filmmakers because it often means that the release of their film is doomed to fail. It also attempts to derive trends in the rating system that implies unfair judgments including: homophobia, female pleasure, and certain sexual movements. Criticizing the reasoning behind these trends, Kirby points out the fact that violence in films is not poorly received by the board and often skates by without scolding. This documentary is an excellent examination of the current rating system and begs the question of whether the MPAA is just a tool for serving the big budget studios rather than protecting the public from inappropriate content.

tagged censorship code jack movies woolf virginia valenti mpaa by gthurst ...on 15-APR-08

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Hollywood V. Hardcore: How the Struggle Over Censorship Saved the Modern Film Industry

Lewis, John. Hollywood V. Hardcore: How the Struggle Over Censorship Saved the Modern Film Industry. New York and London: New York UP, 2000. 135-191.

Chapter 4, titled Hollywood v. Soft Core, examines arguably the most influential year of film censorship to date. In this year, MPAA president Jack Valenti issued a press release to stating that a new production code/ move rating system would be put into place. The same system is still used today to rate films. The chapter does a good job of outlining the events of how this code came into place. The author explains how the "Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf" was denied by the PCA but began production anyway, anticipating that change was to come. It talks about the controversy over the language such as "screw" and "hump the hostess" were debated and the issues Valenti faced with content regulation. In the end of the meeting, Warner Brothers appealed the PCA's preliminary ruling to deny Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf and the film was released. Because of the films amazing success, it marked a point in history where the industry was beginning to understand that the Production Code was a dated system. The film was released with a warning stating "for adults only" and ranked third in the box office list in 1966 behind two other mature-themed pictures. This chapter is very useful and entertaining in its explanation of the pressures and challenges that Valenti faced when negotiating the new rating system. It offers a very in depth perspective and takes the reader on a film by film journey of the controversy.

tagged censorship woolf virginia valenti jack movies mpaa production pca film code by gthurst ...on 15-APR-08

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Play Into Film: Warner Brothers' "Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf?"

This journal article focuses on the challenges of adopting the Broadway play into a feature film. It gives details about screen treatment of the drama's action, setting, and language. A lot of insight is offered about Nichols' vision for the play v. Lehman’s. This mostly stems from the pressures of the industry standards that Lehman was under v. Nichols' desire to be true to Albee's original work. Nichol's was not an experienced filmmaker but he trusted in Albee's vision and never tried to be an artist and offer an alternate interpretation of the script. Leff goes into detail about scenes that Lehman wanted to add but later removed from the script. Leonard’s take on the adaptation is very insightful and refreshing. Lehman apparently did his best to make comprehension of the film easier for audiences because he feared that many would miss the subtle underlying themes present in the play. One of the most interesting issues faced on the set was whether to include the bedroom scene and how they would present it to a moviegoer audience..

tagged censorship code jack mpaa valenti by gthurst ...on 15-APR-08

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Jack Valenti, Confidant of Presidents and Stars, Dies At 85

This article gives a fairly good description of the life of Jack Valenti, who arguably had more power over the motion picture industry than anyone who ever lived. Paragraphs 9 through 16 are particularly useful for formulating a perspective on the era in which Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf was released. It explains how there was a compromise in which three out of four vulgarisms were cut. It also gives credit to the film Blowup for using Woolf's momentum to cause its own controversy with brief nudity and sexual themes. Fearing that censorship power might return to the individual states, Valenti acted,” I knew I had to move swiftly, and I did,” he later recalled. “I was determined to free the screen from anything like the Hays Code. But I also emphasized that freedom demanded responsibility.” Some interesting notes are the fact that the movie Gremlins inspired Valenti to add a PG-13 rating to the initial rating system. Also, the X rating was changed to NC-17. The author then touches on one of the downfalls of Valenti's rating system, "distributors have mostly spurned [NC-17 ratings] for commercial reasons, leaving many filmmakers to make wrenching cuts to adult-themed films in pursuit of an R rating." This explains some of the controversy over the rating system that still goes on today. The rest of the article continues to elaborate on his incredible life but is less valuable for examining film censorship.

tagged censorship film jack mpaa valenticode valenti pca movies by gthurst ...on 15-APR-08

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The Censorship Papers: Movie Censorship Letters From the Hays Office, 1934 to 7968

Gardner, Gerald. The Censorship Papers: Movie Censorship Letters From the Hays Office, 1934 to 7968. New York: Dodd, Mead & Company, 1987. 198-200.This part of Chapter 17, Dramas From Broadway, offers a very informative look at the process of the PCA when reviewing the script of Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf. It tells of the meeting between Jack L. Warner and chief censor Geoffrey Shurlock. After reading a copy of the play by Edward Albee the censor gave a list of all of the explicatives and phrases that would be considered unacceptable by the PCA, which the chapter lists completely. This is a great example of the strictness of the PCA and its discretion towards strong language and sexual themes. When the film was actually made, many of these phrases are omitted or altered. The chapter goes on to explain how the Warner Brother's film held faithful to the Albee play. It was denied by the PCA and was appealed to the MPAA board. The chapter then lists the reasons why the MPAA decided to release the film after all. The reasons were: The film was not designed to be prurient; Warner Brothers has taken the position that no person under eighteen will be admitted unless accompanied by a parent, and that the exemption does not mean that the floodgates are open for language or other material. This chapter is very useful for getting an inside look at the appeal process of the time and the drastic exceptions made on behalf of who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf.

tagged censorship code film movies woolf valenti pca mpaa jack by gthurst ...on 15-APR-08

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Ratings History: How it All Began / Jack Valenti

Valenti, Jack. "Ratings History: How it All Began". Motion Picture Association of America Online. <http://www.mpaa.org/Ratings_HowItAllBegan.asp>.

This article, written by former president of the MPAA Jack Valenti, details how the MPAA film rating system was conceived. He describes the turbulent national scene in 1966 – women’s rights, civil rights, youth protests, and “crumbling of social traditions.” Since he realized that a “new kind of American movie” was being made by filmmakers with a much more open course of dialogue between the filmmaker and the viewer, filmmakers felt they were subject to fewer restraints and restrictions, simply exercising the will of the people. The Hays Code had been continually challenged through loopholes over the years and the emerging counter-culture seemed determined to throw it out altogether. He describes one instance where MGM tried to market the first major studio picture with nudity, which was denied by the PCA of California. The Supreme Court ruled in 1968 that states could constitutionally prevent children from seeing films but not adults. Filmmakers were becoming more brazen and thus, bad language and controversial images were becoming more common. Ultimately, the rating system had to be created in 1968 to take the place of the now-defunct Hays Code.

This is relevant to Sweet Sweetback’s Baadasssss Song because of the way it was marketed, rated, and ultimately distributed. The film received an X rating “by an all-whyte jury” (according to the film’s opening credits), which went along with the pornographic pretence director Melvin Van Peebles created during production in order to avoid trouble on the set of his controversial film. The rating system was still in its infancy in 1971 when the film was released and thus, many changes in the system were still being implemented. In 1970, the minimum age of admission to R-rated movies was raised from 15 to 16 while X-rated films remained at 17. The audience limitations set by this new system made it even harder for Van Peebles to get exhibitors to play his racy, independent film at first. Of course, the rampant success of the film changed all that, but the historical cinematic context in which Sweetback was released made its initial opening and distribution much tougher. Now, filmmaker's consider it a curse if their film receives the NC-17 rating (replacement for X), since very few papers advertise NC-17-rated films. Sweetback was the shining example of this and this article helps show the impact of the initial X-rating. The film’s rating has since been changed to R.

belongs to Sweet Sweetback's Baadasssss Song project

tagged 1968 film mpaa ratings valenti x-rated by amagnes ...on 10-APR-08