moive assignment

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Hollywood Censorship

-1907 Chicago is first major to begin censorship of movies -1908 Mayor McClellan shuts down nickelodeons in New York -The movies raise cultural tensions between art and morality. -Progressivists spend their career teaching immigrants Protestant ethics (this is by no means strictly an American phenomena)

1915 the US Supreme Court ruled (Oliver Wendell Holmes in the majority): “some things should not have pictorial representation in public places.” (This decision remained in place for 40 years) What is driving censorship initiatives:

1) photoplays catered mainly to immigrants; sense of humor is seen as perverse 2) scandals in Hollywood, especially during the 1920s 3) coming of sound: images were no longer seen as indirect–dialogue made emotions very direct 4) Sophisticated urban “modernism” of the roaring twenties; decadence in Broadway shows and American and European literature 5) Depression/economics in the 1930s--country tended toward a more conservative mindset

In 1921 alone, over 100 anti-movie bills were introduced in State legislatures Scandals! -1921, Hollywood was hit by a series of scandals in the industry.

-Hollywood image was not only lascivious, but the Hollywood lifestyle was seen as well.

-$$$$$ Drugs, Sex, Perversions, Deceit, $$$$$

The Fatty Arbuckle Scandal was the first. St. Francis Hotel 1921 Virginia Rapped, a bottle of champagne, and a broken bed -Arbuckle acquitted, but his career was ruined.

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-February 1922 Director William Desmond Taylor found shot to death in his LA home. Murder suspects were Mary Miles Minter and Mabel Normand (both his lovers—triangle). Sex and drugs were apparently involved Normand acquitted but her career was ruined. Minter suffered the same demise (1981 she was found beaten, gagged and left for dead on her kitchen floor after a robbery in Santa Monica).

Hollywood needed a PR person—a censorship czar 1922 A new organization was formed: The Motion Picture Producers and Distributors of America (MPPDA). Will Hays elected as the head man.

-Formerly President Harding’s postmaster general and mid-western businessman. Moralist. He banned Arbuckle from the screen. -With this organization, the states did not censor as heavily.

Hays developed a thirteen-point agreement with the industry (little or no enforcement of these criteria).

-Films could not: deal with sex in an improper manner be about white slavery make vice attractive exhibit nakedness have prolonged passionate love scenes deal with the underworld deal with gambling and drunkeness in an attractive manner instruct the “weak” in methods of committing crime ridicule public officials offend religious beliefs emphasise violence portray vulgar postures and gestures use salacious subtitles or advertising. -But Hollywood didn’t pay much heed. For all the moralism in the US someone was still paying to see the bawdy Hollywood image

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-1927 the Hays formula was strengthened with a series of “Don’t and Be Carefuls” -MPPDA also set up Central Casting to protect all the young starlets (boys and girls) from the ravages of the casting couch -The moral clause was also introduced into the star’s contract 1929 The Catholics, led by Fathers Martin Quigley and Daniel Lord, recommended a formula for control to Will Hays

-With the Catholics new inclusions were added to the “Don’ts and Be Carefuls” -Now, “Particular Applications.” -It consisted of three principle additions: 1) No picture shall be produced where the sympathy of the audience aligns with the side of crime, wong doing, evil or sin 2) correct standards of life shall be presented 3) Law--natural or human--shall not be ridiculed

-1931 the battle continues between moralists and filmmakers

-Censorship people voted to stop Hollywood from producing gangster films. -Because of this Howard Hawks’ Scarface was reconstructed four times before finally being released in 1932 with a prologue line explaining the social significance of the film -Another key player arrives for the Catholics: Joseph Breen. -Irish Catholic, staunch anti-semite: blamed the Jew for what he saw has the perversion on the American screen(Tragic irony—anti-semite forcing the arm of Jewish studio moguls).

The films which finally pushed the Catholics over the ledge:

1) Mae West—career ruined 2)Cecil De Mille’s Sign of the Cross

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3) The gangster films: Public Enemy, Little Caesar, and Scarface: The Shame of a Nation

Combination of Cultural Forces Depression—1929

-1932-1933 a series of studies were conducted called the Payne Studies— sought to show the direct relationship between children’s violent behavior after attending the movies -1933--Catholics form the Legion of Decency--they see Hays as hypocritical -Millions of Catholics signed pledge to boycott films -The church announced that if a Catholic saw a condemned film it was considered a “mortal sin” (this lasted until the 1960s)

-On 13 June 1934, the Production Code Administration (PCA) was put into place

-Joe Breen as its director. -Every film made in Hollywood would have to now pass through the clearing house of the PCA—pre-production through the final cut. -If the studio ignored this procedure they would be fined and most likely denied access to exhibition. -Breen proudly stated at this point: “I am the code”

-After 1934, censorship was focused on the script

-Hundreds of revisions were completed on thousands of scripts In 1936 the PCA reviewed 1200 scripts and made 6,000 opinions

-Savvy film directors and producers learned how to get around the Code visually--visual double entendres— Lubitsch Touch--Trouble in Paradise -PCA is Hollywood’s first major cave-in to conservative movements— -Once sex and violence was cleaned up, moral and political ideology came next

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-Mayer stated: If you want to send a message send a telegram -Hollywood saw itself as somehow making strictly entertainment--as if that was not ideological -Studios, under the watchful eye of the PCA, agreed not to make anything “subversive”: lynchings, strikes, anti-capitalist films, communist polemics, etc

One of the few producers to fight the censorship rulings was Walter Wanger

-A direct line can be drawn from the Catholic involvement in Hollywood to Senator Joe McCarthy’s witch-hunts in the 1950s -In fact, in 1938, the Legion of Decency began to name subversives in Hollywood

-Joe Breen remained in office until 1954. In the same year he received a special Academy Award for his “contributions” to the industry.