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SYSK’s Summer Movie Playlist: How the MPAA Works · Stuff You Should Know

• 0:01
  Speaker 1: Hey, everybody, chuck here for another summer movie playlist feed drop.
• 0:07
  Speaker 1: Today we're going to be covering how the MPAA works,
• 0:10
  Speaker 1: and this is from June twenty fourteen, and it delves
• 0:13
  Speaker 1: into the ins and outs of the MPAA and how
• 0:16
  Speaker 1: they decide on rating movies because it's sort of a
• 0:19
  Speaker 1: dark art as far as we're concerned.
• 0:21
  Speaker 2: So check it out. Welcome to Stuff you should know
• 0:25
  Speaker 2: from HowStuffWorks dot com.
• 0:32
  Speaker 3: Hey, and welcome to the podcast. I'm Josh Clark. There's
• 0:35
  Speaker 3: Charles W Chuck, Bryant, Jerry.
• 0:37
  Speaker 2: But where's Waldough right over there?
• 0:41
  Speaker 3: Apparently?
• 0:42
  Speaker 2: Man, I wish people could hear the in between stuff.
• 0:45
  Speaker 3: I think Jerry was recording that last one.
• 0:48
  Speaker 2: Oh yeah, I think so. She used to give us
• 0:50
  Speaker 2: a neat little outtakes, but she doesn't do that anymore.
• 0:54
  Speaker 2: Those days are long gone. They exist in the vault though.
• 0:57
  Speaker 3: How you doing? Not good?
• 1:00
  Speaker 2: No?
• 1:00
  Speaker 3: No, I don't know what's wrong with me. I am
• 1:03
  Speaker 3: off today? Out of your game? Yeah, it's weird.
• 1:07
  Speaker 2: Well, I think this is the perfect podcast to set
• 1:09
  Speaker 2: you straight.
• 1:10
  Speaker 3: Why, because it's.
• 1:11
  Speaker 2: Something that we both have some passion about against.
• 1:16
  Speaker 3: Yeah, I think anybody who's seen the documentary this film
• 1:21
  Speaker 3: is not yet rated. Yeah, that would be very difficult
• 1:25
  Speaker 3: to not be persuaded to feel strongly about the MPAA
• 1:31
  Speaker 3: and its practices.
• 1:33
  Speaker 2: Yeah, and at least how they do things.
• 1:35
  Speaker 3: But we're going to try to be objective.
• 1:37
  Speaker 2: Yeah, I'm going to go ahead and say up front,
• 1:39
  Speaker 2: I have no problem with rating of film's content, so
• 1:44
  Speaker 2: parents can decide whether or not it's appropriate. I think
• 1:46
  Speaker 2: it's valuable, but I think there are ways to do
• 1:49
  Speaker 2: it that I don't think the MPa does. Yes, So
• 1:53
  Speaker 2: I just wanted to float that early on.
• 1:56
  Speaker 3: Okay, I think that was probably smart. Okay, Okay, I
• 2:01
  Speaker 3: don't have kids, so I don't really whatever, But I
• 2:05
  Speaker 3: mean I can understand the value of that kind of thing.
• 2:07
  Speaker 2: Yeah, but it gives you an idea, Like I like
• 2:10
  Speaker 2: having an idea what I'm about to see too.
• 2:11
  Speaker 3: I feel like I can tell just from watching a
• 2:14
  Speaker 3: trailer of previewsing a movie poster. I'm pretty I'm pretty
• 2:20
  Speaker 3: intuitive when it comes to the marketing techniques of movies.
• 2:25
  Speaker 2: Yeah, but I think like being a film nerd, it's like,
• 2:30
  Speaker 2: is the New uh? Is the New Avengers movie going
• 2:33
  Speaker 2: to be rated? R? That really tells you something.
• 2:36
  Speaker 3: Right, it won't be no it never would be because.
• 2:38
  Speaker 2: PG thirteen is the the that's the strike zone these.
• 2:41
  Speaker 3: Days, it really is. Apparently PG thirteen movies pull in
• 2:45
  Speaker 3: more money than all other ratings combined. Yeah, and it's
• 2:49
  Speaker 3: a relatively new phenomenon. You want to talk about its origin, Yeah,
• 2:54
  Speaker 3: let's do it. So back in nineteen eighty four, a
• 2:57
  Speaker 3: man named Steven Spielberg had two movies out who Steven Spielberg? Right.
• 3:04
  Speaker 3: He directed one, Indiana Jones and the Templar Doom, and
• 3:08
  Speaker 3: he produced another, Gremlins. Yeah, and both of them he
• 3:13
  Speaker 3: caught a lot of heat from both of them.
• 3:15
  Speaker 2: Sure, Indiana Jones for the heart removal scene specifically.
• 3:18
  Speaker 3: Yeah, but also the snake, the live snake at the
• 3:22
  Speaker 3: feast thing yeah yeah, all the snake babies, the eyeballs,
• 3:26
  Speaker 3: all that stuff.
• 3:26
  Speaker 2: Yeah.
• 3:27
  Speaker 3: And then with Gremlins, it was just downright terrifying in
• 3:30
  Speaker 3: a lot of different places, especially if you're a kid.
• 3:33
  Speaker 3: And the reason he caught heat was because both of
• 3:35
  Speaker 3: those movies were rated PG. Yeah. And so Spielberg went
• 3:41
  Speaker 3: to the NPAA, the Motion Picture Association of America, and said,
• 3:47
  Speaker 3: let's do something about this, because these clearly aren't our movies. Yeah,
• 3:51
  Speaker 3: but they apparently aren't PG movies either, so maybe we
• 3:54
  Speaker 3: should come up with something in between. And PG thirteen
• 3:58
  Speaker 3: was born.
• 3:58
  Speaker 2: Yeah, and this was before he had all this way
• 4:03
  Speaker 2: in the world. He was influential, but it wasn't like
• 4:05
  Speaker 2: Spielberg today, who could have just waved his wand and
• 4:08
  Speaker 2: made it happen.
• 4:09
  Speaker 3: Yeah, but I think even at the time he was important.
• 4:12
  Speaker 3: He Yeah, there were very few directors at that time
• 4:16
  Speaker 3: who could have gotten something like that done too. So
• 4:20
  Speaker 3: that's where PG thirteen came from. And that, like you said,
• 4:24
  Speaker 3: that's the strike zone now. And the reason why is
• 4:26
  Speaker 3: because that is the kind of movie that caters to
• 4:31
  Speaker 3: young teenage boys, who apparently are the most successful at
• 4:36
  Speaker 3: getting girls to go to movies with them. So if
• 4:41
  Speaker 3: you can get a movie rated PG thirteen, you're going
• 4:46
  Speaker 3: to make a bunch of money.
• 4:48
  Speaker 2: Yeah. Plus it makes sense, it's right there in the middle. Yeah,
• 4:50
  Speaker 2: you know.
• 4:51
  Speaker 3: But the problem is is it's become a means of
• 4:54
  Speaker 3: almost advertising that rating rather than cautioning parents. It's a
• 4:59
  Speaker 3: way of attracting the audience. Yeah. True, it's like this
• 5:03
  Speaker 3: is in some kids PG movie. This is as close
• 5:05
  Speaker 3: to an R movie as you can get.
• 5:07
  Speaker 2: In Yeah, and I think filmmakers try to achieve that
• 5:10
  Speaker 2: rating by either scaling back their R rated movie or
• 5:14
  Speaker 2: juicing up their PG movie.
• 5:16
  Speaker 3: Or adding more violence. Apparently PG thirteen movies are have
• 5:23
  Speaker 3: tripled in violence over the last few decades. Yeah, and
• 5:29
  Speaker 3: they now have, according to one study, more violence than
• 5:32
  Speaker 3: there are rated counterparts.
• 5:34
  Speaker 2: Yeah, and different kinds of violence that you didn't used
• 5:37
  Speaker 2: to see.
• 5:38
  Speaker 3: Yeah.
• 5:38
  Speaker 2: You know, all right, I guess we should go back
• 5:41
  Speaker 2: in time a little bit. Let's is it way back machine?
• 5:44
  Speaker 3: Sure, let's go way back in time in Hollywood. All right,
• 5:54
  Speaker 3: it's nineteen twenty two.
• 5:55
  Speaker 2: Hollywood and Vine is a viable intersection in Hollywood at
• 5:59
  Speaker 2: the time. I'm unlike now, although people are going to say, no,
• 6:03
  Speaker 2: they built that area back up. Yeah, and that is
• 6:08
  Speaker 2: when the NPA was born in the early nineteen twenties.
• 6:10
  Speaker 3: Yeah.
• 6:11
  Speaker 2: And at the time, it was up to local authorities
• 6:14
  Speaker 2: or your state or your municipality to either stamp something
• 6:19
  Speaker 2: as moral or immoral. There were no ratings on movies.
• 6:24
  Speaker 2: And thanks to a guy named Will Hayes, who was
• 6:27
  Speaker 2: the first president of the MPa, he installed the Hayes
• 6:29
  Speaker 2: Code and said, you're either going to pass or fail.
• 6:34
  Speaker 2: It's either going to be stamped in moral or moral right.
• 6:36
  Speaker 3: And the reason Will Hayes, who is the MPAA president,
• 6:41
  Speaker 3: came up with the Hayes Code, which was really extensive. Yeah,
• 6:46
  Speaker 3: it was like, if you talk about the government, it
• 6:48
  Speaker 3: always has to be good, sexuality has to be like
• 6:53
  Speaker 3: repressed and just basically an hetero. How you think about
• 6:56
  Speaker 3: all movies from like the thirties and forties, Yeah, squeaky clean,
• 7:00
  Speaker 3: basically like the division between good and evil is very
• 7:04
  Speaker 3: clearly defined and the good guy always wins. And if
• 7:08
  Speaker 3: you didn't fall into that Hayes code, like you said,
• 7:10
  Speaker 3: your movie would be stamped immoral. But the whole reason
• 7:13
  Speaker 3: he came up with this code was because local municipalities
• 7:17
  Speaker 3: could pass their own obscenity laws and that could be
• 7:22
  Speaker 3: bad for business.
• 7:23
  Speaker 2: So is it not even get your film exhibited?
• 7:26
  Speaker 3: Right? So remember in the A c l U episode
• 7:29
  Speaker 3: where we're talking about that one, that one movie that
• 7:33
  Speaker 3: New York, just the Catholic said no, you can't show
• 7:36
  Speaker 3: that here, and the a cl went to work getting
• 7:38
  Speaker 3: getting the Catholics beaten in court.
• 7:41
  Speaker 2: Right, even though it was just a bad movie, had
• 7:44
  Speaker 2: something to do with well, I mean it did, but
• 7:46
  Speaker 2: it shouldn't have been shown because it was so terrible.
• 7:48
  Speaker 3: Was it bad? I don't remember.
• 7:50
  Speaker 2: Yeah, I mean it was supposed to be not very good.
• 7:52
  Speaker 3: Okay, but it happened like that kind of thing happened
• 7:55
  Speaker 3: a lot like local local town said we're not going
• 7:57
  Speaker 3: to show that movie. So Hayes figured out if if
• 7:59
  Speaker 3: Hollyoo policed itself, then they could control what, you know,
• 8:04
  Speaker 3: what movies came out, and therefore everybody could make a
• 8:07
  Speaker 3: bunch of money. That's right, And that's the point of
• 8:10
  Speaker 3: the NPAA. They're the lobbying arm of six major Hollywood studios.
• 8:16
  Speaker 2: Yeah, they work for them. Yeah, well, yeah, that's one
• 8:19
  Speaker 2: way to say it. But they and it's just those
• 8:22
  Speaker 2: six too, isn't it. Uh well, yeah, I mean you
• 8:26
  Speaker 2: there's definitely an argument these days that independent filmmakers have
• 8:29
  Speaker 2: a much rougher time with the MPAA. Yeah, but most
• 8:33
  Speaker 2: of the indies too, are eventually distributed by the majors.
• 8:36
  Speaker 3: Anyway, I got you. You know what I'm saying.
• 8:38
  Speaker 2: Okay, So flash forward a bit in our wayback machine
• 8:42
  Speaker 2: to the nineteen fifties. Things changed a little bit after
• 8:45
  Speaker 2: World War Two, and people, I guess the easiest way
• 8:49
  Speaker 2: to say it is people loosened up a little bit
• 8:51
  Speaker 2: and didn't mind certain elements in their entertainment any longer. Yes,
• 8:56
  Speaker 2: A big example this article uses Frank Sinatra got an
• 8:59
  Speaker 2: oscar nomen for playing a heroin Addict and the Man
• 9:03
  Speaker 2: with a Golden Arm. And that couldn't have happened in
• 9:06
  Speaker 2: the nineteen forties.
• 9:07
  Speaker 3: No, millions of people hadn't died in World War Two yet,
• 9:11
  Speaker 3: that's right. I imagine that kind of loosens you up
• 9:13
  Speaker 3: as far as the seeing Chris words and stuff in
• 9:17
  Speaker 3: movies goes.
• 9:18
  Speaker 2: Yeah, like that's not a big deal, Like World War
• 9:20
  Speaker 2: two is a big deal, right, get your haunches down exactly.
• 9:23
  Speaker 3: Yeah, that was the big one, the big first crack
• 9:27
  Speaker 3: to the Hayes code. Yeah, and then there were I
• 9:30
  Speaker 3: think that you said he won an oscar, right. Yeah.
• 9:33
  Speaker 3: It was a really good movie that kind of opened
• 9:35
  Speaker 3: the floodgate so that by the end of the fifties
• 9:37
  Speaker 3: you got some like it. Hot Tony Curtis and Jack
• 9:39
  Speaker 3: lemon are dressed like women hitting on Marilyn Monroe. Yeah,
• 9:43
  Speaker 3: and at that point it was pretty obvious the Hayes
• 9:47
  Speaker 3: code was dead. Yeah.
• 9:48
  Speaker 2: I mean, they weren't passing the code, but they were
• 9:50
  Speaker 2: still getting released. So once something is subverted like that,
• 9:53
  Speaker 2: it's it's dead in.
• 9:54
  Speaker 3: The water, right, So there was a that was fine
• 9:59
  Speaker 3: for a little while. I think the Hayes coach just
• 10:01
  Speaker 3: kind of fell to the wayside, and people were releasing
• 10:03
  Speaker 3: movies without any kind of moral or immoral stamp. But
• 10:06
  Speaker 3: the rating system as we understand it today hadn't come
• 10:09
  Speaker 3: about yet, so it's kind of a limbo period until
• 10:14
  Speaker 3: nineteen sixty eight and a store owner in New York
• 10:19
  Speaker 3: with the last name of Ginsburg got busted for selling
• 10:22
  Speaker 3: nudimags to sixteen year old boys, and he took it
• 10:25
  Speaker 3: all the way to the Supreme Court, saying, you can't
• 10:30
  Speaker 3: say anything about this. There's federal laws about upsnity, not
• 10:32
  Speaker 3: local laws. And the Supreme Court said, you know what,
• 10:35
  Speaker 3: we really think it's up to local municipalities to decide
• 10:39
  Speaker 3: what they want their miners exposed to or not. That
• 10:43
  Speaker 3: got Hollywood's attention because all of a sudden, local municipalities
• 10:47
  Speaker 3: could decide whether or not they wanted to show movies
• 10:50
  Speaker 3: to miners or not. So what was old became new again.
• 10:54
  Speaker 3: And Jack Valenti, who was in charge of the MPAA, said,
• 10:57
  Speaker 3: we need another system of self knowther self policing system,
• 11:01
  Speaker 3: and he came up with the rating system that we
• 11:04
  Speaker 3: have today.
• 11:04
  Speaker 2: Yeah, and he, I mean Jack Valenti was the head
• 11:08
  Speaker 2: of the NBA for close to forty years, and he
• 11:12
  Speaker 2: initially the intention was to stop censorship because he feared
• 11:16
  Speaker 2: that the movies were going to start being censored locally.
• 11:19
  Speaker 2: And so I think the origins of the MPA's rating
• 11:22
  Speaker 2: system were.
• 11:25
  Speaker 3: Art centered, art center, but also money centered, because again,
• 11:29
  Speaker 3: if you have if you have town A showing the movie,
• 11:34
  Speaker 3: but Town's B through L deciding that the movie is
• 11:36
  Speaker 3: obscene and not showing it, then you're losing that money
• 11:40
  Speaker 3: and B through L. So what Valenti came up with
• 11:43
  Speaker 3: was this idea that let us tell you what is
• 11:47
  Speaker 3: appropriate for minors or not, what movie is, and we'll
• 11:52
  Speaker 3: just make a simple rating system. Yeah, gpg R or
• 11:56
  Speaker 3: X the old X yeah.
• 11:59
  Speaker 2: And triple X. It wasn't even formally a rating, it
• 12:03
  Speaker 2: was just.
• 12:03
  Speaker 3: A marketing tool.
• 12:04
  Speaker 2: Yeah. Yeah, because three x'es that's like WHOA.
• 12:07
  Speaker 3: I wonder if anybody ever came out with one with
• 12:09
  Speaker 3: four X.
• 12:10
  Speaker 2: Yeah or double X even yeah, like we cut out
• 12:13
  Speaker 2: that one part so ta X uh. Yeah. Christian our
• 12:18
  Speaker 2: colleague here wrote a great blog post about the former
• 12:21
  Speaker 2: X rated movie.
• 12:22
  Speaker 3: Is that right? Yeah, we'll have to check that out.
• 12:24
  Speaker 3: It's good for brain stuff for stuff of genius.
• 12:27
  Speaker 2: On the brain Stuff blog earlier this year, and you
• 12:30
  Speaker 2: actually recommended it on your blog the X rating, yeah
• 12:34
  Speaker 2: the best I remember it this week.
• 12:36
  Speaker 3: Yeah, I remember recommending one of his things. I just
• 12:38
  Speaker 3: don't remember that one. It's good.
• 12:40
  Speaker 2: I thought about asking him in here, but then I thought, yeah,
• 12:42
  Speaker 2: we got it N So yeah, back then it was
• 12:45
  Speaker 2: G through X and well we'll talk about you know
• 12:49
  Speaker 2: how that changed maybe after this message break. All right,
• 12:57
  Speaker 2: so no longer do we have X rated movies? Now
• 12:59
  Speaker 2: we have something. I guess we should just go through
• 13:01
  Speaker 2: what these ratings mean today in twenty fourteen. Okay, so
• 13:06
  Speaker 2: you've got your G.
• 13:07
  Speaker 3: G's always been G general audience.
• 13:09
  Speaker 2: Anyone can see it, Yes, and that's your your family
• 13:13
  Speaker 2: cartoon that kids love and parents are forced to go to.
• 13:17
  Speaker 3: Right.
• 13:18
  Speaker 2: Then you've got PG that means no drug use, maybe
• 13:22
  Speaker 2: a little violence, because as we'll learn, the MPa has
• 13:26
  Speaker 2: less problems with violence and more problems with language and sex.
• 13:30
  Speaker 3: Huge criticism, huge criticism.
• 13:33
  Speaker 2: PG thirteen, which we've you know, kind of been through.
• 13:37
  Speaker 2: Then you've got your R and that is no one
• 13:39
  Speaker 2: under seven. This is a suggestion that no one over
• 13:41
  Speaker 2: seventeen be admitted without a parent. And these aren't laws though,
• 13:45
  Speaker 2: that's one thing that's important to point out. Those are suggestions.
• 13:49
  Speaker 2: And then theaters have policies.
• 13:51
  Speaker 3: Yes, it's let's kind of dig into that. So none
• 13:55
  Speaker 3: of this is legally binding. Now, none of them are
• 13:58
  Speaker 3: anything more than recommendation. And they're basically saying that this
• 14:02
  Speaker 3: movie has X amount of profanity or x amount of nudity,
• 14:08
  Speaker 3: or lacks any drug use or something like that. And
• 14:12
  Speaker 3: so for what the MPAA thinks the average moral compass
• 14:17
  Speaker 3: of the average American thinks about these different things like sex, drugs, nudity,
• 14:22
  Speaker 3: all that stuff, this movie falls into this rating. And
• 14:26
  Speaker 3: again it's not enforceable. You don't even need to have
• 14:29
  Speaker 3: a rating to release a movie. But if you want
• 14:31
  Speaker 3: to get your movie in theaters, there's basically no theater
• 14:35
  Speaker 3: chain out there right now, no major theater chain out
• 14:38
  Speaker 3: there right now that will show an unrated movie.
• 14:41
  Speaker 2: Yeah, it's a completely voluntary system to submit your film
• 14:45
  Speaker 2: to the MPa ratings board.
• 14:47
  Speaker 3: But it's de facto.
• 14:49
  Speaker 2: But you have to do it. Yeah, that's the rub
• 14:53
  Speaker 2: is that they say it's voluntary, but you actually have
• 14:55
  Speaker 2: to pay a fee to submit your movie if you
• 14:56
  Speaker 2: ever want to have it shown in theaters.
• 14:59
  Speaker 3: Right, is anywhere from like twenty five thousand dollars for
• 15:02
  Speaker 3: a big budget movie to seven hundred and fifty dollars
• 15:05
  Speaker 3: for a short. Yeah, and so you submit your movie. Well,
• 15:10
  Speaker 3: we'll get into it in a second. Let's talk some
• 15:12
  Speaker 3: more about the rest of the ratings.
• 15:13
  Speaker 2: Yeah, well there's only one more, and that's NC seventeen,
• 15:16
  Speaker 2: which replaced X. And that means this is in nineteen
• 15:19
  Speaker 2: ninety and that basically means that it's for adults only
• 15:23
  Speaker 2: and you should not come in if you're under eighteen.
• 15:26
  Speaker 3: Right, and also means these days it's foreign or about
• 15:30
  Speaker 3: lesbian or gays. Basically, yeah, not fully, but sure, it's
• 15:34
  Speaker 3: pretty close. Yeah, and NC seventeen. The first movie to
• 15:39
  Speaker 3: come out with that was Henry in June. Yeah, not
• 15:42
  Speaker 3: to be confused with Benny and June. And it basically
• 15:45
  Speaker 3: sunk that movie because everybody was like, oh, this is
• 15:49
  Speaker 3: X now, right, NC seventeen. If you jumble it all together,
• 15:53
  Speaker 3: it looks like X. And the whole reason they came
• 15:55
  Speaker 3: out with NC seventyeen was to replace X because X
• 15:58
  Speaker 3: was associated exclusively with pornography in the minds of moviegoers.
• 16:03
  Speaker 2: Yeah exactly, Yeah, all right, so let's get into this.
• 16:08
  Speaker 2: The actual ratings board. There's the MPAA, and then working
• 16:12
  Speaker 2: for the MPa is the classification and ratings administration Kara,
• 16:18
  Speaker 2: and Kara doesn't say whether your movie stinks or not.
• 16:23
  Speaker 2: Kara is eight to thirteen people, and they are called raiders,
• 16:27
  Speaker 2: and they are overseen by senior Raider, and they sit
• 16:30
  Speaker 2: down and watch these movies and take copious notes on
• 16:33
  Speaker 2: what they think based on their standards. Is I don't
• 16:38
  Speaker 2: want to say offensive, but just noteworthy, right, Like maybe
• 16:42
  Speaker 2: they're not offended, but they think the average mom and
• 16:45
  Speaker 2: sheboygan might be offended.
• 16:47
  Speaker 3: Right supposedly, which is a kind of a thing, because
• 16:50
  Speaker 3: the whole rating system, as you just kind of pointed out,
• 16:53
  Speaker 3: is a subjective.
• 16:56
  Speaker 2: Totally subjective. They supposedly. Here's the other rub is it's
• 17:01
  Speaker 2: all secret.
• 17:02
  Speaker 3: Right.
• 17:02
  Speaker 2: You can find out a federal judge's name and address,
• 17:06
  Speaker 2: but you can't find out who a raider is for
• 17:09
  Speaker 2: your films. It's all conducted in private. None of the
• 17:12
  Speaker 2: stuff is released and That's one of the big rubs
• 17:14
  Speaker 2: in that documentary and with filmmakers in general, is it's all,
• 17:19
  Speaker 2: you know, done behind closed doors. There's never any explanations provided.
• 17:23
  Speaker 2: These people are supposed to have kids between ages of
• 17:26
  Speaker 2: five and seventeen, but many of them do not, right,
• 17:29
  Speaker 2: either have kids at all or have kids that are
• 17:30
  Speaker 2: older than eighteen.
• 17:31
  Speaker 3: Yep.
• 17:34
  Speaker 2: It basically frees them up from any accountability. Yeah, to
• 17:38
  Speaker 2: do this all in private and in secrecy.
• 17:40
  Speaker 3: And until that movie by Kirby what is Kirby's last name?
• 17:45
  Speaker 3: Henry and June No no, the documentary.
• 17:49
  Speaker 2: Oh oh yeah, this film is not yet rated.
• 17:51
  Speaker 3: Yeah, until Kirby Dick's this film is not yet rated
• 17:56
  Speaker 3: came out, Like all of this stuff was just conjection
• 18:00
  Speaker 3: and conjecture in Hollywood legend. He was the first one
• 18:04
  Speaker 3: to really basically he tailed these people, tailed them to
• 18:07
  Speaker 3: lunch to find out who they were and eavesdrop on
• 18:10
  Speaker 3: them and like did some digging and found like these
• 18:14
  Speaker 3: anonymous people did not fall into the requirements that the
• 18:17
  Speaker 3: NPAA said they did. And so not only was it
• 18:21
  Speaker 3: in secret, it was it was fraudulent. Basically, this rating system.
• 18:28
  Speaker 3: So according to the standards, you submit your film. This
• 18:33
  Speaker 3: group of people, this anonymous group of people, watch it,
• 18:36
  Speaker 3: they rate it, then they come together and vote on
• 18:39
  Speaker 3: a rating, and then they passed their their vote along
• 18:44
  Speaker 3: to a senior raider. Yeah, who talks to the movie's
• 18:46
  Speaker 3: distributor or director or producer says, here's the rating, here's
• 18:49
  Speaker 3: why we rated it like this, and then your face
• 18:53
  Speaker 3: with a choice. You can accept the rating. You can
• 18:58
  Speaker 3: edit your film as per the CI's recommendations.
• 19:03
  Speaker 2: Take out these bad words, cut the sex scene a
• 19:06
  Speaker 2: little early, leave all the violence.
• 19:08
  Speaker 3: Yeah. Or you can reject the rating and just release
• 19:13
  Speaker 3: your movie is unrated.
• 19:15
  Speaker 2: Yeah, which, well, you can try to release it, but
• 19:19
  Speaker 2: since no one will show it, it's really sort of
• 19:20
  Speaker 2: a misnomer.
• 19:22
  Speaker 3: Right, but it's becoming increasingly a thing again. You need
• 19:27
  Speaker 3: the rating to get your movie shown in movie theaters. Yeah,
• 19:30
  Speaker 3: But what happens if you don't care if your movie
• 19:32
  Speaker 3: comes out in theaters, video on demand, yeah, or just
• 19:35
  Speaker 3: releasing it to the internet.
• 19:37
  Speaker 2: Now, I'm curious about that. How that's going to change
• 19:39
  Speaker 2: the landscape.
• 19:40
  Speaker 3: Well, right now, it's a huge threat to the NPAA
• 19:43
  Speaker 3: because all of the power they wield is found in
• 19:46
  Speaker 3: this rating system.
• 19:47
  Speaker 2: And if for theaters yes, If no one's going to theaters.
• 19:51
  Speaker 3: Then the MPAA loses all of that power, which is
• 19:54
  Speaker 3: a big deal, especially now because the NPAA is needed
• 19:58
  Speaker 3: more than ever as a lobbying group because of online piracy,
• 20:02
  Speaker 3: which we'll talk about some more. So it's a very
• 20:04
  Speaker 3: precarious time for the MPAA right now, and it's a
• 20:06
  Speaker 3: terrible time for them to be under as much scrutiny
• 20:10
  Speaker 3: and public attack and critique as they are. So it's
• 20:14
  Speaker 3: I mean, they got spears sticking out every which way,
• 20:18
  Speaker 3: and their trunk is flailing and they're honking. That is true.
• 20:22
  Speaker 2: One thing I should point out is I said, is
• 20:24
  Speaker 2: that there's no accountability.
• 20:25
  Speaker 3: That's what the NPA says.
• 20:27
  Speaker 2: It's the good thing about the secrecy is that it
• 20:30
  Speaker 2: frees them up. That anonymity does. It frees them up
• 20:33
  Speaker 2: from accountability.
• 20:35
  Speaker 3: I just don't agree, right, Okay, So the if you
• 20:39
  Speaker 3: want to appeal, there was apparently a change made in
• 20:43
  Speaker 3: response to Kirby Dick's movie the documentary before if you
• 20:49
  Speaker 3: were appealing your rating, which is very difficult, almost never
• 20:55
  Speaker 3: was done.
• 20:56
  Speaker 2: Well you never want that's for sure.
• 20:58
  Speaker 3: Right, And when you were appear you couldn't reference any
• 21:01
  Speaker 3: other film. It was totally done in a vacuum, which
• 21:05
  Speaker 3: is pretty preposterous.
• 21:07
  Speaker 2: Yeah, Like that's the only way to be able to
• 21:10
  Speaker 2: tell us, like, wait a minute, if you said this
• 21:12
  Speaker 2: about this, then why not this for my movie?
• 21:15
  Speaker 3: Right, Which meant that there was no real standard, yeah,
• 21:18
  Speaker 3: that you could point to, or there were standards you
• 21:21
  Speaker 3: could point to, they just wouldn't be considered.
• 21:23
  Speaker 2: Yeah, or at the very least, if they do have
• 21:25
  Speaker 2: written standards, they don't release them, so you don't even
• 21:28
  Speaker 2: know what they are.
• 21:28
  Speaker 3: Right. So the MPAA is, they've got their rating system,
• 21:36
  Speaker 3: they've got the appeals process.
• 21:38
  Speaker 2: Which was also in secret, unless that's changed, right, I think.
• 21:43
  Speaker 2: I think the appeals board not only was the appeals
• 21:46
  Speaker 2: board and secret, but they weren't even just raiders. They
• 21:48
  Speaker 2: were people from the industry.
• 21:51
  Speaker 3: Right, and the Theater Owners Association exactly, whereas the people
• 21:56
  Speaker 3: who were raiders are supposedly unaffiliated with the movie indust
• 22:00
  Speaker 3: and are just like average ordinary.
• 22:02
  Speaker 2: Parents representing EU Middle America. We'll just call it, even
• 22:08
  Speaker 2: though I think that's insulting.
• 22:10
  Speaker 3: The thing is, though, is a lot of people criticize
• 22:12
  Speaker 3: the NPA and say these raiders are really representing the
• 22:16
  Speaker 3: six major studios who rake in ninety five percent of
• 22:19
  Speaker 3: the ten point nine billion dollars made in the United States. Yeah,
• 22:24
  Speaker 3: in theaters alone, just ticket sales, not DVD or anything
• 22:27
  Speaker 3: like that. Yeah, And that's what the NPAA does. In
• 22:32
  Speaker 3: addition to rating, they are, like we said, the lobby
• 22:35
  Speaker 3: are for these six studios.
• 22:39
  Speaker 2: That's right, and they I guess we should talk about
• 22:42
  Speaker 2: piracy now, Huh. That's one of their other big besides
• 22:45
  Speaker 2: from rating movies, they are heavy in the lobby against well,
• 22:50
  Speaker 2: especially now with online piracy, because the digital distribution network
• 22:54
  Speaker 2: is it seems like the way forward as far as
• 22:58
  Speaker 2: distribution goes, right, Like it's the futre. It's not the future,
• 23:01
  Speaker 2: it's the present and the future.
• 23:02
  Speaker 3: And the NPAA has a they're accused of basically trying
• 23:07
  Speaker 3: to quell new technology by just saying like, well, let's
• 23:12
  Speaker 3: just keep people from peer to peer file sharing in
• 23:16
  Speaker 3: total so that they can't steal movies. In part, and
• 23:21
  Speaker 3: if you go back to the early eighties, Jack Valente
• 23:24
  Speaker 3: was known to have railed and lobbied against the legality
• 23:28
  Speaker 3: of VCRs.
• 23:30
  Speaker 2: People are just gonna be recording things and handing them
• 23:32
  Speaker 2: out to their friends exactly.
• 23:34
  Speaker 3: So there was a the NPA is a long history
• 23:37
  Speaker 3: of basically like just doing anything at can to stifle
• 23:39
  Speaker 3: innovation in order to protect the profits of these big
• 23:42
  Speaker 3: movie studios. The other problem with them lobbying in favor
• 23:49
  Speaker 3: of these six movie studios is that they inherently have
• 23:52
  Speaker 3: a conflict of interest against the studios that are not
• 23:56
  Speaker 3: part of these six that they represent, but whose movies
• 24:00
  Speaker 3: they still rate. Right, so they've been accused of more
• 24:04
  Speaker 3: scrupulously or scrutinously rating the movies of rival studios or
• 24:11
  Speaker 3: foreign studios when assigning a rating.
• 24:14
  Speaker 2: Well, and that's why filmmakers call consistently for transparency. I
• 24:20
  Speaker 2: don't think there are many filmmakers out there saying there
• 24:22
  Speaker 2: should be no rating, we should just maybe some like
• 24:25
  Speaker 2: a large fontrier, you know, or Werner Herzog. They're probably
• 24:29
  Speaker 2: like nota eight things at all. But I think they
• 24:32
  Speaker 2: just want transparency, like open it up and let everyone
• 24:35
  Speaker 2: know how this is all done, who these people are,
• 24:38
  Speaker 2: and give us an idea on what in the world
• 24:40
  Speaker 2: we're submitting to voluntarily quote unquote. Pretty interesting.
• 24:45
  Speaker 3: So you were talking about online piracy, and with digital
• 24:50
  Speaker 3: distribution being a big deal now, the NPAs needed more
• 24:54
  Speaker 3: than ever because they have to lobby Congress to fight
• 24:57
  Speaker 3: online piracy at a time when more and more people
• 25:00
  Speaker 3: are distributing online and going around the MPAA. So it's
• 25:04
  Speaker 3: losing its power, right, but it needs its power more
• 25:06
  Speaker 3: than ever. So, like we said, it's a precarious time
• 25:09
  Speaker 3: for the MPAA. Yeah, and they tried a few things.
• 25:12
  Speaker 3: They were successful with the what was the first one
• 25:16
  Speaker 3: in two thousand, the Digital Sofa No, the Digital Millennium
• 25:22
  Speaker 3: Copyright Act, oh right, which basically that up until then
• 25:27
  Speaker 3: it wasn't a federal crime to share movies on peer
• 25:31
  Speaker 3: to peer networks, right, that one did it, and they
• 25:34
  Speaker 3: got that passed. The MPAA lobbied and got that passed.
• 25:37
  Speaker 2: Yeah, they've cracked down on camcorder recording yeap. Like when
• 25:41
  Speaker 2: you're in New York City and someone has that brand
• 25:43
  Speaker 2: new copy of Godzilla on video cassette for you, Yeah,
• 25:47
  Speaker 2: that's because if you've seen Seinfeld, someone went and sat
• 25:50
  Speaker 2: in that theater with a camera recorder and just made
• 25:54
  Speaker 2: a stupid, awful quality pirated version.
• 25:56
  Speaker 3: Yeah. And it says that those are the most common.
• 25:58
  Speaker 3: I guess I kind of believe that they're also the
• 26:01
  Speaker 3: worst quality. Like sometimes people will like get up and
• 26:03
  Speaker 3: move in front of the camera, like they go to
• 26:05
  Speaker 3: the bathroom or something.
• 26:07
  Speaker 2: And yeah, it's uh, I've never seen one, but I
• 26:09
  Speaker 2: think they're terrible.
• 26:10
  Speaker 3: Yeah much, I don't want to say more common, but
• 26:15
  Speaker 3: probably more common these days are like copies of screeners. Yeah,
• 26:18
  Speaker 3: like they send out DVDs to everybody who's members of
• 26:21
  Speaker 3: the Academy to vote on movies, and so around Oscar
• 26:25
  Speaker 3: timer before Oscar time, it seems like the Internet gets
• 26:28
  Speaker 3: flooded with way more high quality copies of these major
• 26:32
  Speaker 3: movies that are up for awards. Yeah.
• 26:34
  Speaker 2: I think now they have, thanks to the NPA, have
• 26:38
  Speaker 2: something coded to your name now on your copy.
• 26:42
  Speaker 3: So like they'll know who leaked it or whatever. I think. So, yeah,
• 26:45
  Speaker 3: I'm not surprised by that. Apparently, if you want to
• 26:50
  Speaker 3: show Frozen at your church, yeah, you better have a
• 26:55
  Speaker 3: public performance license because it is illegal to show a
• 27:00
  Speaker 3: movie outside of your home. Yeah, that surprised me.
• 27:03
  Speaker 2: But there are a lot of especially in the summertime,
• 27:06
  Speaker 2: a lot of community screenings, like every city now has uh,
• 27:10
  Speaker 2: you know, Atlanta shows them and uh, I think at
• 27:12
  Speaker 2: Oakland Cemetery some other places in New York. They have
• 27:16
  Speaker 2: them all over the place. And technically, yeah, they're supposed
• 27:19
  Speaker 2: to have a license to do, so, I'm sure they
• 27:20
  Speaker 2: do the big ones.
• 27:21
  Speaker 3: Yeah, the big ones, I'm sure do.
• 27:22
  Speaker 2: But like at your community pool and you want to
• 27:25
  Speaker 2: show et and.
• 27:27
  Speaker 3: The FED could kick the gate down around the pool.
• 27:31
  Speaker 3: I bet everybody.
• 27:32
  Speaker 2: I bet they don't love HBO these days because you know,
• 27:35
  Speaker 2: HBO go people steal that. They're just like, hey, dude,
• 27:40
  Speaker 2: what's your log in? Oh right, yeah, and HBO came
• 27:42
  Speaker 2: out and they're like, who cares?
• 27:44
  Speaker 3: Yeah, people are watching it, yeah, like go watch True Detective.
• 27:48
  Speaker 2: Maybe you'll sign up for HBO, yeah because you liked it,
• 27:50
  Speaker 2: or maybe you'll just support the show period on social media,
• 27:54
  Speaker 2: even though you're getting it for free. Like we're making
• 27:57
  Speaker 2: enough money basically.
• 27:58
  Speaker 3: Yes, And that's some thing that a lot of people say,
• 28:01
  Speaker 3: you know, film industry, we don't really feel that bad
• 28:04
  Speaker 3: for you, Yeah, Sean Austin, sit down, because you guys
• 28:08
  Speaker 3: made ten point nine billion dollars in America in ticket
• 28:12
  Speaker 3: sales alone in twenty thirteen. We don't feel that bad
• 28:18
  Speaker 3: about this whole conundrum that the MPAA is facing.
• 28:21
  Speaker 2: What's Shawn aston Steel he was voices or yeah, yeah,
• 28:25
  Speaker 2: oh okay, Yeah, I don't think I knew that.
• 28:28
  Speaker 3: Yeah he was. I can't remember the there was like
• 28:31
  Speaker 3: a whole kind of push, an anti piracy pushed a
• 28:35
  Speaker 3: few years back, and he was the face of it,
• 28:37
  Speaker 3: part of it. Yeah, yeah, and he looked really mad
• 28:39
  Speaker 3: about things too. Du But speaking of piracy, I remember
• 28:43
  Speaker 3: there was a story that came out recently. It was
• 28:46
  Speaker 3: if you think about it at first, it's like wah whah,
• 28:48
  Speaker 3: But then if if you really kind of lended some thought,
• 28:52
  Speaker 3: it's really disturbing. Yeah, there were there was a report
• 28:57
  Speaker 3: of prisoners at a prison being shown pirated movies and
• 29:03
  Speaker 3: some of the prisoners were there for pirting movies. Oh wow,
• 29:08
  Speaker 3: and like really think about the injustice behind that. Yeah,
• 29:12
  Speaker 3: like that's just crazy town. Imagine if you've been like
• 29:15
  Speaker 3: selling counterfeit first, and you go to prison and all
• 29:19
  Speaker 3: of the all the guards are wearing counterfeit for coats.
• 29:23
  Speaker 2: It'd be pretty swing in prison.
• 29:25
  Speaker 3: It'd be weird, but it would also be unjust.
• 29:28
  Speaker 2: Yeah.
• 29:29
  Speaker 3: Yeah, true. But in relation to this, it's just more
• 29:32
  Speaker 3: and more widespread every day. It feels like it's it's
• 29:35
  Speaker 3: a losing battle. I think that the NPAA is fighting
• 29:38
  Speaker 3: right now.
• 29:38
  Speaker 2: Well, I think I read somewhere today that they I
• 29:40
  Speaker 2: think they might release a few of the Raiders' names
• 29:45
  Speaker 2: per film, not all like thirteen, right, but I need
• 29:49
  Speaker 2: to look up that. Look that up again, because that
• 29:51
  Speaker 2: I don't know. I don't see the why releasing a
• 29:54
  Speaker 2: three out of thirteen names? Does anybody any good?
• 29:56
  Speaker 3: It does zero good? Yeah, And speaking of doing zero good,
• 30:01
  Speaker 3: there's kind of a new attachment to the rating system
• 30:07
  Speaker 3: that they have now. It's called check the box, and
• 30:12
  Speaker 3: it's basically a brief description of why a movie is,
• 30:15
  Speaker 3: like PG. Thirteen, So it'll say like intense sci fi
• 30:18
  Speaker 3: action or something like that, or some drug use, yeah,
• 30:21
  Speaker 3: that kind of thing. And some critics of the NPAA
• 30:26
  Speaker 3: say it's just basically like shooting a laser beam into
• 30:30
  Speaker 3: like a fifteen year old boy's brain, like brief nudity.
• 30:35
  Speaker 3: Come see it PG thirteen, Check it out, kid. And
• 30:40
  Speaker 3: I think a lot of people are looking at it
• 30:41
  Speaker 3: like it's it's just kind of a disingenuous advertisement, cynical advertisement,
• 30:48
  Speaker 3: because the MPAA is accused of not regulating or even
• 30:54
  Speaker 3: potentially directly marketing to kids under the age of the
• 30:59
  Speaker 3: movie that are being advertised. Yeah, so like you're seeing
• 31:03
  Speaker 3: a lot of ads for like r rated movies on
• 31:05
  Speaker 3: websites that are like very popular among like the seventeen
• 31:08
  Speaker 3: and undercrowd. There's a lot of tie ins for PG
• 31:13
  Speaker 3: thirteen movies with like kids toys for kids who are
• 31:16
  Speaker 3: under who are under thirteen, And so there's like this
• 31:20
  Speaker 3: idea that there's the MPAA is supposedly serving America's moral compasses. Yeah,
• 31:29
  Speaker 3: but really, at the same time, they're undermining that morality
• 31:34
  Speaker 3: that they're supposedly defending. Yeah, by marketing and exploiting kids.
• 31:40
  Speaker 2: Yeah, that'd be like a cigarette company having a cartoon
• 31:43
  Speaker 2: animal as their mascot.
• 31:45
  Speaker 3: Can you imagine?
• 31:46
  Speaker 2: Be weird? Well, one thing about the the subjectivity of
• 31:51
  Speaker 2: it and the fact that it is a closed book
• 31:53
  Speaker 2: and they filmmakers don't even know, you know what, how
• 31:57
  Speaker 2: to tailor their movie to achieve a certain rating, I
• 32:00
  Speaker 2: mean to within a certain degree, but they've learned how
• 32:03
  Speaker 2: to manipulate it because there is no set standard by
• 32:06
  Speaker 2: if you watch that film is not yet rated. And
• 32:08
  Speaker 2: you've heard plenty of stories over the years about filmmakers
• 32:11
  Speaker 2: intentionally putting in things that they never intend to be
• 32:14
  Speaker 2: in the final movie. Oh yeah, just to sort of
• 32:17
  Speaker 2: distract from some of the other things. So they'll shoot
• 32:19
  Speaker 2: something kind of really outrageous to get the MPA's raiders
• 32:25
  Speaker 2: haunches up and what they were never going to keep
• 32:28
  Speaker 2: that part anyway, right, So they're subverting the system because
• 32:30
  Speaker 2: there is no set standard.
• 32:32
  Speaker 3: Yeah, and they're just the stuff they want to keep
• 32:35
  Speaker 3: in is comparatively exactly more palatable.
• 32:39
  Speaker 2: And if you don't have the set standard where you
• 32:41
  Speaker 2: can go and I wonder what those sheets look like
• 32:44
  Speaker 2: on the interior, you know, I mean that's the great mystery. Yeah,
• 32:47
  Speaker 2: surely they have their own interior standards. They're not just
• 32:50
  Speaker 2: like watch it and see what you think. Well, they
• 32:52
  Speaker 2: have group discussions too, man, I'd love to sit in
• 32:56
  Speaker 2: on those.
• 32:57
  Speaker 3: So the I read Another criticism of NPAA is that
• 33:01
  Speaker 3: the difference between PG thirteen movies and our movies these
• 33:05
  Speaker 3: days is the profanity and the sexuality. That they're similar
• 33:11
  Speaker 3: in violence, if not more violent in PG thirteen movies,
• 33:14
  Speaker 3: and that this is kind of messed up, that the
• 33:17
  Speaker 3: NPAA has very little problem with violence. Yeah, but when
• 33:20
  Speaker 3: it comes to bad words or sexuality of almost any
• 33:25
  Speaker 3: nature except for women being objectified and men being gratified,
• 33:32
  Speaker 3: then the NPAA suddenly puckers up.
• 33:37
  Speaker 2: Well, yeah, in any a woman achieving receiving sexual gratification,
• 33:42
  Speaker 2: or a homosexual couple NC seventeen.
• 33:45
  Speaker 3: Yeah, virtually like guaranteed or depending on how they do it,
• 33:49
  Speaker 3: are if it's coming out of like one of the
• 33:52
  Speaker 3: major studios.
• 33:53
  Speaker 2: So in other words, a man can receive pleasure from
• 33:57
  Speaker 2: a woman, and of course it's scrutinized somewhat, because any
• 34:01
  Speaker 2: kind of sex is more heavily scrutinized than violence. But
• 34:04
  Speaker 2: if a woman does like you said, or if it's
• 34:07
  Speaker 2: a gay couple, it's all over so homophobic, misogynistic.
• 34:12
  Speaker 3: You decide right, and fetishistic of violence, you know.
• 34:19
  Speaker 2: Yeah, Like here's one example. There's a great article called
• 34:22
  Speaker 2: Don't Expect any major changes to the NPA rating system
• 34:25
  Speaker 2: in twenty fourteen, and it's basically Chris Dodd, who's the
• 34:28
  Speaker 2: new head and the gang, digging in and saying, you
• 34:31
  Speaker 2: know what, we talk to your average parents and we
• 34:37
  Speaker 2: pull them and this is what they want. But they
• 34:41
  Speaker 2: release No, none of those studies are released. Yeah, none
• 34:43
  Speaker 2: of those conversations are released. A movie like Filamina, which
• 34:47
  Speaker 2: you saw, was rated at R.
• 34:49
  Speaker 3: Yeah. It was about a lady looking for a long
• 34:52
  Speaker 3: lost sun. It was so far from an R movie.
• 34:54
  Speaker 3: It was ridiculous.
• 34:55
  Speaker 2: Yeah, but it had a couple of F bombs in it,
• 34:58
  Speaker 2: so they cut those out and they bring it to
• 35:01
  Speaker 2: a PG thirteen. You might think, who cares cut up
• 35:04
  Speaker 2: the F bombs make it PG thirteen. But there's something
• 35:07
  Speaker 2: bigger going on here, you know.
• 35:09
  Speaker 3: Yeah, there's a great AV Club article about how just
• 35:14
  Speaker 3: totally out of step a lot of the ratings are.
• 35:18
  Speaker 3: And they have fifteen movies listed and basically talk about
• 35:22
  Speaker 3: their ratings. Like the first one they talk about once. Yeah,
• 35:27
  Speaker 3: that romantic. It wasn't like a romantic comedy, wasn't. No.
• 35:32
  Speaker 2: I would say it was a bittersweet, just a modern
• 35:35
  Speaker 2: day romance told through music.
• 35:37
  Speaker 3: Right.
• 35:37
  Speaker 2: It wasn't a musical, but there are a lot of
• 35:39
  Speaker 2: musical numbers.
• 35:39
  Speaker 3: Highly inoffensive love story. Yeah, very sweet movie. It had
• 35:45
  Speaker 3: the same rating as a hostile too, which is basically
• 35:49
  Speaker 3: torture porn. They both got the same rating.
• 35:53
  Speaker 2: Yeah, we should read this first line from the AV Club.
• 35:56
  Speaker 2: In early summer of two thousand and seven, two films
• 35:58
  Speaker 2: were released with our ratings. One feature to scene where
• 36:01
  Speaker 2: a naked woman is suspended from a ceiling while another
• 36:04
  Speaker 2: naked woman slashes her with a scyth and baths in
• 36:08
  Speaker 2: Her Blood. The other featured two Dublin musicians singing songs together,
• 36:12
  Speaker 2: falling in love and opting not to act on it.
• 36:16
  Speaker 2: Like there was never any sex scene. They didn't even
• 36:18
  Speaker 2: get together. Really.
• 36:19
  Speaker 3: Nope.
• 36:20
  Speaker 2: They're both rated R.
• 36:21
  Speaker 3: Both rated are because of profanity.
• 36:24
  Speaker 2: Rushmore rated R for the uh scene at the end
• 36:29
  Speaker 2: whether Max is putting on the play, the Vietnam play,
• 36:33
  Speaker 2: and there is a shot of a couple of little
• 36:35
  Speaker 2: kids looking at on the set. There's some Playboy centerfolds
• 36:39
  Speaker 2: up in the locker, yep, like on the Vietnam set,
• 36:41
  Speaker 2: and these it shows these little kids like looking at
• 36:43
  Speaker 2: those like a twelve year.
• 36:45
  Speaker 3: Old would probably do. And it got an R for that,
• 36:47
  Speaker 3: got an R for that. Happiness Todd Sollins one of
• 36:51
  Speaker 3: my favorite movies of all time. Yeah, they tried to
• 36:55
  Speaker 3: give it an NC seventeen rating, and he said, you
• 36:57
  Speaker 3: know what, I'm not cutting anything. You who can just
• 37:00
  Speaker 3: go take a long walk off a short peer is
• 37:05
  Speaker 3: what I think he famously said to them. Yeah, and
• 37:08
  Speaker 3: he released his movie as unrated. Oh really, yep, I
• 37:12
  Speaker 3: don't think I knew that way to go.
• 37:13
  Speaker 2: Todd Solins, or if you're looking at some serious homophobia.
• 37:18
  Speaker 2: The Great nineteen eighty nine movie and longtime Companion features
• 37:22
  Speaker 2: no real sex acts at all, nothing explicit. In fact,
• 37:27
  Speaker 2: the AB Club says it could show on network TV
• 37:30
  Speaker 2: today with just a few alterations. But it was about
• 37:34
  Speaker 2: a gay couple, and uh so I got an NC seventeen.
• 37:39
  Speaker 3: Yeah. There's something called Afternoon Delight, which was a movie
• 37:45
  Speaker 3: about a woman who hires a jigalow. Yeah, and it
• 37:50
  Speaker 3: apparently is heavy on the the woman receiving sexual gratification.
• 37:57
  Speaker 3: It got an R rating. Yeah, bite, and it got
• 38:01
  Speaker 3: in our rating after apparently the director cut a lot
• 38:04
  Speaker 3: of stuff out and the director said, what the hey,
• 38:08
  Speaker 3: after Wolf of Wall Street came out, Like, have you
• 38:11
  Speaker 3: seen this movie with like some very graphic apparent sex
• 38:14
  Speaker 3: scenes between a man and a woman. Yeah, but Leonardo
• 38:18
  Speaker 3: DiCaprio is the one enjoying it the most, So it's fine.
• 38:21
  Speaker 3: It's an R right. Blue is the warmest color. Yeah.
• 38:25
  Speaker 2: Last year that a teenage lesbian love story n S seventeen.
• 38:29
  Speaker 2: Yeap got a lot of attention, and there were some
• 38:31
  Speaker 2: theaters that allowed high school age kids to go see
• 38:36
  Speaker 2: that anyway.
• 38:37
  Speaker 3: Because again, this is in law, it's not binding it's
• 38:40
  Speaker 3: up to the theaters.
• 38:42
  Speaker 2: Yeah, it's just so strange that such a small group
• 38:44
  Speaker 2: of people have such influence on such a large industry.
• 38:48
  Speaker 3: And yeah, the secret the more you dig into it,
• 38:50
  Speaker 3: the more conflicts of interest arise, and the more arbitrary
• 38:54
  Speaker 3: the standards become, the more blood boiling it is. I
• 38:59
  Speaker 3: highly recommend you go read some stuff like Rated Are
• 39:01
  Speaker 3: for Ridiculous by Kirby Dick his little uh yeah, his
• 39:04
  Speaker 3: little op ed about the MPAA that one US News
• 39:09
  Speaker 3: and World Report article you wrote or suggested it was good.
• 39:13
  Speaker 2: I wish I wrote it.
• 39:15
  Speaker 3: Had you been there, would have been used correctly.
• 39:19
  Speaker 2: Oh did they misuse it? What?
• 39:21
  Speaker 3: Yeah?
• 39:21
  Speaker 2: I know, and that's terrible. Uh So the NPA will
• 39:24
  Speaker 2: defend themselves and they say that there's no such bias
• 39:27
  Speaker 2: and that we all these objectionable scenes are rated on
• 39:31
  Speaker 2: the graphic quality and how graphic it is. But if
• 39:36
  Speaker 2: you just look at the you'd have to be a
• 39:38
  Speaker 2: dummy not to see these correlations, right, And the fact
• 39:41
  Speaker 2: that they don't seem to care that much about violence
• 39:44
  Speaker 2: in this age where I don't know, does it influence
• 39:48
  Speaker 2: people to go shoot up a school? Who knows?
• 39:52
  Speaker 3: Did you see that John Oliver quote that's going around, Yes,
• 39:57
  Speaker 3: but what was it? It's like somebody on successfully tries
• 40:01
  Speaker 3: to carry a bomb onto a plane in their shoe.
• 40:03
  Speaker 3: We all take our shoes off. Oh right, there's like
• 40:06
  Speaker 3: thirty somethings school shootings after Columbine and absolutely nothing's changed.
• 40:11
  Speaker 2: Yeah, or the onion article that's going around too, now,
• 40:14
  Speaker 2: is this is something that can't be prevented, says the
• 40:19
  Speaker 2: only country where this kind of thing happens all the
• 40:21
  Speaker 2: time something like that. Huh I'm paraphrasing.
• 40:24
  Speaker 3: Oh yeah, that's the onion.
• 40:27
  Speaker 2: Yeah, good stuff, MPa, keep doing the fighting, the good fight.
• 40:30
  Speaker 3: Yeah, go check out, like, just go start reading up
• 40:33
  Speaker 3: on it. It's funny how much we just take this
• 40:35
  Speaker 3: stuff for granted, but when just start digging just slightly
• 40:39
  Speaker 3: beneath the surface at the very least. See this film
• 40:42
  Speaker 3: is not yet rated. It's really good, Yeah, really engrossing.
• 40:46
  Speaker 3: And you know, for every one hundred documentaries that come out,
• 40:49
  Speaker 3: what five of them are like really great? Sure, most
• 40:52
  Speaker 3: of them are pretty good, some are terrible. So any
• 40:55
  Speaker 3: really good one is worth seeing just in and of itself.
• 40:58
  Speaker 2: Agreed.
• 40:59
  Speaker 3: You want to learn more about the MPAA. Type those
• 41:02
  Speaker 3: letters into the search housetifforks dot com and I said,
• 41:04
  Speaker 3: search pars. It's time for listener mail.
• 41:09
  Speaker 2: I'm gonna call this wild Parrots. Josh mentioned in the
• 41:14
  Speaker 2: Tattoo podcast that he had heard parrots like to hang
• 41:16
  Speaker 2: together when free, and I wanted to burst in the
• 41:19
  Speaker 2: podcast booth and tell you about the wild parrots of
• 41:22
  Speaker 2: San Francisco. I'm not going to get into it except
• 41:25
  Speaker 2: to say that, over the course of my life, the
• 41:27
  Speaker 2: parrots in San Francisco are a sort of living legend
• 41:29
  Speaker 2: that one would occaionally get the privilege of spotting now
• 41:31
  Speaker 2: and then. However, about three years ago, I moved in
• 41:33
  Speaker 2: with my aunt in the little San Francisco suburb of Brisbane,
• 41:38
  Speaker 2: and apparently the famous flocks of parrots were also making
• 41:41
  Speaker 2: their home there. Since it was warmer unless windy, these
• 41:44
  Speaker 2: parrots were often hanging right outside my bedroom window, which
• 41:47
  Speaker 2: is pretty amazing or no, she says, amusing. I say
• 41:51
  Speaker 2: it's amazing, but also somewhat annoying, especially since my first
• 41:56
  Speaker 2: son was just a little guy then and a very
• 41:57
  Speaker 2: light sleeper, and these suckers are allowed, That's true. They
• 42:00
  Speaker 2: are very loud. Also, guys, I'm sending you the link
• 42:02
  Speaker 2: to watch the preview of the two thousand and three
• 42:04
  Speaker 2: documentary The Wild Parrots of Telegraph Hill. So I didn't
• 42:08
  Speaker 2: know that was a documentary.
• 42:09
  Speaker 3: I've heard that, Yeah, I've heard of that before. I
• 42:11
  Speaker 3: never knew what it was about. Amy.
• 42:13
  Speaker 2: I will check that out.
• 42:14
  Speaker 3: Thank you, thank you for writing it. Yeah, thanks a lot, Amy.
• 42:18
  Speaker 3: If you have a documentary recommendation, we are always interested
• 42:21
  Speaker 3: in those. Heck yeah, you can tweet them to us
• 42:24
  Speaker 3: at SYSK podcast. You can post them on Facebook dot com,
• 42:28
  Speaker 3: slash stuff you Should Know, and you can send us
• 42:31
  Speaker 3: an email to Stuff Podcast at HowStuffWorks dot com and
• 42:35
  Speaker 3: as always, joined us at our home on the web,
• 42:37
  Speaker 3: the Beautiful stuff youshould Know dot com.
• 42:45
  Speaker 2: For more on this and thousands of other topics, visit
• 42:48
  Speaker 2: HowStuffWorks dot com.