As far as the Clean Flicks thing, those will never get submitted to get a rating since CF doesn’t own the copyright. The consumer just has to trust the judgement of CF.

Orrin Hatch is currently sponsoring legislation to explicitly legalize CF. Oddly his is still supportive of the DMCA, which outlaws software that could be used to achieve even better filtering of DVDs without having to make an edited copy or alter the original in any way. Such software could be used for much greater control over filtering and would be a boon to parents and Jar-Jar haters everywhere. Orrin needs to get a clue. My letters have always fallen on deaf ears.

Oddly, when DVDs were first being marketed the ability to have filtering on a disc was often cited as a feature. As far as I know it has almost never been used by studios. This is pretty dumb, as they are leaving money on the table. They are however willing to do the opposite and release “unrated” versions of popular movies with the most graphics scenes that didn’t make it to the theaters re-inserted.

Having been in that camp, knowing a movie would be R-rated if it were rated would be enough to avoid it. I mean, really, the Not Rated is just a cover for a “not as bad, but still R-rated.”

But I really can’t tell for sure what R-rated movie avoiders think. I was recently told by a close friend of mine (an R-rated movie avoider) that I was mingling the philosophies of men with scripture.

I think that knowing what it would be rated is an impact many will consider in choosing not to watch the re-release. I hope that they will consider the edits and revisions and consider the counsel given that its not R rated material we are counseled to avoid, but the things in the media that are not uplifting.

As others have pointed out the MPAA is broken. We need to MPFiX it!

Gibson’s approach might be a way to avoid “avoiding” for many of us to are just avoiding to be obedient, and not out of any kind of moral superiority to non-avoiders. The problem is that, because of Gibson’s attempt to get the cut version a PG-13 rating, as reported by Bob, we know that the movie would still get an R rating. So seeing it with this knowledge is still knowingly violating a request of Church leaders not to see movies with an R-rating.

(Maybe this is an idea for a different post, but wouldn’t it be great if ALL movies followed Gibson and nobody used the rating system anymore? What would we have to do then?)

As far as the question of the Passion. As a non-R-rated watcher I would not watch it. Obviously it is released un-rated b/c it would have recieved an R-rating. I see it differently from Clean Flicks, where they edit to specifically remove not along rating lines but along lines of what they feel to be appropriate for discerning viewers. Usually this leads to a film with less content then PG-13. But this is an easy choice for me as I have no desire to view the Passion. I’m not big into media depictions of the sacred and usually avoid them. I put the Passion in the same camp as Singles Ward, God’s Army. All movies I really don’t want to view (I know some are now scoffing at me placing SW and God’s Army with a movie as well done and artistic as the Passion–but oh well). Now if we were discussing the same scenerio with a movie like Collateral, well I might just come out differently….

Having said that, it is a personal decision for me and my family. I can accept that there are perfectly loyal Latter-day Saints who watch R and PG-13 rated movies. But it makes my stomach sick to watch most of that stuff.

I didn’t watch the Passion when it came out in the theaters but decided to order it through Clean Films. It was almost unwatchable even on CF. The Gospels don’t concentrate on the gore. They concentrate on the suffering, but we can imagine the suffering and gore without having to see it. I was reminded of Mormon and Moroni’s words about the terrible times they lived in. The people during those times became desensitized to the violence to the point where it no longer repulsed them. The Spirit of the Lord was completely lost from the land. That was how I felt while watching “the Passion” — a complete absence of the Spirit. I would recommend “The Greatest Story Ever Told” over “The Passion” any day.

I think Rusty is probably right… When writing this post, I honestly had the idea of withholding the information about the MPAA stating that they would still issue an R rating for the movie, if it were to be rated. I see now that the post would have probably been more interesting, if a mean trick. But indulge us here, John Fowles (& other non-R watchers), would you have considered the new edited movie had Mel Gibson not taken it to the MPAA and found it still to be in the R category? I mean, there are presumably many Mormons who won’t read a dozen press releases like I did to find out this information and who would, in turn, just consider the movie “edited and unrated”. So did I do you (and anyone who reads this post) a favor? Is this like the classic missionary story of Elders accepting a what-appears-to-be-safe drink, which actually has alcohol in it? Had they known, then of course they wouldn’t have accepted the drink. But since they didn’t know, they usually don’t necessarily regret it. Don’t read too much into the analogy, but what say ye? Would you have seen it under different circumstances? In my quest to recommend this movie to my fellow Mormons, did I just throw away my chance by revealing certain evidence?