Schirmer Encyclopedia of Film
A system of film censorship existed in the United States
as early as 1907, when it was introduced in Chicago
under pressure from social reformers. The rapid emergence of the nickelodeons gave rise to concerns not only
about the fire hazards within them, but also the content
of films being viewed by unaccompanied children in
these darkened venues. In Chicago an ordinance decreed
that all films within the city had to be screened first to
the police for approval. Similar concerns existed wherever
the nickelodeons emerged and, in New York one proprietor was arrested for projecting a film to children that
showed a Chinese opium den. On Christmas Eve in
1908, the New York City police commissioner, as part
of his tough stance on nickelodeons, revoked the licenses
of 550 such film venues, requiring them to apply for a
new entertainment license. The film industry, then based
in New York, funded a Board of Censorship for the city
in March 1909. As more states adopted a practice of film
censorship, the US film industry formed its own national
regulatory body, the National Association of the Motion
Picture Industry, in 1916. This failed to satisfactorily
control the content of film, and in 1921 the Motion
Picture Producers and Distributors of America was created, an association fronted by Will Hays, formerly
the US Postmaster General. This too failed to establish
the desired control, and under pressure from the Roman
Catholic Church, the Production Code, a list of guidelines and prohibitions developed from Hays’s earlier
unsuccessful thirty-six rules, was adopted on 31 March
1930. The code was prepared by a Catholic layman,
Martin Quigley, and a Jesuit priest, Father Daniel Lord; supervised by Hays, it was referred to as the Hays
Code. The Code operated as a guide to film companies
as to what was allowed in a film; any film that contained
prohibited images or dialogue was denied a Code Seal
and was therefore unable to receive distribution or exhibition through the companies that were part of the
Motion Picture Producers and Distributors of America
(MPPDA).
The years 1930 to 1934, which preceded the Code’s
effective enforcement, are known as the ‘‘pre-Code’’
period in US cinema. Censorship in this period was
markedly lax, with films such as Frankenstein (1931),
The Sign of the Cross (1932), Blonde Venus (1932),
Scarface (1932), She Done Him Wrong (1933), and Baby
Face (1933) pushing the boundaries of permissible film
content with stories focused on horror, sex, gangsters,
and religion. The Hays Code was ridiculed for its inability to enforce censorship; American Catholics began a
crusade against Hollywood in 1933, and the newly
formed Catholic Legion of Decency placed films on its
own ‘‘banned’’ list. To appease such a powerful body, in
July 1934 a tougher Code was applied under the new
control of the Production Code Adminstration and its
chief, Joseph Breen. Films such as Blonde Venus and Baby
Face were categorized as Class I movies, which meant
they were removed immediately from distribution and
with the view they would never again be released.
A period of tightly regulated Hollywood production
followed, with figures such as Mae West and the cartoon
character Betty Boop losing their appeal as their overt
sexuality was constrained or erased. Films were still capable of generating controversy: Scarlet Street (1945), The
Outlaw (1943), and Baby Doll (1956) were condemned,
and in places banned, for their immorality. Baby Doll,
a story of lust, sexual repression, and seduction scripted
by Tennessee Williams, was described in a Time magazine
review as ‘‘the dirtiest American-made motion picture
that has ever been legally exhibited.’’ Cinemas exhibiting the film were picketed, while clergymen attempted
to record the names of any parishioners who attended
screenings. The city of Aurora, Illinois, complained that
the film was ‘‘scandalous, indecent, immoral, lewd, and
obscene,’’ and successfully managed to bar its local
exhibition. Clearly, state and municipal authorities were
still able to exert their power to censor and prohibit the
exhibition of particular films. In 1965 a Supreme Court
decision, Freedman v. The State of Maryland, declared
this practice unconstitutional, and by 1981 state and
local film boards had disappeared.
In the 1960s an influx of foreign films with a stronger adult content, and the emergence of a postclassical
Hollywood, with a new wave of directors drawn to a
more aggressive and ‘‘truthful’’ cinema, rendered the
old Code system unusable. The Production Code was
dismantled in 1968, and a ratings system was introduced
in its place. This system had four classifications ranging
from ‘‘G’’ (Suggested for General Audiences) through ‘‘X’’
(Persons Under 16 Not Admitted; the age was increased to
17 in 1972). The ‘‘X’’-rating was associated predominantly with films of a pornographic nature, and for some
there was a stigma attached to receiving the classification.
The art film Henry & June (1990) became the first film to
receive the new ‘‘NC-17’’ rating, designed to distance
certain films with explicit sexual content from any associations with pornography. Nevertheless, some ‘‘NC-17’’–rated
films, such as Kids (1995) and Requiem for a Dream (2000),
retained the stigma, with the major video-rental chains,
Blockbuster and Hollywood, refusing to carry such titles.