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February 03, 2007

This Film Is Not Yet Rated - 5

This is a documentary about the film rating system in America, run by Motion Picture Association of America. How films are rated is mostly a secret kept in a locked down building in LA. Run for more than 30 years by Jack Valenti, the MPAA has confused Hollywood by seemingly arbitrarily categorizing films. Director Kirby Dick (he also did the film about postmodern philosopher Derrida) wants to investigate what the rating standards are. He interviews directors (Kevin Smith, Matt Stone, Darren Aronoksky, Kimberly Pierce, and others) that have had to edit their films to get an R rating, rather than an NC-17. An NC-17 rating chases away theatres from showing and promoting it, which means less funding from the production studio. The highlight of the film is when the private investigators that Dick has hired are able to follow people out of the locked down building and exposes the rating board as big studio executives, rather than the everyday family folks, Valenti claims they are. Like you would suspect, this film is rated NC-17, since it shows most of the scenes that the MPAA told others to cut.

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