Quote:
Originally posted by Sidd Finch
*Or differently, since as usual I don't quite understand your point, perhaps because I don't know if you can say "penis breath" on primetime non-cable TV.
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No, you understood my crotchety point entirely. The world has changed since E.T., in that now parents think PG means the film has been vetted for general appropriateness. It doesn't --- it simply means the MPAA won't stop your child from seeing the movie.
Pre-"Gremlins," there was no PG-13. PG meant that the film had adult themes that required parental guidance, but the film might be harmless --- even healthy --- for children under 18 if that guidance was forthcoming. Because of the broad range of films in the PG category, adults had to make a decision about whether an individual film was appropriate, because the MPAA was merely putting up a yellow light. (My parents pre-screened "Star Wars" for my six year old self, and decided I could handle it if I watched it with them.)
Now, with the creation of PG-13, all need for parental guidance for straight PG movies is off the radar screen. If it's PG, it's appropriate for kids both over and under 13 (sayeth America, though in fairness the MPAA didn't desire this result). So many parents now just use all ratings as an index of the number of times the "s" word is used.
The whole rating system is mostly fucked. Roger Ebert recently made the point that "Whale Rider" got a PG-13 because of one "shit," one "damn," three non-sexual references to "dicks," and a hash pipe in the background of one shot. Meanwhile, all of the Star Wars movies got straight PGs, even though a few of them involved entire planets of people being murdered in wide shots. Ebert went on to say that any film rating system that puts "Whale Rider" in the same category as "Charlie's Angels Full Throttle" and "2 Fast 2 Furious"
vis-a-vis their appropriateness for kids has "lost all reason." I think he might have intended the double entendre.
