On their Touchstone label, yes. And they owned Miramax for 17 years.
And they have distributed films for others, e.g. Fright Night (a Dreamworks film) was a 15 last year.
The first Disney branded film to get a 12A was Pirates of the Caribbean, most Disney films before that were usually PG or U and even then only a handful have been rated 12A.
It did surprise that Men in Black 3 was PG as there was one use of the word shit, guess the BBFC is a bit more relaxed about language than the MPAA.
Another weird case was This Means War which was rated R originally by the MPAA because of the sexual humour but the distributor made cuts to make it PG-13 but the BBFC passed it in its original forms with no cuts,
Momentum did have more 18's than any other distributor in 2012:
"Shame", "The Divide", "The Raid", "The Rise and Fall of a White Collar Hooligan", "The Players", "Lawless", & "Dead Europe". Plus "Tim and Eric's Billion Dollar Movie" which played at the Prince Charles Cinema only.
Sorry, I was looking at the BBFC classifications list, under the assumption all were going to be released this year... Except the one's that were obviously old films being reclassified.
It's a real shame there are so few mainstream 18 rated action films anymore. Everything is made for the family market. But then I suppose you see how Dredd died on its arse, and there's your reason why.
An R rating (its the US market that Hollywood thinks of first) means a box office bomb for the kind of tent-pole films that studios need to make to turn a profit, its really that simple. When films were cheaper and less prone to ludicrous gigantic scaling you could happily make an R rated film for say 30 or 40 million bucks and make a profit, now that's not enough the industry is based around
mega films on mega budgets they need to kids or they crash and burn taking whole studios with them..
25 years ago, the NC17 was considered the kiss of death for a film in the US, now it's the R. How long before it's the PG13?
Only in America, where a nation of people who love their guns and violence so much, allow teenagers and adults barely out of nappies to obtain guns who then use them on 6 yr old children, could a 15 certificate film be deemed to corrupt the youth.
It did surprise that Men in Black 3 was PG as there was one use of the word shit, guess the BBFC is a bit more relaxed about language than the MPAA.
"Shit" is far from uncommon in PG rated stuff anyway!
Funny thing as well though, is that in the US, the G rating is considered the kiss of death too, for live action films anyway. Apparently the MPAA has a policy of not giving live action films G ratings unless the distributor really, really wants it. Whereas plenty of live action films in this country get U ratings with no issue whatsoever!
An R rating (its the US market that Hollywood thinks of first) means a box office bomb for the kind of tent-pole films that studios need to make to turn a profit, its really that simple. When films were cheaper and less prone to ludicrous gigantic scaling you could happily make an R rated film for say 30 or 40 million bucks and make a profit, now that's not enough the industry is based around
mega films on mega budgets they need to kids or they crash and burn taking whole studios with them..
25 years ago, the NC17 was considered the kiss of death for a film in the US, now it's the R. How long before it's the PG13?
Only in America, where a nation of people who love their guns and violence so much, allow teenagers and adults barely out of nappies to obtain guns who then use them on 6 yr old children, could a 15 certificate film be deemed to corrupt the youth.
The R is not the kiss of death, that role is still occupied by NC-17 rated films...
Having said that, most of this years big hitters have been fairly cheap R rated films...
Sony TriStar (via Filmdistrict)'s Looper was made for $30m and has got a worldwide box office of $166,334,953.
Ben Affleck's R-rated Argo cost $44.5m and has made $159m
R-Rated Cloud Atlas has made 62 of it's $100m budget back, and it hasn't even opened in most of Europe, parts of South American and Asia... I'd be amazed if it made a decent profit, but I think it may slowly get all it's money back (which for "Germany's first blockbuster", is probably good enough)....
I think for any action movie that hopes to entertain a "blockbuster" tag, an R would now be considered the kiss of death. Die Hard 4.0, Total Recall (2012) are prime examples of PG13/12 movies which should've been R/15, and were deliberately made family friendly to maximise box office takings.
I'm reminded of an interview I read years ago with Paul Verhoeven where he spoke about his battle with the studio execs at Orion Pictures when he shot Robocop. According to Verhoeven, the studio gave Robocop back to him four times before it sent the film to the MPAA, Orion knowing all of Verhoeven's previous finished cuts would get an NC17. If Verhoeven was to make Robocop now, he'd be forced to make it a PG13 as the studio's bogeyman rating would the R.
Of course, for all the complaints and notoriety of the film 25 years ago, Robocop is now considered a classic. It's the sort of film Hollywood will never make again.
I think for any action movie that hopes to entertain a "blockbuster" tag, an R would now be considered the kiss of death. Die Hard 4.0, Total Recall (2012) are prime examples of PG13/12 movies which should've been R/15, and were deliberately made family friendly to maximise box office takings.
I'm reminded of an interview I read years ago with Paul Verhoeven where he spoke about his battle with the studio execs at Orion Pictures when he shot Robocop. According to Verhoeven, the studio gave Robocop back to him four times before it sent the film to the MPAA, Orion knowing all of Verhoeven's previous finished cuts would get an NC17. If Verhoeven was to make Robocop now, he'd be forced to make it a PG13 as the studio's bogeyman rating would the R.
Of course, for all the complaints and notoriety of the film 25 years ago, Robocop is now considered a classic. It's the sort of film Hollywood will never make again.
Isn't it all about box office these days? I mean, if they think reducing violence/sex will increase their profits, they'll cut a film until it appeals to a wider audience.
Exactly. I couldn't have said it better myself. It's ALL about the box office these days and the number of bums on seats. Thank god for Shame, Dredd, The Raid, Lawless and Django Unchained but dear god we need more 18 rated films these days! Can't stand all these movies being released these days for the teen market who are the worst audience to be stuck in a cinema with!
Case in point - Jack Reacher. Not really a film for teens but loads more can go see it now. Should have been a 15 uncut, it was cut and it's now a 12A.
Exactly. I couldn't have said it better myself. It's ALL about the box office these days and the number of bums on seats. Thank god for Shame, Dredd, The Raid, Lawless and Django Unchained but dear god we need more 18 rated films these days! Can't stand all these movies being released these days for the teen market who are the worst audience to be stuck in a cinema with!
Case in point - Jack Reacher. Not really a film for teens but loads more can go see it now. Should have been a 15 uncut, it was cut and it's now a 12A.
the producers of The King's Speech IIRC had to fight to get the 12A ratings as they exceeded the swear word quota because of one scene in the film which would have given it a 15 rating, they had the same problem in the US too.
A lot of comedy films tends to be 15 rated, it's rare for a comedy to be lower than that apart from family comedies or romcoms.
the producers of The King's Speech IIRC had to fight to get the 12A ratings as they exceeded the swear word quota because of one scene in the film which would have given it a 15 rating, they had the same problem in the US too.
A lot of comedy films tends to be 15 rated, it's rare for a comedy to be lower than that apart from family comedies or romcoms.
The King's Speech contained 7 uses of the f word (way over the BBFC's working limit of 4) in an unusual context so the BBFC were presumably cautious and gave it a 15. The distributor appealed, and a 12A was given.
In the States it was given an R with no hope of appeal (the US board is very weird and doesn't normally take context into account), so a few profanities were muted and it got a PG-13.
I still find it amusing how the lefty child shrinks who work at the BBFC think there's some serious harm that's going to come to a 14 year old because they heard the F word 7 times in a film instead of 4, that in some way those extra three utterances are going to cause the breakdown of civilisation as we know it.
The very fact the BBFC deemed The Kings Speech to be OK at 12 simply because the distributor appealed, shows it has no idea what it's doing, and is unable to apply any level of common sense.
Can local council's still change the certificate of a film being shown in cinemas? (The first film that comes to mind with this happening is the first Spider-Man starring Toby Maguire.) If so, the idea the BBFC is the be all and end all when it comes to UK certification is laughable.
A bit off topic I know (so apologies in advance if you want to remove this), but going back through the thread and seeing V/H/S being mentioned reminded me about an event for V/H/S taking place on January 16th that my friend told me about. Not sure if anyone's interested, but the info is HERE.
Can local council's still change the certificate of a film being shown in cinemas? (The first film that comes to mind with this happening is the first Spider-Man starring Toby Maguire.) If so, the idea the BBFC is the be all and end all when it comes to UK certification is laughable
Local councils may still change the classification of a film, though it is infrequent. Since 2000, I can think of only two examples Spider-man (BBFC: 12) 13-PG in Birmingham, trialled by the BBFC as 12A in Norwich, eventually re-released nationally once 12A was available, This Is England (BBFC felt it was borderline 15/18 they gave it an 18), Shane Meadows asked local councils to downgrade it, (see http://www.guardian.co.uk/film/filmblog/2007/apr/23/an18forthisisenglandthis ) some did, most didn't.
Film4 frightfest often asks it's local council for permission to show unrated films, they wouldn't issue permits for Human Centipede 2 until it had been seen by the BBFC. It was rushed through and I think we all know how that turned out...
Recently, there were proposals for any new release that shows smoking (in a modern context, with no clear disapproval - e.g. Skyfall) to be rated an 18 in Liverpool. http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/england/merseyside/8105585.stm if you're interested. I don't remember hearing anything about it so I'll assume it didn't happen...
Also, Die Hard 4 was rated 15 by BBFC - and it was a 15 when I saw it at the cinema on release - yet I often hear people say they're adamant it was a 12A at their local cinema.
So I'm assuming it was another one of those films local councils agreed to lower? The BBFC have no record of different versions of the film ever officially getting a 12A.
Also, Die Hard 4 was rated 15 by BBFC - and it was a 15 when I saw it at the cinema on release - yet I often hear people say they're adamant it was a 12A at their local cinema.
So I'm assuming it was another one of those films local councils agreed to lower? The BBFC have no record of different versions of the film ever officially getting a 12A.
I can't remember any reports of Die Hard 4.0 being lowered to a 12A by councils, as far as i'm aware it was a 15 everywhere in the UK. The people claiming otherwise are definitely mistaken, possibly because they knew that the film was rated PG-13 in the US and so automatically assume that the film was a 12A (it was a very tame 15, so it's easy to see why people might think it was rated lower).
I can't remember any reports of Die Hard 4.0 being lowered to a 12A by councils, as far as i'm aware it was a 15 everywhere in the UK. The people claiming otherwise are definitely mistaken, possibly because they knew that the film was rated PG-13 in the US and so automatically assume that the film was a 12A (it was a very tame 15, so it's easy to see why people might think it was rated lower).
Die Hard 4 could have easily been a 12A but I imagine it would have involves cuts to language or violence. A Good Day to Die Hard I imagine Fox will try and get a 12A to widen its box office potential and audience.
The very fact the BBFC deemed The Kings Speech to be OK at 12 simply because the distributor appealed, shows it has no idea what it's doing, and is unable to apply any level of common sense.
I'd imagine it's extremely difficult to categorise films from a classification based on nothing more than the age of the viewer. It's not as if you can draw up an explicit list of what gets put into what category, if for no other reason than no two people are the same, let alone whole groups of people based simply on their age. If you come up with something like "a disturbing act of violence", who gets to decide what is or is not disturbing, and to whom, and under what circumstances? What levels are acceptable for what viewer?
In the end you're more or less left with nothing more than a panel of viewers who get a 'feeling' about what sort of category to put something in, and that's far from predictable, or even definitely repeatable, even using the same panel.
It must be a nightmare and I'm not in the least surprised that there are many anomalies and inconsistencies. I think generally these days the BBFC does as good a job as you have any right to expect, especially since the dark days of Ferman.
I still find it amusing how the lefty child shrinks who work at the BBFC think there's some serious harm that's going to come to a 14 year old because they heard the F word 7 times in a film instead of 4, that in some way those extra three utterances are going to cause the breakdown of civilisation as we know it.
The very fact the BBFC deemed The Kings Speech to be OK at 12 simply because the distributor appealed, shows it has no idea what it's doing, and is unable to apply any level of common sense.
And as for the MPAA, words fail me.
The BBFC compile their guidelines from public research (presumably with adults rather than children) so parents would prefer their children not to hear the f word, I believe the BBFC would change their guidelines if the public felt it was acceptable (hence more and more films with very strong language slipping into a 15).
The BBFC doesn't consider appeals, the Video Appeals Committee does (my understanding is that it is independant of the BBFC), and 7 uses over 114 mins works out at 1 every 17 mins, hardly infrequent like the guidelines suggest it should be.
Also, The King's Speech was a problem for the BBFC because they hadn't seen anything like it before (from a classification perspective), so they classified according to their guidelines, but their guidelines hadn't been designed with situations like that in mind. My understanding is that they have now adapted their guidelines, incase another situation like that arises.
Local councils may still change the classification of a film, though it is infrequent. Since 2000, I can think of only two examples Spider-man (BBFC: 12) 13-PG in Birmingham, trialled by the BBFC as 12A in Norwich, eventually re-released nationally once 12A was available, This Is England (BBFC felt it was borderline 15/18 they gave it an 18), Shane Meadows asked local councils to downgrade it, (see http://www.guardian.co.uk/film/filmblog/2007/apr/23/an18forthisisenglandthis ) some did, most didn't.
Film4 frightfest often asks it's local council for permission to show unrated films, they wouldn't issue permits for Human Centipede 2 until it had been seen by the BBFC. It was rushed through and I think we all know how that turned out...
Recently, there were proposals for any new release that shows smoking (in a modern context, with no clear disapproval - e.g. Skyfall) to be rated an 18 in Liverpool. http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/england/merseyside/8105585.stm if you're interested. I don't remember hearing anything about it so I'll assume it didn't happen...
I did not know that, thanks for the info. Sounds a bit crazy, but I can understand why people would suggest that.
Comments
The first Disney branded film to get a 12A was Pirates of the Caribbean, most Disney films before that were usually PG or U and even then only a handful have been rated 12A.
It did surprise that Men in Black 3 was PG as there was one use of the word shit, guess the BBFC is a bit more relaxed about language than the MPAA.
Another weird case was This Means War which was rated R originally by the MPAA because of the sexual humour but the distributor made cuts to make it PG-13 but the BBFC passed it in its original forms with no cuts,
Sorry, I was looking at the BBFC classifications list, under the assumption all were going to be released this year... Except the one's that were obviously old films being reclassified.
mega films on mega budgets they need to kids or they crash and burn taking whole studios with them..
Only in America, where a nation of people who love their guns and violence so much, allow teenagers and adults barely out of nappies to obtain guns who then use them on 6 yr old children, could a 15 certificate film be deemed to corrupt the youth.
"Shit" is far from uncommon in PG rated stuff anyway!
Funny thing as well though, is that in the US, the G rating is considered the kiss of death too, for live action films anyway. Apparently the MPAA has a policy of not giving live action films G ratings unless the distributor really, really wants it. Whereas plenty of live action films in this country get U ratings with no issue whatsoever!
Having said that, most of this years big hitters have been fairly cheap R rated films...
Sony TriStar (via Filmdistrict)'s Looper was made for $30m and has got a worldwide box office of $166,334,953.
Ben Affleck's R-rated Argo cost $44.5m and has made $159m
R-Rated Cloud Atlas has made 62 of it's $100m budget back, and it hasn't even opened in most of Europe, parts of South American and Asia... I'd be amazed if it made a decent profit, but I think it may slowly get all it's money back (which for "Germany's first blockbuster", is probably good enough)....
And, Django Unchained is definitely an 18 http://www.bbfc.co.uk/releases/django-unchained-2013-0
I'm reminded of an interview I read years ago with Paul Verhoeven where he spoke about his battle with the studio execs at Orion Pictures when he shot Robocop. According to Verhoeven, the studio gave Robocop back to him four times before it sent the film to the MPAA, Orion knowing all of Verhoeven's previous finished cuts would get an NC17. If Verhoeven was to make Robocop now, he'd be forced to make it a PG13 as the studio's bogeyman rating would the R.
Of course, for all the complaints and notoriety of the film 25 years ago, Robocop is now considered a classic. It's the sort of film Hollywood will never make again.
:eek:
Exactly. I couldn't have said it better myself. It's ALL about the box office these days and the number of bums on seats. Thank god for Shame, Dredd, The Raid, Lawless and Django Unchained but dear god we need more 18 rated films these days! Can't stand all these movies being released these days for the teen market who are the worst audience to be stuck in a cinema with!
Case in point - Jack Reacher. Not really a film for teens but loads more can go see it now. Should have been a 15 uncut, it was cut and it's now a 12A.
I wonder what the DVD release will be.
Would guess the dvd will be the edit, and the bluray will be the 15 cut.
The PG rating allows for a lot more swearwords than you'd think, and it has done since the 80's!
A lot of comedy films tends to be 15 rated, it's rare for a comedy to be lower than that apart from family comedies or romcoms.
The King's Speech contained 7 uses of the f word (way over the BBFC's working limit of 4) in an unusual context so the BBFC were presumably cautious and gave it a 15. The distributor appealed, and a 12A was given.
In the States it was given an R with no hope of appeal (the US board is very weird and doesn't normally take context into account), so a few profanities were muted and it got a PG-13.
The very fact the BBFC deemed The Kings Speech to be OK at 12 simply because the distributor appealed, shows it has no idea what it's doing, and is unable to apply any level of common sense.
And as for the MPAA, words fail me.
A bit off topic I know (so apologies in advance if you want to remove this), but going back through the thread and seeing V/H/S being mentioned reminded me about an event for V/H/S taking place on January 16th that my friend told me about. Not sure if anyone's interested, but the info is HERE.
Local councils may still change the classification of a film, though it is infrequent. Since 2000, I can think of only two examples Spider-man (BBFC: 12) 13-PG in Birmingham, trialled by the BBFC as 12A in Norwich, eventually re-released nationally once 12A was available, This Is England (BBFC felt it was borderline 15/18 they gave it an 18), Shane Meadows asked local councils to downgrade it, (see http://www.guardian.co.uk/film/filmblog/2007/apr/23/an18forthisisenglandthis ) some did, most didn't.
Film4 frightfest often asks it's local council for permission to show unrated films, they wouldn't issue permits for Human Centipede 2 until it had been seen by the BBFC. It was rushed through and I think we all know how that turned out...
Recently, there were proposals for any new release that shows smoking (in a modern context, with no clear disapproval - e.g. Skyfall) to be rated an 18 in Liverpool. http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/england/merseyside/8105585.stm if you're interested. I don't remember hearing anything about it so I'll assume it didn't happen...
So I'm assuming it was another one of those films local councils agreed to lower? The BBFC have no record of different versions of the film ever officially getting a 12A.
I can't remember any reports of Die Hard 4.0 being lowered to a 12A by councils, as far as i'm aware it was a 15 everywhere in the UK. The people claiming otherwise are definitely mistaken, possibly because they knew that the film was rated PG-13 in the US and so automatically assume that the film was a 12A (it was a very tame 15, so it's easy to see why people might think it was rated lower).
Die Hard 4 could have easily been a 12A but I imagine it would have involves cuts to language or violence. A Good Day to Die Hard I imagine Fox will try and get a 12A to widen its box office potential and audience.
In the end you're more or less left with nothing more than a panel of viewers who get a 'feeling' about what sort of category to put something in, and that's far from predictable, or even definitely repeatable, even using the same panel.
It must be a nightmare and I'm not in the least surprised that there are many anomalies and inconsistencies. I think generally these days the BBFC does as good a job as you have any right to expect, especially since the dark days of Ferman.
Regards
Mark
The BBFC doesn't consider appeals, the Video Appeals Committee does (my understanding is that it is independant of the BBFC), and 7 uses over 114 mins works out at 1 every 17 mins, hardly infrequent like the guidelines suggest it should be.
Also, The King's Speech was a problem for the BBFC because they hadn't seen anything like it before (from a classification perspective), so they classified according to their guidelines, but their guidelines hadn't been designed with situations like that in mind. My understanding is that they have now adapted their guidelines, incase another situation like that arises.
I did not know that, thanks for the info. Sounds a bit crazy, but I can understand why people would suggest that.