Too Violent? Too Late.

Christopher Tookey of The Daily Mail seems to have highlighted something that I think we all know has some truth ...

"Anyone who thinks violent pornography is harmless and cathartic is deluded. The rise of the internet means any one country’s attempt to maintain some minimal standards of decency can be of only limited effectiveness.

Differences of culture means there will always be some country in which selling this kind of pornography will be not only permitted, but encouraged. There is more money than ever to be made out of exploiting people’s weaknesses and perversions.

However, there can be no doubt the BBFC’s refusal to grant an 18 certificate to the few films it has stood up to must have made those productions less profitable and decreased their availability. "

Read the whole article: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2055937/Christopher-Tookey-Its-just-internet-thats-violent-porn--cinemas.html#ixzz1cYDbaer7

I think it is quite clear that what was deemed an 18-rated film way back in the 90's and, even, the 80's would now be deemed a 15. Many have been changed sicne their release to DVD but I think what it is determining, is the inevitable change in attitude towards an 18-rated film. It used to be an 18 had adult content, now it seems that it is a film with something particularly offensive - you know that, if it is rated 18, you can expect something to shock or use something in a gratutious way. The Passion of the Christ, Saw, Grindhouse, Inglourious Basterds, Hostel and Eastern Promises. I'll bet, without thinking, we can all pin-point the moment/scene the films moved from to 18-rated material.

But, take Zodiac (rated 15), though not gratutious in its use of violence ... it is adult in its content of a serial-killer investigation (SPOILER: Of a killer who may/may not be still out there...) and some scenes hint enough to get under your skin. I would argue moreso than many of the 18-rated films above. Shutter Island, though not gratuituous, there is enough to deem it 'adult' in its nature to garner it an 18 certificate - psychological madness, corrupted-protaganists, murder, child death, depiction of fire on a body, etc.

As an adult, I will happily watch violent films (unlike Tookey, who seems to believe it is wrong) - I watched every Saw film theatrically - but, we must be realistic about how the BBFC has changed in recent years and consider the reasons why... and the repurcussions.

To Editorial of To Advertorial?

I have recently added the Pulse App to my phone and, in the process of adding new feeds, I added Dave Chen's always-interesting blog. Unfortunately, my app seems to have stalled at end-of-October 2009 for some unclear reason on his blog. Without knowing the date, I read through some interesting articles about a situation and negative comments on the use of advertorials (aka, Editorials paid for to advertise a product) -

"I'm not inherently opposed to the idea of advertorials; in essence, I think any form of experimentation with monetization is not only healthy for our industry, but necessary given the economic climate we live in, although the execution of paid elements like advertorials is key."

You can read the full post here - and it truly is fascinating!

The idea of the film critic online community having such conflict simply amazes me. In fairness, this was years ago and the credability of such an argument is long gone, but it is interesting to consider how even when /film and a range of other sites started off there must've been a certain element of balancing business with true criticism. Thats not to say they took hand-outs but how exactly does a blog move from the small-scale to the big-time? Not to mention the ton of adverts on the film sites anyway ... and, especially now, how often do we see posts on "news-sites" highlighting the cheaper price of products?

You have to question how much is, in effect, adverts. Even coverage on a topic gives something - already with millions put into the publicity - more coverage. The whole point of free-previews is part-payment for coverage ... only recently Empire tweeted how some hot-teachers arrived to their office handing out Bad Teacher on Blu-Ray to the staff. Free advertising across twitter and, who knows, maybe something in the magazine?

Take out the fact that payment does not have to be solid-cash, and you realise that when anything successful determines an audience, it has to 'sell-out' to stay ahead of their own competitors.

In effect, it's all advertising ...

Is There An Anti-Spielberg Trend?

Phil Hoad, on The Guardian, seems to jump on the Spielberg-bashing band-wagon by writing a small piece about whether 'Spielberg has lost his Mojo'.

"Is it true? Is the main man's career headed for the great script conference in the sky? It's arguable. He's still raking in the big bucks; among recent works, only Munich went close to a loss. But he had a patchy noughties: by my count, two successes, both in sci-fi (Minority Report, War of the Worlds); one middling film (Catch Me if You Can); three washouts (Indy, AI, Munich). I haven't seen The Terminal, but that doesn't alter what looks like a pretty indifferent hand. Even supporters of the new Tintin made constant mention of atoning for Crystal Skull, and how the adaptation was the real successor to the vintage Indiana Jones adventures. The real reference points for Spielberg, worryingly, seem to be in the past." 

The irony is how The Adventures of Tintin has come up Number #1 across Europe with mid-to-positive press reviews - 85% on Rotten Tomatoes. It seems The Guardian are the only newspaper trashing it so much (Xan Brooks and Peter Bradshaw both giving the film 2/5).

At any rate, I enjoyed it, and I will continue to sing it's praises ...

Across the Blogosphere...

I've been busy this Half-Term. Covering a few films at The London Film Festival, continuing the Star Wars posts for Man, I Love Films, managing to watch a special screening of The Matrix and even squeezing in an analysis on the new Tintin film! I have also tried to re-organise some of the scroll-down menu's if you wanted to see some analysis of some other films - in fact, I wanted to re-release the analysis of the Saw films, but decided against it.

But, blogs continue to build with posts coming from every angle so of course I have been reading a few and I thought I'd highlight a couple...

We Have A Pope/Habemus Papam (Nanni Moretti, 2011)

*This is part of my London Film Festival 2011 coverage. Four Films, Four Days ...

Introduction

My parents brought me up as a Catholic. I vividly recall the weekly services, reflective Homily and transubstantiation. What I have no recollection of is the excitement and tradition of an election of a new Pope. Pope John Paul II began his papacy in 1978 - six years before I was even born - and by the time he died in 2005, and Pope Benedict X began his, I was finishing my University degree and Catholicism had taken a back-seat in my life. Having said that, what made Dan Brown's Angels and Demons novel interesting was the context of the conclave the film was set within - that and the Bernini art references in Rome littered throughout.