Tag Archives: Censorship

Classic Hollywood #47














The strained creative relationship Continue reading

Censored! What The Movies Couldn’t Show In 1921

An Incredible List of Things That Movies Were Not Allowed To Portray In 1921

Annette Kellerman the first "star" to do a nude scene 1916 "A Daughter of the Gods"

Famous swimmer, Annette Kellerman was the first “star” to do a nude scene 1916 “A Daughter of the Gods”

Looking at what was prohibited in the state of Maryland from being shown on movie screens in 1921 is overwhelming in its restrictiveness. It includes, but is not limited to: indecorous dancing; over passionate love scenes; exhibition of feminine underwear; gruesome murders; birth control; disrespect for the law; use of opium or other habit forming drugs; executions; profanity; excessive drunkeness especially in women; and maternity scenes.

The complete Maryland censorship rules is a laundry list of vice and of how people really behaved. Basically real life was prohibited in the movies.

Because there was no film industry set of standards, individual states set up their own board of censors to either insist on cuts to movies or block films from being exhibited entirely within that state.

In 1921 there were only six state censorship boards, and that number would greatly expand throughout the 1920’s. What was okay in one state, may not be playable in another. This set off a quagmire of problems for producers of films who needed to be able to show their films to the widest possible audience without having to make special edits to satisfy each state’s censorship board.

Rather than risk the creation of a national censorship board, the film industry eventually self monitored and created its own censorship code and a board to enforce the rules.

One of the last pre-code films. 1933 Roman Scandals with a young Lucille Ball in the chorus as a slave girl

One of the last pre-code films. 1933’s Roman Scandals with a young Lucille Ball in the chorus as a slave girl

The Hays Code (1930) and Joseph Breen, head of the Production Code Administration  standardized censorship rules and staved off an official national censorship board.

But even after the Production Code went into full effect (1934), local authorities or the Legion of Decency could still condemn a film and keep it from being exhibited. The city of Boston was a prime example of banning films with objectionable content.

Below is the complete list of Maryland’s censorship restrictions. Continue reading

Classic Hollywood #23

Censorship and Brigitte Bardot 1965 

Brigitte Bardot Viva Maria 1965

Brigitte Bardot co- starred in Viva Maria! (1965) with Jeanne Moreau. The Louis Malle film was partially responsible for the development of the MPAA ratings system for films.

Viva Maria! is set in an unnamed Central American country in 1907. Bardot plays an Irish revolutionary named Maria, who is a fugitive after blowing up a bridge in a British colony. Bardot meets up with a Parisian actress, also named Maria played by Jeanne Moreau, performing with a traveling circus touring the area. They cross the border into a neighboring country where they invent striptease, and get caught up in a popular uprising against the country’s dictator.

The stripping was what caught the attention of censors.

The movie board of Dallas, Texas banned the film from exhibition in the city for being “too racy.” The U.S. distributor, Interstate Circuit, Inc. sued and in 1968 the case made it all the way to the Supreme Court. This case and another case heard the same day where a copy of Playboy was sold to a 16-year-old in New York, were more or less combined to make a decision that censorship for minors was okay, but not for adults. The age of 17 was set as the dividing line between minor and adult for the motion picture industry.

The objectionable content in the film of Bardot and Moreau stripping would be considered tame by today’s standards.