You'll hear a lot about Jack Valenti in the coming days. He was in the motorcade in which JFK was killed. He was a Presidential aide to two US Presidents. He was the head of the MPAA, the Motion Pictures Association of America, who rates the films made in Hollywood and released in America. In fact, Valenti developed the ratings system (G, PG, R, X, etc.) which has seen only minor changes since the 1960s.
That's the problem.
If you've seen any movies in the past, oh, 30-40 years - and I'm assuming you have - then you've likely realized how many of them ended up with restrictive ratings - X, NC-17, etc. - for sexual conduct and/or content. And you should have noticed how many of them got far more lenient ratings regardless of their brutality and violence.
If these things didn't occur to you, you owe it to yourself to see the IFC movie, This Film is Not Yet Rated. In fact, the ratings system is undergoing some serious changes thanks to this fantastic documentary. I hate to say it, but I do have to wonder if this documentary didn't help him get that other foot in the grave.
And I don't mean that jokingly. Valenti appears in the film and is very upset and very vocal about its worthlessness. He was one of these Old School cats who believed what he believed and wouldn't bend - and you know what they say about trees like that: they break.
But don't get the wrong idea from me; I didn't know Valenti personally and I don't have anything against him aside from his being a lobbyist and the information I learned from the documentary. I remember when there was a movement for the "A" rating - a rating specifically for movies and music depicting horror, gore, and violence - in order to separate them from sexually explicit content, which would keep the X (and XXX). It never got far.
In case you didn't know, there are some pretty bizarre "rules" the MPAA followed - most of which don't make any real sense outside of the system. A full-frontal nudity scene of Sean Penn had to be cut for Fast Times at Ridgemont High to get its rating; full-frontal male nudity alone could get most films an X or NC-17 rating. Midnight Cowboy, released in 1969, was the first movie to receive the X rating and also won an Academy Award for Best Picture. This so embarrassed the MPAA that it downgraded that to an R without cuts.
Jack Valenti was 85. Our condolences to his friends and family.
That's the problem.
If you've seen any movies in the past, oh, 30-40 years - and I'm assuming you have - then you've likely realized how many of them ended up with restrictive ratings - X, NC-17, etc. - for sexual conduct and/or content. And you should have noticed how many of them got far more lenient ratings regardless of their brutality and violence.
If these things didn't occur to you, you owe it to yourself to see the IFC movie, This Film is Not Yet Rated. In fact, the ratings system is undergoing some serious changes thanks to this fantastic documentary. I hate to say it, but I do have to wonder if this documentary didn't help him get that other foot in the grave.
And I don't mean that jokingly. Valenti appears in the film and is very upset and very vocal about its worthlessness. He was one of these Old School cats who believed what he believed and wouldn't bend - and you know what they say about trees like that: they break.
But don't get the wrong idea from me; I didn't know Valenti personally and I don't have anything against him aside from his being a lobbyist and the information I learned from the documentary. I remember when there was a movement for the "A" rating - a rating specifically for movies and music depicting horror, gore, and violence - in order to separate them from sexually explicit content, which would keep the X (and XXX). It never got far.
In case you didn't know, there are some pretty bizarre "rules" the MPAA followed - most of which don't make any real sense outside of the system. A full-frontal nudity scene of Sean Penn had to be cut for Fast Times at Ridgemont High to get its rating; full-frontal male nudity alone could get most films an X or NC-17 rating. Midnight Cowboy, released in 1969, was the first movie to receive the X rating and also won an Academy Award for Best Picture. This so embarrassed the MPAA that it downgraded that to an R without cuts.
Jack Valenti was 85. Our condolences to his friends and family.
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