Hollywood v. Hard Core
How the Struggle Over Censorship Created the Modern Film Industry
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- $27.99
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- $27.99
Publisher Description
A tale of censorship and regulation at the heart of the modern film industry
In 1972, The Godfather and Deep Throat were the two most popular films in the country. One, a major Hollywood studio production, the other an independently made "skin flick." At that moment, Jon Lewis asserts, the fate of the American film industry hung in the balance.
Spanning the 20th century, Hollywood v. Hard Core weaves a gripping tale of censorship and regulation. Since the industry's infancy, film producers and distributors have publicly regarded ratings codes as a necessary evil. Hollywood regulates itself, we have been told, to prevent the government from doing it for them. But Lewis argues that the studios self-regulate because they are convinced it is good for business, and that censorship codes and regulations are a crucial part of what binds the various competing agencies in the film business together.
Yet between 1968 and 1973 Hollywood films were faltering at the box office, and the major studios were in deep trouble. Hollywood's principal competition came from a body of independently produced and distributed films—from foreign art house film Last Tango in Paris to hard-core pornography like Behind the Green Door—that were at once disreputable and, for a moment at least, irresistible, even chic. In response, Hollywood imposed the industry-wide MPAA film rating system (the origins of the G, PG, and R designations we have today) that pushed sexually explicit films outside the mainstream, and a series of Supreme Court decisions all but outlawed the theatrical exhibition of hard core pornographic films. Together, these events allowed Hollywood to consolidate its iron grip over what films got made and where they were shown, thus saving it from financial ruin.
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Lewis's exhaustive history of censorship in American motion pictures starts off with a bang as he traces how the fledgling Motion Picture Association of America allied itself in 1947 with the House Committee on Un-American Activities to increase its power. The truth of the Hollywood adage "when they tell you it's not about the money... it's about the money" is repeatedly confirmed as Lewis demonstrates how the MPAA, which is supposed to serve as a watchdog for parents, really functions to promote big Hollywood business and discourage upstart independents. Lewis's chronicle of prominent skirmishes with the MPAA censors begins in the '50s (with The Moon Is Blue, Baby Doll and Tea and Sympathy) and continues into the '60s, when an X rating didn't necessarily indicate pornographic material (Midnight Cowboy, A Clockwork Orange, The Killing of Sister George), before moving into the present day (Eyes Wide Shut, Showgirls). The MPAA doesn't come off as an evil censor so much as a money-driven business concernDunlike Ted Turner, who apparently sabotaged the release of his own company's Crash and Bastard Out of Carolina because of his distaste for the projects. Only a fraction of the book covers the few years in the early 1970s when Hollywood was actually threatened by the popularity of hardcore films like The Devil in Miss Jones and Deep Throat. If there's a problem with Lewis's investigative report, it's that it is exhaustively complete: there is no detail too small to trace back a century, making it an outstanding reference but too detailed for most general readers. Photos throughout.
