Film Censorship

Film Censorship

Author: Sheri Chinen Biesen

Publisher: Columbia University Press

Published: 2018-08-28

Total Pages: 268

ISBN-13: 0231851138

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Film Censorship is a concise overview of Hollywood censorship and efforts to regulate American films. It provides a lean introductory survey of U.S. cinema censorship from the pre-Code years and classic studio system Golden Age—in which film censorship thrived—to contemporary Hollywood. From the earliest days of cinema, movies faced controversy over screen images and threats of censorship. This volume draws extensively on primary research from motion picture archives to unveil the fascinating behind-the-scenes history of cinema censorship and explore how Hollywood responded to censorial constraints on screen content in a changing American cultural and industrial landscape. This primer on American film censorship considers the historical evolution of motion-picture censorship in the United States spanning the Jazz Age Prohibition era, lobbying by religious groups against Hollywood, industry self-censorship for the Hays Office, federal propaganda efforts during wartime, easing of regulation in the 1950s and 1960s, the MPAA ratings system, and the legacy of censorship in later years. Case studies include The Outlaw, The Postman Always Rings Twice, Scarface, Double Indemnity, Psycho, Bonnie and Clyde, Midnight Cowboy, and The Exorcist, among many others.


Dirty Words and Filthy Pictures

Dirty Words and Filthy Pictures

Author: Jeremy Geltzer

Publisher: University of Texas Press

Published: 2016-01-04

Total Pages: 385

ISBN-13: 1477307435

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Boxing, porn, and the beginnings of movie censorship -- The rise of salacious cinema -- State regulations emerge -- Mutual and the capacity for evil -- War, nudity, and birth control -- Self-regulation reemerges -- Midnight movies and sanctioned cinema -- Sound enters the debate -- Tension increases between free speech and state censorship -- Threats from abroad and domestic disturbances -- Outlaws and miracles -- State censorship statutes on the defense -- Devil in the details : film and the Fourth and Fifth Amendments -- Dirty words : profanity and the patently offensive -- Filthy pictures : obscenity from nudie cuties to fetish films -- The porno chic : from Danish loops to Deep throat -- Just not here : content regulation through zoning -- Is censorship necessary? -- The politics of profanity


Hollywood Censored

Hollywood Censored

Author: Gregory D. Black

Publisher: Cambridge University Press

Published: 1994

Total Pages: 354

ISBN-13: 9780521565929

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After a series of sex scandals rocked the film industry in 1922, movie moguls hired Will Hays to clear the image of movies. Hays tried a variety of ways to regulate movies before adopting what became known as the production code. Written in 1930 by a St Louis priest, the code stipulated that movies stress proper behaviour, respect for government, and 'Christian values'. The Catholic Church reinforced these efforts by launching its Legion of Decency in 1934. Intended to force Hays and Hollywood to censor films, the Legion of Decency engineered the appointment of Joseph Breen as head of the Production Code Administration. For the next three decades, Breen, Hays, and the Catholic Legion of Decency virtually controlled the content of all Hollywood films.


Silencing Cinema

Silencing Cinema

Author: D. Biltereyst

Publisher: Springer

Published: 2013-03-26

Total Pages: 467

ISBN-13: 1137061987

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Oppression by censorship affects the film industry far more frequently than any other mass media. Including essays by leading film historians, the book offers groundbreaking historical research on film censorship in major film production countries and explore such innovative themes as film censorship and authorship, religion, and colonialism.


Film Censorship in America

Film Censorship in America

Author: Jeremy Geltzer

Publisher: McFarland

Published: 2017-11-28

Total Pages: 245

ISBN-13: 1476630127

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Since the first films played in nickelodeons, controversial movies have been cut or banned across the United States. Far from Hollywood, regional productions such as Oscar Micheaux's provocative race films and Nell Shipman's wildlife adventures were censored by men like Major M.L.C. Funkhouser, the terror of Chicago's cinemas, and Myrtelle Snell, the Alabama administrator who made the slogan "Banned in Birmingham" famous. Censorship continues today, with Utah's case against Deadpool (2016) pending in federal court and Robert Rodriguez's Machete Kills (2013) versus the Texas Film Commission. This authoritative state-by-state account covers the history of film censorship and the battle for free speech in America.


Better Left Unsaid

Better Left Unsaid

Author: Nora Gilbert

Publisher: Stanford University Press

Published: 2013-01-09

Total Pages: 202

ISBN-13: 0804784876

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Better Left Unsaid is in the unseemly position of defending censorship from the central allegations that are traditionally leveled against it. Taking two genres generally presumed to have been stymied by the censor's knife—the Victorian novel and classical Hollywood film—this book reveals the varied ways in which censorship, for all its blustery self-righteousness, can actually be good for sex, politics, feminism, and art. As much as Victorianism is equated with such cultural impulses as repression and prudery, few scholars have explored the Victorian novel as a "censored" commodity—thanks, in large part, to the indirectness and intangibility of England's literary censorship process. This indirection stands in sharp contrast to the explicit, detailed formality of Hollywood's infamous Production Code of 1930. In comparing these two versions of censorship, Nora Gilbert explores the paradoxical effects of prohibitive practices. Rather than being ruined by censorship, Victorian novels and Hays Code films were stirred and stimulated by the very forces meant to restrain them.


Irish Film Censorship

Irish Film Censorship

Author: Kevin Rockett

Publisher: Four Courts Press

Published: 2004

Total Pages: 552

ISBN-13:

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This book maps the history of Irish film censorship from its origins in the 1910s, through to the all-encompassing Censorship of Films Act 1923, the more liberal implementation of screening policies from the late 1960s onwards, and present-day concerns about media proliferation and distribution. Its main focus is on the 1920-70 period, when Irish film censors banned 3,000 films and cut an additional 10,000. The role of political censorship and its effect on television and cinema is examined, as are the more contemporary issues of video classification and debates around the internet and child pornography. Through the examination of over 18,000 of the censors decisions, Kevin Rockett provides an invaluable insight into the cultural geography of Ireland. - Choice Outstanding Academic Title 2005


Movie Censorship and American Culture

Movie Censorship and American Culture

Author: Francis G. Couvares

Publisher: Univ of Massachusetts Press

Published: 2006

Total Pages: 356

ISBN-13: 9781558495753

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From the earliest days of public outrage over "indecent" nickelodeon shows, Americans have worried about the power of the movies. The eleven essays in this book examine nearly a century of struggle over cinematic representations of sex, crime, violence, religion, race, and ethnicity, revealing that the effort to regulate the screen has reflected deep social and cultural schisms. In addition to the editor, contributors include Daniel Czitrom, Marybeth Hamilton, Garth Jowett, Charles Lyons, Richard Maltby, Charles Musser, Alison M. Parker, Charlene Regester, Ruth Vasey, and Stephen Vaughn. Together they make it clear that censoring the movies is more than just a reflex against "indecency," however defined. Whether censorship protects the vulnerable or suppresses the creative, it is part of a broader culture war that breaks out recurrently as Americans try to come to terms with the market, the state, and the plural society in which they live.


The Miracle Case

The Miracle Case

Author: Laura Wittern-Keller

Publisher:

Published: 2008

Total Pages: 256

ISBN-13:

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Examines the Supreme Court's unanimous 1952 decision in favor of a film exhibitor who had been denied a license to show the controversial Italian film, Il Miracolo. The ruling was a watershed event in the history of film censorship, ushering in a new era of mature--and sophisticated--American filmmaking.