There's a choice quote in this Emily Browning interview over at Nylon Magazine, which was reported by Cinemablend that merits a mention. Its implications are kinda shocking,. The crux is the discussion of changes that Zach Snyder had to make in order to ensure Sucker Punch (review) would win a PG-13 from the MPAA, which apparently took seven tries. I'll let Browning lay it out:"I had a very tame and mild love scene with Jon Hamm. It was like heavy breathing and making out. It was hardly a sex scene... I think that it's great for this young girl to actually take control of her own sexuality. Well, the MPAA doesn't like that. They don't think a girl should ever be in control of her own sexuality because they're from the Stone Age. I don't know what the f**k is going on and I will openly criticize it, happily. So essentially, they got Zack to edit the scene and make it look less like she's into it. And Zack said he edited it down to the point where it looked like he was taking advantage of her. That's the only way he could get a PG-13 (rating) and he said, 'I don't want to send that message.' So they cut the scene!"
I've often defended the MPAA when films are given harsher ratings for breaking clearly-outlined rules (if you have more than one 'f-word', you get an R, period). I've long argued that the real enemy is the major theater chains that won't screen NC-17 or unrated movies, as well as the major networks and newspapers that won't carry advertising for them. But this is a clear cut case of the MPAA showing serious puritanical colors. So, just to clarify, it appears that the MPAA had serious issues with the idea that Emily Browning having consensual sexual relations with Jon Hamm, but they had less of an issue with the idea that Jon Hamm was taking advantage of, perhaps even raping Emily Browning. Let me repeat that one more time: the MPAA was more comfortable with the idea of a young woman raped by an older man than with the idea of a young woman making her own choices in regards to her own sexuality. I don't even need to further editorialize here.
Scott Mendelson
Scott Mendelson
9 comments:
What the!?
Exactly what I thought. Yet every article where this is being discussed, everyone seems to be missing that point. Sad.
Of course, the movie now goes out of its way to mention that she's 20, which makes it moot.
I caught that too Luke, to my detriment. While I personally think that the whole age thing was either A) the step father lying or B) a concession to the MPAA, I did change the headline and a couple points in the essay. I still honestly believe that we were supposed to presume that the five heroines of Sucker Punch were older kids.
Using the term "young girl" does not suggest that she has reached the age of consent. It is confusing and disturbing.
I just saw this on OpenSalon, but came over here because it's not recognizing my login over there.
Your post made me really try to figure out what they're thinking, and I've found a way that it sort of makes sense.
The MPAA doesn't think rape is more appropriate, they think consensual sex the woman enjoys is *hotter*. Female agency and orgasm is sexy, it is arousing -- and one of their goals is to keep forthrightly sexually arousing material behind the R line. They don't necessarily intend to punish movies with female orgasms -- but female orgasms turn them on, a *lot* (and I am all for this!), so they get a higher and in effect more punitive rating.
From that perspective, the MPAA's goal was to signal Snyder to make the scene less arousing by cutting it to be less explicit, for the really sexy parts (=>female orgasm) to be implied rather than shown. What he did, though, was to make it less *consensual* -- to move it away from "too sexy for PG-13" in the direction of "evil", instead of in the direction of "vague".
Clearly I need to watch "This Film Is Not Yet Rated", but in the meantime it looks to me as though the filmmakers bear a share of the blame for the ratings debacle: their reluctance to be indirect, to actually imagine that they're showing a PG-13 movie to a class of high-school freshmen, ends up populating PG-13 movies with non-con and dub-con.
I just saw this on OpenSalon, but came over here because it's not recognizing my login over there.
Your post made me really try to figure out what they're thinking, and I've found a way that it sort of makes sense.
The MPAA doesn't think rape is more appropriate, they think consensual sex the woman enjoys is *hotter*. Female agency and orgasm is sexy, it is arousing -- and one of their goals is to keep forthrightly sexually arousing material behind the R line. They don't necessarily intend to punish movies with female orgasms -- but female orgasms turn them on, a *lot* (and I am all for this!), so they get a higher and in effect more punitive rating.
From that perspective, the MPAA's goal was to signal Snyder to make the scene less arousing by cutting it to be less explicit, for the really sexy parts (=>female orgasm) to be implied rather than shown. What he did, though, was to make it less *consensual* -- to move it away from "too sexy for PG-13" in the direction of "evil", instead of in the direction of "vague".
Clearly I need to watch "This Film Is Not Yet Rated", but in the meantime it looks to me as though the filmmakers bear a share of the blame for the ratings debacle: their reluctance to be indirect, to actually imagine that they're showing a PG-13 movie to a class of high-school freshmen, ends up populating PG-13 movies with non-con and dub-con.
Disturbing and sickening. THAT SCENE drives the whole movie HOME, in me and my friends oppinions. What is that!
I found it to be perfectly clear that she was an adult and the people who were turned on by her youthful lookingness were in the wrong for being turned on like Blue was. That was part of the point of the film.
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