Rather than have one designated film critic, we're going to ask all of you to share your thoughts and insights on the films you've seen here, so others can benefit from your experience. Of course, we won't be reviewing any "R" or "NC-17"-rated films, and we will limit the films that are reviewed to those that fit within the standards outlined in the "For the Strength of Youth" pamphlet and in the 13th Article of Faith ("virtuous, lovely, or of good report, or praiseworthy").
If you're very familiar with my taste in films, you might guess that "Of course" there really bugged me. Not that I seek out racy movies or anything, but about 1 in 3 of my very favorite movies of all time just happens to carry an R rating. My tastes in movies definitely fall a little on the "arthouse/foreign film" side of things (though I still enjoy a good action flick as much as the next guy). But what good is a movie review site that, right up-front, leaves out 1 in 3 movies I absolutely wouldn't have wanted to miss? So I took what seemed to be the rational course of action at the time... I wrote the editors of MormonTimes.com.
I just read about your forthcoming website, MormonTimes.com. I think it's a fine idea, and I like the idea of "community reviews" for movies instead of from a designated film critic.
However, I feel compelled to write about your stated policy that no "R" rated movies will be reviewed. I fully agree with and endorse the views expressed in "For the Strength of Youth," which you referred to in your story. From that pamphlet, I quote: "Choose only entertainment and media that uplift you. ... While much entertainment is good, ... offensive material is often found. ... Such entertainment (can make) what is wrong and evil look normal and exciting." It goes on to list the criterion we should use in deciding what worthy entertainment is: "Do not attend, view, or participate in entertainment that is vulgar, immoral, violent, or pornographic in any way. Do not participate in entertainment that in any way presents immorality or violent behavior as acceptable."
I feel these are clear and inspired guidelines on what entertainment a person should choose for themselves. However, a key point of emphasis in this pamphlet (and indeed in the entire gospel) is that we must learn to make such life choices ourselves. This underlies my objection to basing the movie reviews in any way upon MPAA rating. The MPAA movie ratings are not created by people who share our values, and they can hardly be relied upon to judge between those films which will encourage moral understanding and responsibility. I do not believe we should push our responsibility to choose uplifting entertainment in any measure onto the MPAA. Indeed, this is one of the very biggest reasons that an LDS-focused community film review site is such a great idea!!
The MPAA rating of a movie is often--though not always--roughly proportional to the amount of explicit material in that film that a typical American parent might find "objectionable". However, my spiritual sensibilities are still deeply offended at some of the material covertly directed at children in PG and even some G movies, and certainly a great many PG and PG-13 movies violate the mandate to not "present immorality or violent behavior as acceptable." On the other hand, some movies with R ratings, though they may be difficult to watch, present information and ideas for mature audiences that serve to educate us, caution us of real dangers of the world we live in, and force us to consider and work through difficult or ambiguous moral dilemmas. These types of films, which I consider more educational or cautionary in nature than strict entertainment, can be a valuable resource, and I view the MPAA's rating them R as something of a disservice to society. Certainly they are not appropriate for young children, but they can be valuable part of young adult and adult intellectual, political, and emotional discourse and growth.
Rating systems do not differentiate between depictions of violence intended to educate about the real horrors of war, and depictions intended to thrill or breed hate. They do not differentiate between depictions of drug use intended to show the real and horrible consequences of such choices, and depictions that glorify drug use and deny consequences. They do not differentiate between depictions of sex that show it as a real, natural, loving union between two committed individuals, or that depict sexual abuse as an awful but very real problem faced by many families in society, and those depictions which are salacious or pornographic in nature and are intended to tease, tempt and titillate. In short, rating systems give us very little information about whether a movie will be uplifting or debasing, educational or deceptive, worthwhile or a complete waste of time.
The real challenge, then, is helping people to make informed decisions about the films they choose to watch, and consequently the ideas they choose to take into their minds. It is my sincere hope that your website will be helpful in this regard. To that end, may I make some suggestions? ...
Please don't automatically eliminate films from your site simply because of their rating; please take into account your users' reviews in deciding what gets endorsed on the site. I believe this could be done by not showing any films (of any rating) on the main portion of the site until they reach some threshold of positive reviews from site users. Of course you're free to exercise editorial control as well, suppressing mention of individual films that you feel (perhaps despite user reviews) may be misleading or otherwise inappropriate. But to effectively give to the anonymous MPAA ratings board control over which movies your users can review would, I feel, be a mistake and would severely limit the utility I and others might find in the site. ...
I wasn't too optimistic on getting a response, but one of their editors responded this afternoon (Monday). His response was far more reasonable than I'd feared.
... As far as the “no R-rated movies” policy is concerned, that has actually moderated a bit during the last couple of weeks – for many of the reasons you note. While we are comfortable with drawing a line at MOST r-rated movies (again, understanding that the MPAA ratings system is not the ultimate source of truth and light in this matter), we will remain open to the possibility of an occasional r-rated movie that we think will be worthy of consideration and discussion. “The Passion of the Christ” comes to mind. It was certainly widely discussed, both among people in general and among LDS audiences specifically. We would want to be able to weigh in on that one. Similarly, “Saving Private Ryan” and “Schindler’s List” are probably films we’d want to put out there for thoughts, reviews and comments. So while I’m completely comfortable in slamming the door shut for most R-rated films, we are leaving the door open a crack for the occasional r-rated film that we feel merits consideration.
I fired back some follow-up questions about just what might cause them to feel such a film "merits consideration":
I guess my biggest question after reading your response, though is this: Will you at least place user submitted reviews in the balance when weighing whether a film that happens to bear an R rating merits consideration? As an example, let's suppose I hear some very positive things about an R-rated film. Let's suppose it's the relatively recent (and IMO critically underrated) "Children of Men." Suppose I see it and am deeply impressed with the quality of the film, the positive and life-affirming message it delivers, its central themes of having courage to do the right thing against very daunting odds, and the remarkably prescient things it has to say about the society we live in and the dangers of letting our political decisions be motivated by fear instead of love. Suppose I write a thoughtful review on this, which includes very clear and careful warnings about the R-ratedness of the film and the violence and language that, while not gratuitous or wanton, are nonetheless disturbing (and are intended to be so). I may even make reference to ideas about how, within the context of the film, these courser elements provide a foil that makes the sweet and touching moments of joy we discover as the story unfolds all the more powerful. The review might caution that the film is definitely not intended for children and is very intense, but could be very rewarding for adults, who might also like to use it as a jumping-off point for many types of discussions, etc.
His reply (in part):
“Children of Men” is not a film that I would naturally put [in the same category as the others mentioned earlier], so I probably wouldn’t consider reviewing it unless someone provided a review like the one that you described... The critical element to me would be the context of your review. If you reviewed it... from a gospel perspective rather than simply an artistic perspective, [and] stressed the positive values of the film, or the way it reflected gospel teachings – give me an LDS reason to run the review – I could be persuaded.
So there you have it. Me? I'm undecided, both on the count of whether I'll eventually write that review of Children of Men, and whether I'll find MormonTimes.com a useful resource in discovering good and perhaps under-publicized films to watch out for.
