[Dixielandjazz] Fw: Why was the BG Movie so vapid?

[Phil Wilking]

Actually, that is not quite accurate.

In the late 1920's some motion pictures had gotten so "raunchy" that there 
was an active movement to establish a government censorship board similar to 
the British one. To stave off the government censors, the motion picture 
industry established its own self-censorship office, the so-called "Hayes" 
office.

The Hayes office restrictions were sometimes a bit overboard, that is true. 
All evil-doers had to come to a bad end by the end of the film, "ladies of 
the evening" (never whores) almost invariably had hearts of gold, married 
couples always had twin beds, no toilets were ever used (nor even shown in 
full view in bathrooms even if the scene was a father shaving while talking 
to his son), that sort of thing. The result was unrealistic many times, but 
points were still made through skillful writing by people who knew good 
English.

This lasted until Otto Preminger released "The Moon Is Blue" after World War 
2. He refused to take the word "virgin" out of the heroine's dialog (she 
bore a remarkable resemblance to a very young Debby Reynolds), the Hayes 
office refused to issue a seal of approval, he released the picture without 
it and it was a success. Thus the beginning of the trend toward the modern 
graphic "blood and guts and tits and asses" movies, with scripts churned out 
by those who can't even spell "subtlety" or "good taste," much less know 
what they mean. As contrasted with the late 1930's when the likes of F. 
Scott Fitzgerald were writing scripts.

"There is nothing new under the sun except the history you don't know," 
Harry S Truman.

Phil Wilking

Those who would exchange freedom for
security deserve neither freedom nor security.

----- Original Message ----- 
From: "Pat Ladd" <pj.ladd at btinternet.com>
>>>
>> It is only recently, as Hollywood pushes the censorship limits, that
>> we've come to accept real sex, graphic violence, complete freedom of
>> speech, the "F" word etc., etc., etc. in movies.
>>