We’ve all seen ratings on movies and TV shows. Who hasn’t as a 16 year old wanted to see a movie SO bad only to find out it’s rated R and you know your parents won’t take you. And to lead off of that, one of the benefits of turning 18 being that you can finally go and watch whatever you want. It’s a common joke that kids dress up in a giant trench coat to try and sneak into movies they’re not allowed to see. Things like this kinda make it feel like it’s just another one of those things we deal with in life and it is how it is. But should it be? Sure, it’s probably a good idea to keep your young children from seeing borderline hardcore pornography, but when does it begin to feel like it makes the human body controversial?

As you watched the movie This Film is Not Yet Rated, you begin to notice some of the common themes that the MPAA seems to censor. A couple of scenes showing someone being brutally beaten, shot, and bloodied would certainly be the biggest concern, right? Violence can be disturbing and it’s been a longtime argument that younger minds might become desensitized to that or begin to glorify it. But that in fact isn’t true. It seems the MPAA has much more concern around the human body, something very natural. As an art student, even in 9th grade, I came to terms that the body isn’t something to be shunned or seen as horribly inappropriate. I came to appreciate the body as a natural beauty, and something that should be less stigmatized. We sketched a nude model and her curves, how the skin folds, and the flow of how the body stretches and sits. Yet the MPAA is shown to heavily censor scenes where a woman’s pubic hair shows, or where a woman is deriving pleasure from sex. Again, all very natural things. Though, if you were born female, you know women’s bodies are already under constant restriction and criticism, it’s nothing all too new. Women are expected to be rid of their natural body hair or else they’re seen as disgusting, and it’s a common shared experience that women don’t typically get off during sex if it’s with a cisgender male. In a way, the MPAA rating seems to be very sexist in the way it rates movies. A point brought up in the movie is how a lot of things are to be seen through the male perspective, and a woman being natural or enjoying herself seems unnatural or gross. Not even to touch on the apparent censorship of LGBT+ narratives.

We discussed before how movies are supposed to reflect the time and public feeling. Movies are being made to do exactly that, to show that women with pubic hair are natural and they should be able to have pleasure in sex, but it’s being censored. The MPAA seems to be a direct road block in the progression of movies and what current artists in the industry feel is important to touch upon. In a way, it’s trying to keep views stagnant and contain the views of those now coming into the industry. Though I believe ratings and censorship is to an extent, something that should exist, I believe that as it is today is unacceptable and needs to change. Movies need to be able to speak on what they want and express thoughts on the world today.

Do you feel that the way movies are rated needs to change? If so, do you have any idea on how?