Hardest PG Films

[Gulftastic]

Due to the brief appearance of bush 'Revenge Of The Nerds' was an 18 back in the day. I think it's a 15 now. Rape scene and all.

[greenman]

I'm guessing that outside of the aforementioned martial arts implements and female body parts you had less of a checklist kind of mentality to the BBFC back in the day and the tone of the film would be a bigger factor so Temple of Doom being mostly a fairly light hearted adventure could get away with more.

[Noodle Lizard]

I used to have an official book of BBFC guidelines, and it always fascinated me how arbitrary some of them were.  Very specific ways you can use the word "cunt" in a 15, for instance, or drug use in a 12 so long as no positive consequences are seen.

Then again, they flouted their own criteria pretty often.  According to that book, an erect penis would qualify as an instant R18 (only sold in porn shops, basically), but there have been plenty of examples where that's not been the case.  I think they specify "so long as it is not intended to titilate", which goes to show you just how arbitrary the whole thing is. 

Still baffles me that it's an actual government institution.  Say what you will about the MPAA (and there's a lot to say), at least they don't have any official control over what people can produce or watch in the US.

[drdad]

Still baffles me that it's an actual government institution.  Say what you will about the MPAA (and there's a lot to say), at least they don't have any official control over what people can produce or watch in the US.

Someone may correct me on this but I understood that the BBFC only has official control over home media and that cinema certificates are still advisory, the ultimate responsibility for cinema exhibition falling with the local authority. Or has this changed in recent years?

[Noodle Lizard]

Someone may correct me on this but I understood that the BBFC only has official control over home media and that cinema certificates are still advisory, the ultimate responsibility for cinema exhibition falling with the local authority. Or has this changed in recent years?

As far as I'm aware, no film is allowed to be broadcast or otherwise distributed in the UK without the BBFC taking a look at it first, and if they refuse certification or make cuts or whatever, that's what goes.  I think it only applies to films and home video, though, TV has its own regulatory system - though if a TV show gets a home video release, each episode (and each extra feature, including commentaries) will have to be rated by the BBFC.  And that gets quite expensive, hence the amount of barebones UK DVDs.

[Shit Good Nose]

Someone may correct me on this but I understood that the BBFC only has official control over home media and that cinema certificates are still advisory, the ultimate responsibility for cinema exhibition falling with the local authority. Or has this changed in recent years?

As far as I'm aware, no film is allowed to be broadcast or otherwise distributed in the UK without the BBFC taking a look at it first, and if they refuse certification or make cuts or whatever, that's what goes.  I think it only applies to films and home video, though, TV has its own regulatory system - though if a TV show gets a home video release, each episode (and each extra feature, including commentaries) will have to be rated by the BBFC.  And that gets quite expensive, hence the amount of barebones UK DVDs.

It's true that no film is allowed to be shown or distributed without having a BBFC certification (as Noodle Lizard says TV is a bit of a different ballgame).  However, it's also true that local authorities, legally, still have the final say and can overrule a BBFC decision.  BUT that would only be to cut a film further or ban it outright (most famously Life of Brian being banned outright in Bournemouth until a few years ago).  The local authority would not, for example, be allowed to show any of the Italian cannibal films with all the animal cruelty put back in, because that would be against the law (more of that below).  But LAs overruling the BBFC doesn't really happen these days, mainly because most of them don't have the departments or staff any more - I know of a couple of LAs where, on paper, this sort of stuff has been passed to their trading standards departments, but it's not even on their priorities list, let alone at the bottom of it - they've got far more important things to worry about, like takeaways using rotten rat meat and dodgy toys held together with razor blades.  Having said that, there was that case fairly recently where a music documentary was given a 15 due to language, but the LA for the town the doc focuses on reduced that to a PG or 12 without any cuts because they felt it was a very important piece of work that every local (including children) should see.

Some independent cinemas still occasionally show films fully uncut, or that are banned, and/or otherwise uncertificated, reminiscent of the old cinema clubs of the 70s and early 80s where they would show hardcore porn, A Clockwork Orange, The Exorcist, Cannibal Holocaust etc and, as they are technically acting illegally, they're open to being raided and shut down, but like the trading standards departments the police have more important things to concentrate on.

Still baffles me that it's an actual government institution.  Say what you will about the MPAA (and there's a lot to say), at least they don't have any official control over what people can produce or watch in the US.

It's not quite as simple as that and, if anything, the MPAA is even worse than the BBFC.  Don't get me wrong, I absolutely abhor censorship - any films that are cut over here (even for the animal cruelty) I will ALWAYS buy the uncut DVD or blu ray from whichever country has it uncut.  Not that I'm defending animal cruelty (and these days, what with CGI and that, there is absolutely NO excuse to continue to do it for real), I just HATE censorship and I want to see things fully uncut.  BUT I always defend the BBFC because they do a difficult job well and are one of the most lenient censorship authorities on the planet (we're a LONG way from the darkest days of the Ferman BBFC, when he would cut of ban films just because he didn't like them or they offended him, even if his board thought the films were otherwise fine - The Exorcist being the prime example).  The difference is that we are (I believe) the only developed country in the western world where there is a legal requirement above and beyond censorship - the Video Recordings Act, brought in and passed by a bunch of clueless MPs based on things that didn't actually exist and Mary Whitehouse (glad she's dead, cunt) and her lot moral high grounding everyone.  Because of that, we don't have the option to see or buy films uncertificated, like almost every other country in the west.  But if you actually step back and compare the BBFC to the MPAA in America, or the FSK in Germany, or Spain which still has remnants of Franco's Supreme Censorship Board in effect, they are incredibly lenient - they typically don't, for example, cut for political or religious subject matter, whilst most other countries are very hot on that - the difference is, again, that in those countries you can pop along to the nearest HMV equivalent and buy the uncertificated version of a film just as easily as the censored certificated one.  We can't do that over here because of the VRA laws.

We've also become quite American in recent years with the introduction of the 12A (the worst thing to happen to UK filmgoing since the VRA was introduced), which has resulted in more studio cuts (from BBFC advice) to achieve a lower rating to maximise profit.  So you have studios now cutting films to get a 15 instead of an 18, or a 12/12A instead of a 15, which is something that happens routinely in the States.  It didn't really happen much here until the 12A came in (ironically introduced as a result of local authority shenanigans with one of the Spidermen films), but when it did the number of films cut increased massively.  This is something the BBFC gets masses of stick for, but all they're doing in those cases is advising the distributor based on what rating that distributor wants.  Example:
Distributor - here's The Equalizer (Denzel one).  Rate it please.
BBFC - hello distributor.  We have rated The Equalizer 18 for violence, with no cuts.
Distributor - ooooohhhh....what do we need to do to get a 15?
BBFC - here is a list of cuts required to achieve a 15.
Distributor - thanks.  We will cut it and re-submit for a 15.
BBFC - we have noted your cuts and have now rated the film a 15.

You can't really hold that against the BBFC.

[Sebastian Cobb]

How often in practice does the UK get a different cut to the US/rest of Europe? Are we that big a market?

The idea of the BBFC getting a say on stuff on the internet is a terrifying prospect.

[Noodle Lizard]

I don't have an issue with distributors cutting films to get a lower rating (well, I do, but I agree it's not the BBFC's fault), but I do have an issue with the fact that, unlike the MPAA, if the BBFC refuses to classify or pass a film uncut, it essentially becomes illegal to own or show.  Granted, your chances of getting in any trouble for that are small, and with the internet all it really achieves is ensuring that nobody can pay to watch it in the UK.  It's the principle that's important.

And while they ostensibly don't cut or ban for political reasons, they do have restrictions which are open to a hell of a lot of subjective interpretation (e.g. banning a documentary for "glorifying" football hooliganism, Grotesque because they didn't think the sadism was "justified").

The MPAA itself is ridiculous, hypocritical and greatly favors the studio system, but they're not a government body and nowadays their nonsense only really affects movies made within the studio system anyway.  With more and more avenues opening up for distribution, they're becoming less and less important.  In theory, a film has never needed an MPAA certification to be shown in the US - the issue only exists because most major cinemas and retailers won't carry films that aren't.

How often in practice does the UK get a different cut to the US/rest of Europe? Are we that big a market?

The idea of the BBFC getting a say on stuff on the internet is a terrifying prospect.

Surprisingly often.  The BBFC has specific problems with things like headbutting and other "imitable" actions that other countries don't seem bothered by.  They've also a bit weird about things that might make a film too intense - for instance, The Woman In Black needed to have bits darkened and sound effects toned down or removed in some parts to get a 12A.  Since moving to the US and rewatching some films I knew well, I was surprised by some of the things that were different in the UK version.

[Sebastian Cobb]

I thought personal ownership of an unclassified film was still legal, just distribution or showing made it illegal.

I suppose that means that technically, when cinemas show shoestring films from the local art college or put short films on before the feature these are technically illegal as they've not been classified.

[Noodle Lizard]

I thought personal ownership of an unclassified film was still legal, just distribution or showing made it illegal.

Yeah, what I meant by owning was "being able to buy".  I don't think there are any specific laws against importing a copy of a banned film from another country - or if there are, they're completely unenforceable.

[Sebastian Cobb]

I think Australia are pretty cagey on that. I'm basing it on one of those customs tv shows were some bloke came into the country with a cd wallet chock full of porn dvd's and they went through it with a fine-toothed comb as while bringing grot into the country is legal, Australia has pretty strict rules on smut (at one point they tried to ban small breasts because nonces might like them).

[Shit Good Nose]

I don't have an issue with distributors cutting films to get a lower rating (well, I do, but I agree it's not the BBFC's fault), but I do have an issue with the fact that, unlike the MPAA, if the BBFC refuses to classify or pass a film uncut, it essentially becomes illegal to own or show.

But that's because of the VRA law, which was passed by central government, not the BBFC, which is just tasked with enforcing it.  If we didn't have the VRA law (which also covers films shown at the cinema), we'd have exactly the same system as they have in the States, and indeed as we did have before the VRA was passed.

[Noodle Lizard]

But that's because of the VRA law, which was passed by central government, not the BBFC, which is just tasked with enforcing it.  If we didn't have the VRA law (which also covers films shown at the cinema), we'd have exactly the same system as they have in the States, and indeed as we did have before the VRA was passed.

Well yes, but the two go hand in hand as you say.  I suppose the BBFC, to me, represents a government of a "free country" enforcing what its public can and can't watch - especially fictional entertainment.  I know it's not exactly 1984 dystopia in practice, but it's still far from ideal.

[Small Man Big Horse]

Babe: Pig In The City has a U rating and it's loaded tits to trotters with distressing images and bad old vibes.

Narrative that just lays into everyone. Disaster upon disaster. Shit luck all roads and directions. Pitiless and relentless. Dogs hanging off bridges. Folk clattering down wells. It's all your fault, over and over. Fuck me. It's an amazing film, one of my very favourite films ever made,* but it's not a U.


* Wasn't always one of my very favourite films ever made. By fuck. Like everyone else, I hated it at the time. Thought it was fucking horrible. Most folk thought it was fucking horrible. Leonard Klady got it ("Tour-de-force filmmaking"), and Roger Ebert got it ("A wonderment lolling in its enchanting images... Literate, humane, wicked"), but everyone else thought it was fucking turnip. Peter Stark's review for the San Francisco Chronicle was far more in tune with the consensus:

"A desperate, pathetic mess... Much too dark and cruel for children."

If the IMDB reviews from the time are anything to go by, that's how audiences were feeling too:

"Dark, depressing, disjointed and unfit for ANY type of viewing, much less family viewing." (J.S. Bricker Jr.)

"There were scenes that upset me to the point of near tears and I am an adult. I think taking a child to see this movie would be a huge mistake." (Candy-10)

"I have never forgotten some kids crying because of what they were seeing and outraged parents storming out of the theatre and complaining LOUDLY that this was not a kids film. The original had dark moments but nothing like what we see here." (Wayne Malin)

"The cute pig and sweet singing mice did not offset the disturbing, vile nature of the film. [...] There were countless scenes of cruelty and violence - maimings and barbarism. The film is a sick parody of a children's movie." (Chaz-19)

And so on and so forth.

Dunno if they're still there or not, those reviews, I grabbed them before IMDB blasted its message boards to bejeesus for I was for writing about it, is why. Writing about Babe: Pig In The City. Could write about it for days. Never finished what I started, mind you, but that's my fault, not the film's fault. Enough going on in the film to fill a hundred journals a dozen times over. Babe by way of Baudrillard, like. And that's only the half of it. Fucking hell.

One of Tom Waits's  favourite films, by the chat.

Anyway, sorry, you're looking Hardest PGs and I'm swinging a Hardest U about. But Pig In The City should be a hardest PG. Dunno how it isn't.

I hated it upon release as well, after loving the first and expecting to see something equally as joyous, only to emerge from the cinema in the same confused state as I did after Cronenberg's Crash. I'm sure if I rewatched it knowing how harrowing it is I'd enjoy it, but I've yet to do so.

It's great and everyone who thinks different can just go away.

Seriously though, it's very enjoyable.

I just wanted to echo the love for Biggles here, really liked it as a kid, rewatched it a few years ago and liked it even more.

[Shit Good Nose]

I don't think there are any specific laws against importing a copy of a banned film from another country - or if there are, they're completely unenforceable.

You're right, there aren't - it's entirely legal to import stuff which is cut or banned in the UK from countries where it isn't (as long as it's not child porn, beastiality etc, obvs) - you can very easily get most of it from Amazon UK - as personal imports are outside of the BBFC's remit.  In those cases there ARE laws which specifically forbid you from showing that material in public ("exhibited to a group of people", which ostensibly means in cinemas, but the small print of the relating American federal law does go far as intimating that you can't even show it to anyone other than yourself), but that goes more into copyright law and, as you say, is impossible to enforce anyway.

[popcorn]

Can someone summarise what is so harrowing about Pig in the City?

[Catalogue Trousers]

Big Trouble In Little China was a PG on its first UK release - heads smashed through planks, people slashed with cleavers, decomposing bodies, exploding bodies (albeit played for laughs there), impalings between the eyes...

It's been a 15 for years now, for some reason...

[Phoenix Lazarus]

It always struck me as mental that the original Star Wars trilogy and Episode I were all rated U. Scenes of implied torture, dismemberment (bloody too, in Star Wars), murder, sex slavery. In films rated U. Bonkers.

In the 1977 one, Darth Vadar lifts a man off his feet, then breaks his neck by constricting it with both hands-we hear the bones crunching. 

[DukeDeMondo]

Can someone summarise what is so harrowing about Pig in the City?

Well, it starts with our beloved Farmer Hoggett breaking himself in bits by falling down a well, an accident for which Babe is held accountable (Babe is held accountable for almost everything bad that happens in the film, and that's a lot of bad). Next the Bank Boys are battering at the door threatening to take the whole farm away because the Hoggetts are falling behind on their rent. Before we know it Babe and Mrs Hoggett are having to race off to take part in a sheep-herding competition held in some unspecified far-off city, en route to which Mrs Hoggett is subjected to a humiliating round of searching and prodding because a bored sniffer dog lied about her carrying drugs.

The city itself, when they finally get there, soon reveals itself to be a snarling, inhospitable nowhere-zone of a place, a Baudrillardian nightmare battered together from bits and pieces of other cities and populated almost entirely by thugs and cheats and cons and murderers. Babe and Mrs Hoggett end up staying at a dark, wonkily constructed hotel full of doors open just a bit and eyeballs watching you wherever you turn. Within minutes of their arrival (far as screen time goes), Babe is kidnapped by an old clown played by Mickey Rooney, who will eventually need to be hospitalised after falling into a coma; Mrs Hoggett is arrested after being harassed in the street; Babe is tormented by a gang of thieving chimpanzees and chased by a shower of wild dogs; a dog near dies by hanging after falling off a bridge; so on and on and so forth.

But it's not just the what happens, although it's certainly partly that. It's how. The relentless pace of it. The sadism of it (the palpable delight it takes in lingering on the image of the near-dead dog dangling from the bridge, for example). The nightmarish look of it. Andrew Lesnie's cinematography is phenomenal. Looks like a Jean-Pierre Jeunet film, half the time, but this is a Jean-Pierre Jeunet film in the key of Delicatessen, we're talking.

Prior to Fury Road I would have said it's George Miller's best film. Post-Fury Road, I'm not so sure. But it's my favourite of his films, I know that.

Return To Oz is rated PG and it's nowhere near as dark as Pig In The City.

Hardest PiG, maybe, a man might say.

[Gulftastic]

The pit bull chase in Babe 2 is bloody terrifying

[goinggoinggone]

BTTF1 has a lot of nasty shit that surprised me when I rewatched it. George fondling the bras, repeated swearing, the Libyans letting loose on Doc somewhat graphically, the implication of the Libyans in general.

Just be grateful this scene was left on the cutting room floor...

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fR9XmI6hDII

[goinggoinggone]

Let's be honest, most PG rated films pre-12A were hardly "kids fare".  The Fifth Element has mild nudity that is depicted innocently enough, but then it also has a scene where Chris Tucker gives forced oral sex to an air stewardess, which wouldn't fly now (no pun intended) and to be honest, as a 14 year old I thought it was a bit strong at the time.

I always found it strange that back in the 80's, "Oscar baity" films like The Mission, Greystoke and the critically reviled Revolution were all PGs, despite the fact that they probably bored the arse off most kids.  Imagine going to the cinema to watch any of those, only to find that a stupid parent had brought a children's party full of kids to them...

even weirder, one of the main characters in Revolution is a peado!

[goinggoinggone]

Now that I think of it, Chariots of Fire (the film that spurned those Oscar bait Goldcrest films) got a U certificate, despite the fact that it's boring enough for adults, nevermind kids.

[drdad]

It's true that no film is allowed to be shown or distributed without having a BBFC certification (as Noodle Lizard says TV is a bit of a different ballgame).  However, it's also true that local authorities, legally, still have the final say and can overrule a BBFC decision.  BUT that would only be to cut a film further or ban it outright (most famously Life of Brian being banned outright in Bournemouth until a few years

Didn't the GLC famously allow The Texas Chainsaw Massacre to be shown when it was refused a BBFC certificate?

And, hailing from Bournemouth myself, I seem to recall the council slapping an 'X' certificate on Life of Brian, rather than outright banning it. This did result in it not being shown due to some technicality of distribution, though.

[thecuriousorange]

Charlie Chaplin's character takes cocaine in Modern Times (1936) and that's rated a bloody U.

https://youtu.be/3ykdb8Zen-o

[Shit Good Nose]

Didn't the GLC famously allow The Texas Chainsaw Massacre to be shown when it was refused a BBFC certificate?

And, hailing from Bournemouth myself, I seem to recall the council slapping an 'X' certificate on Life of Brian, rather than outright banning it. This did result in it not being shown due to some technicality of distribution, though.

Not sure about Texas Chainsaw Massacre (a film I've, famously, never really "got" - superb production and set design aside, I've always thought it to be a terribly acted and scripted piece of C grade boredom), but in the case of Bournemouth and Brian, if memory serves (someone can correct or confirm) Bournemouth council at the time had a blanket ban on all films with an X certificate, so the fact that the local councillors lobbied for it to be slapped with an X (when most others were happy with the BBFC's AA) showed they knew exactly what they were doing.  The joke being, of course, that you could just nip along to the next LA area and see it easily (another reason LAs don't tend to flex their censorship muscles much these days).

Charlie Chaplin's character takes cocaine in Modern Times (1936) and that's rated a bloody U.

https://youtu.be/3ykdb8Zen-o

Yeah, but cocaine was still in most soft drinks back then.

[drdad]

Not sure about Texas Chainsaw Massacre (a film I've, famously, never really "got" - superb production and set design aside, I've always thought it to be a terribly acted and scripted piece of C grade boredom), but in the case of Bournemouth and Brian, if memory serves (someone can correct or confirm) Bournemouth council at the time had a blanket ban on all films with an X certificate, so the fact that the local councillors lobbied for it to be slapped with an X (when most others were happy with the BBFC's AA) showed they knew exactly what they were doing.  The joke being, of course, that you could just nip along to the next LA area and see it easily (another reason LAs don't tend to flex their censorship muscles much these days).

I can confirm we definitely got 'X' films in Bournemouth. Apparently the distributor refused to show the film anywhere the 'AA' certificate was changed. Seems an odd decision but maybe they thought a  outright 'ban' would excite more interest in the film so punters would rush to see it in Poole.

[Ambient Sheep]

Yeah! PG and all that stuff didn't come in until 1982, before then it was U, A (5+), AA (14+) and X (18+)

Although https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_British_film_certificates doesn't say so, it's my very distinct recollection that A meant you had to be Accompanied by an adult if you were under 14 (in fact, until now that's what I thought the "A" stood for, there was a sign on the cinema wall explaining it).

Certainly at my local cinema you couldn't get in to see an A unless you had a grown-up with you.  Whether that was something enforced by just that particular cinema, or just that local council, or the whole cinema chain (Odeon) in general, or everybody (and Wikipedia is wrong/incomplete) I don't know.

But since I was aged 5 to 17 at the time that the A certificate existed, my memory on that is, I like to think, pretty firm.  As was the fact that when it changed from A to PG, kids no longer needed to drag their parents along -- something that Wikipedia in fact hints at when it says "The A certificate was replaced by PG, which was now completely advisory." (emphasis mine).


Hmmm, looking again it says that from 1950 to 1970 some councils did use it to mean that... so perhaps some of them carried that over until the 1982 revision.  Either that or I learnt the rule as a 4yo or 5yo just before the 1970 change and never realised it had been revoked but that seems unlikely... I still remember that sign on the wall.

Hmmm, anyone else of a certain age remember?

[studpuppet]

The three Lord Of The Rings films are PG, 12A and 12A, and The Lion The Witch & The Wardrobe from around the same time is also a PG. I think certainly for the latter it was seen as a kids' book and so certified accordingly, but there's mad insane (admittedly mostly 'bloodless') battle scenes in all of them.

I know that Flash Gordon was an 'A' when it came out, because my mum went to the video rental shop and accidentally hired Flesh Gordon instead. Hilarity ensued...

[Noodle Lizard]

The three Lord Of The Rings films are PG, 12A and 12A, and The Lion The Witch & The Wardrobe from around the same time is also a PG. I think certainly for the latter it was seen as a kids' book and so certified accordingly, but there's mad insane (admittedly mostly 'bloodless') battle scenes in all of them.

I think the first LOTR came out before the 12A came in.  Same with the first couple of Harry Potters.  Also, the "censors" (for lack of a better word) are far more forgiving of violence if it's inflicted among fictional creatures and the blood isn't red.  But for some reason they're still proper draconian about fictional creatures shagging with green jizz.