Examining the once ubiquitous rise and staggering fall of the Motion Picture Production Code

 

The Motion Picture Production Code may be important in cinema history as a result of restoring moral history after the dominance of the scandalous Pre-Code but among serious cinephiles, it is considered to be well-meaning but absolutely antiquated at the same time. Cinema has come a long way from the once prevalent and ubiquitous censorship of the Code in that Cinema nowadays is growing before our very eyes as filmmaking allows various cast and crew members to make any type of film that they want to make without any type of censorship. The Code is looked at by cinephiles as an example of something that was once ruling the industry with an iron fist that is now seen as dated and as a relic of Hollywood's past. It is understandable why so many cinephiles (especially younger viewers) have their issues with the Code as a result of the censorship that makes some of the movies of the Golden Age of Hollywood seem so dated today due to how they abided too much by the code for the worse.

Dating back to the Silent Era, Hollywood was filled with so much immorality to where there was so much gossip, scandal among other issues that there needed to be a change in the industry. Enter Will Hayes, Hayes became the first chairman of the Motion Picture Producers and Distributors of America (MPAA) by the time MPAA was enforced in 1922. Hayes was formerly a chairman of the Republican National Committee and was a part of the Teapot Dome Scandal. He was able to use his conservative stance as a way to enforce a policy that will bring about ubiquitous censorship onto the industry at large. The MPAA was made as a response to the scandal involving Roscoe "Fatty" Arbuckle raping and murdering actress Virginia Rappe and as a result, Arbuckle was acquired on all charges, but the case still remains a mystery to this day. No matter what happened to Arbuckle, the censors really wanted to enforce a code in 1922 as a way to enforce rules that will make films decent enough to bring more and more family audiences to the theater so that moral integrity will absolutely rule movie screens thus the first code called the Formula was inaugurated in 1922. Unfortunately, a lot of the filmmakers were sick and really tired of the Formula, so it had to be worked on and the Formula became the Don'ts and Be Carefuls in the process.

The Don'ts and Be Carefuls had Forbidden Content that filmmakers should clearly abstain from (the Don'ts) and it had rules for subject matter that needed to be done in a meticulously tasteful way (the Carefuls). The Don'ts and Be Carefuls code were enforced in 1927, which was five years after the Formula was enforced. After sound was introduced in 1927, nobody seemed to care about the Don'ts and Be Carefuls rules, so the Pre-Code began to overshadow the rules only to allow filmmakers to get away with dealing with tough content for a little while for the sake of obliterating censorship as a way to add real life on screen even if it meant offending family audiences. However, the Pre-Code lasted until July of 1934 considering that three devout Catholics named Joseph Breen, Daniel-Day Lord along with Martin Quigley really wanted to put an end to the unfiltered and more aggressive nature of the Pre-Code so Breen became president of the Production Code Association, which was a part of the MPAA, and ended up enforcing stricter rules that filmmakers had to really abide by even if it meant watering down tough content. With Breen as president, the Motion Picture Production Code finally was enforced for real this time thus ushering in the ubiquitous rise that will influence filmmaking for better or worse.

The Motion Picture Production Code became more ubiquitous and prevalent than ever by the time it was enforced by 1934 that Breen, Quigley and Day Lord more than ever began to force all of the filmmakers in Hollywood to either abide by the restrictions or get fired. The purposes of the Code were to really make sure that films reflected moral integrity by never sympathizing with wrongdoing, focusing on the correct standards of life along with not ridiculing human life. Once filmmakers understood these purposes, they had no choice but to abide by them because they realized that the days of getting away with tough content as a result of the Pre-Code were over now as the Code definitely affected how the films were made due to the unleashed censorship in the process. Some of the rules included not glorifying tough subject matter like murder, rape along with sex. Also, adult content was either ignored or dealt with in an implied manner as a way to bring a large amount of family audiences to the theaters, no matter what the genre was whether it was Comedy, Drama and even Action. The more that the Code continued to put more rules and regulations on the films, the more successful it became in terms of making films more moral only for the films to be successful among family audiences who wanted morals in their films. However, later on, many filmmakers along with audiences were starting to complain about the censorship in that they really wanted real life in their films only for the Code to start losing control over the industry thus proving that the Code will soon experience a staggering fall that will prove that censorship has ran its course.

The staggering fall of the Motion Picture Production Code was slowly beginning to take root as directors like Billy Wilder, Alfred Hitchcock among others really were tired of the outdated restrictions of the Code only to start pushing the boundaries in the process. Wilder ended up releasing the great Some Like it Hot (1959), which contained content like cross dressing, cleavage among other things that the Code itself did not approve of at all and as a result, it was released without Code approval. Hitchcock followed suit by releasing his adaptation of Robert Bloch's Psycho (1960) and as with Some Like it Hot, Psycho was also released without Code approval due to also having things that the Code did not approve of like showers, showing some skin, violence, etc. With the release of these two films, Hollywood was slowly ready to get rid of the Code now that they realized that censorship was on the way out. By the mid-late 1960s, Jack Valenti became president of the MPAA, and he was sick and tired of the blatant censorship of the Code that he decided to create a ratings system in order to really explore humanity in art without any censorship forever. The ratings system contained ratings like PG, PG-13, R among others as a way to let Hollywood know that audiences need reality on screen as opposed to sanitizing it in an untruthful way only to finally obliterate the once powerful, now antiquated Code for real and the ratings system still continues to this day. Plus, thanks to Valenti, the New Hollywood Era capitalized on the end of the Code and the newly formed ratings board by having filmmakers make reality-based films that reflected and documented life on screen in a disturbingly realistic manner. With the rating system enforced along with the New Hollywood Era on full swing, the Motion Picture Production Code had finally experienced its staggering fall now that audiences and filmmakers gravitated towards films that can get away with dark material only to really see the Code as a thing of the past.

As far as I am concerned, I really do have mixed feelings about the Motion Picture Production Code but still want to continue to study and learn more about it. I say that because as a devoted cinephile, I realized that no matter how problematic history itself can be, it is better to examine and study it so that I will learn from it as a way to never give in to the problematic aspects of it for the better. I will address the elephant of the room and that is my mixed feelings of the Code itself. On one hand, whenever a film abides too much by the Code by portraying human life in a way that is sanitized along with too didactic, then it will not hold up well at all. On the other hand, if the film can get away with tough material with little to no censorship as well as not glorifying the subject, then it will hold up forever in Cinema history. I believe that other devoted cinephiles should always study the Code no matter what they think about it considering that studying the Code is still a qualification for Cinephiles so that they can realize that there was censorship in the industry before we ever had ratings systems. In addition, expressing glorification of tough subject matter along with sanitizing it is equally destructive since it is better to deal with tough material in a contextual manner and it is also better to deal with wholesome material in a realistic manner as well. The Code is one of those moments in history that always needs to be evaluated in a cautious manner due to its problematic approach of censorship that exemplified sanitized moral integrity at the expense of adding nuance and believability in storytelling. It is up to cinephiles like us to constantly study the Code for the sake of expanding and enriching our pallet while still being aware of the truly problematic and outdated aspects of it too. God bless.