Censorship
We have come to feel, in the absolute safety that is a film theatre’s dark, the fun, the abandon, the passion in the destruction of things we have to take such neurotic care of all the time in real life.
David Thomson IoS 16/9/01
Censorship in one form or another has long existed in relation to art and writing. Look closely enough and you’ll find sex and violence in ancient myths and legends from Homer to the Bible which then transfer into artistic depictions created in Renaissance times that led at least one Pope to confiscate paintings and imprison artists. All those muscular thighs, exposed virginal bosoms, naked infants encouraging voyeuristic tendencies in holy places, not to mention close encounters with Michelangelo’s works in marble! Protestants, not to be left out, of course prohibited dramatic representation.
Democratisation in art (as in politics) resulted in secular subject matter, ordinary people with ordinary bodies having ordinary experiences. Then along came film, a massively popular medium that the Establishment (the State, the Church, etc.) soon felt needed controlling. Along came the Hays Code in the USA which would seem thoroughly ludicrous to us were it not that there are still allegations (all unproven) about the risks of film disturbing, corrupting, stimulating audiences to maim, rape and kill. This means that there remains much pressure to protect audiences from supposed cinema excess.
We live at a time when many leading commentators find a differentiation between the highbrow and lowbrow in our culture harder to define (as proof, note the increasingly radical and risqué modern interpretations of well-known and established operas as directors strive to appear modern alongside progressive artistic developments elsewhere).
Since the 1950s, film has achieved artistic respectability, although possibly the technical cleverness of modern film, especially CGI, and the over-emphasis on realism could lead film to be accused of latterly going down the road of gimmickry at the cost of deeper filmic engagement and audience satisfaction. If no longer striving to be properly affective, does film still require heavy chaperoning? If all that film can luridly depict and more is available through the Internet in one way or another, is there any point at all any more in its censorship?
