1996
50m

Summary A six hour series exploring the 100 year evolution of sexuality and censorship in motion pictures. View more details

1996
50m

Sex, Censorship and the Silver Screen

Directed : Unknown

Written : Unknown

Stars : Raquel Welch Dan Aykroyd Marisa Tomei Jason Alexander

All cast & crew

7.7

Details

Genres : History Documentary

Release date : Jan 8, 1996

Countries of origin : United States

Language : English

Filming locations : Avalon Stages, Hollywood, Los Angeles, California, USA

Production companies : Eleventh Day Entertainment

Summary A six hour series exploring the 100 year evolution of sexuality and censorship in motion pictures. View more details

Details

Genres : History Documentary

Release date : Jan 8, 1996

Countries of origin : United States

Language : English

Filming locations : Avalon Stages, Hollywood, Los Angeles, California, USA

Production companies : Eleventh Day Entertainment

Photos

Sex, Censorship and the Silver Screen (1996)

Episodes

View All Seasons

Episode 1 • Dec 31, 1969

Peep Shows and Public Outrage

From the opening of the first cinema in New York in 1894, movie makers realized that sex and scintillation sold tickets. The Kiss (1896) was a scandal and considered an attack on public morals as was the film of the belly dancer in Fatima (1897). Censorship began take shape leading the mayor of New York City to cancel all licenses to show motion pictures in 1908. Theda Bara appeared in A Fool There Was (1915) and instantly became the screen's first sex symbol and made 40 films over the next 4 years. After a 1915 ruling by the US Supreme Court that movies were not protected under the Constitution, censorship began in earnest. The movie industry moved west and Hollywood became the center of the American movie industry. Actors such as Pola Negri, 'Gloria Swanson' and 'Rudolph Valentino' made the screen sizzle. Tinseltown continued to produce scandals however and none was greater than the Roscoe 'Fatty' Arbuckle murder case. Although he was found not guilty, Arbuckle's career was in ruins. The studios formed the Motion Picture Producers and Distributors of America and hired Will H. Hays to police the industry.

Episode 2 • Dec 31, 1969

The Temptations of Eve

The focus is on the early years of the talkies in Hollywood and particularly some of its biggest female stars including Jean Harlow, Marlene Dietrich and Mae West. The Hays office was in a constant battle battle with the movie studios to delete any sexually suggestive scenes or dialog but the movies moguls knew what would sell and pushed it to the limit. As the films got racier however, politicians and social groups began to demand a greater degree of censorship changing the movies for years to come.

Episode 3 • Dec 31, 1969

Censored

By the 1930s, the Hays Office was in firm control of censorship. The Hollywood studios were constantly trying to find ways to circumvent those controls by inventing snappy dialog and innuendo. While some of Hollywood's stars move on - Jean Harlow died at the age of 26 - others take their place. Veronica Lake with her peekaboo hairstyle and Lana Turner, the sweater girl, are among the new sex symbols of the 1940s. The first genuinely successful challenge to the Hays Office came from Howard Hughes whose film The Outlaw (1943)starred the buxom Jane Russell. He was forced to distribute the film independently but the film's success showed it to be possible.

Episode 4 • Dec 31, 1969

Hollywood Comes of Age

After the end of the Second World War, public attitudes began to change but the Hays Office and the League of Decency still held considerable sway. When the much-loved Ingrid Berman announced she was going to leave her husband to live with Roberto Rossellini, she was the subject of a fierce campaign of character assassination and even denounced on the floor of the US Senate. A Supreme Court ruling in 1952 granting films the same freedom of speech protection as other arts opens the door. It starts with European films being shown in art house theaters but it's the works of Tennessee Williams that really sets the stage for literate films with adult themes. The 1950s was also the time of the sex symbol including Mamie Van Doren, Jayne Mansfield and from Europe, the elegant Sophia Loren. None had quite the impact of Marilyn Monroe, however.

Episode 5 • Dec 31, 1969

Look Ma, No Clothes

In 1956 New York State banned a nudist colony documentary entitled The Garden of Eden. On appeal however, the courts ruled that nudity in and of itself was not obscene. Independent film makers were becoming bolder and films like Russ Meyer's The Immoral Mr. Teas (1959) began to appear. In main stream Hollywood, little changed but European films continued to evolve. Victim (1961) with Dirk Bogarde dealt with homosexuality in a serious way and was the first film where a man said 'I love you' to another man. Other European films like La dolce vita (1960) and those of the the French New Wave directors continued to explore new themes. The Pawnbroker (1964) by director Sidney Lumet was the first Hollywood production to get a seal of approval that was in direct violation of the code. With the closure of the Legion of Decency 1965, a new MPAA production code was introduced but it too was eventually scrapped in 1968 in favor of a film eating system. A new generation of filmmakers in the late sixties however continued to push the limits of permissiveness.

Episode 6 • Dec 31, 1969

Forward Into the Past

By the 1970s, Americans were undergoing fundamental societal changes. Many US communities banned films such as A Clockwork Orange (1971) and Carnal Knowledge (1971). 'Stanley Kubrick (I)' re-edited A Clockwork Orange (1971) as a result. The film Deep Throat was controversial and popular and was at the vanguard of the the rise of pornographic films. Under the new MPAA rating system, an X rating soon became associated with pornographic films and Ultimo tango a Parigi (1972) (Last Tango in Paris) was the last major studio release to carry an X rating and it wasn't until 1990 that a new adult film category, NC-17, was created. In June 1973, the U.S. Supreme Court returned to local communities the right to set their own standards. European films meanwhile continued to push the limits with films like Salò o le 120 giornate di Sodoma (1975) by Pier Paolo Pasolini. The invention of the VCR changed the pornographic film industry and such films became available everywhere.

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