This Film Is Not Yet Rated is a documentary by Kirby Dick about the MPAA and the Rating System in the USA.

“Plot”:
As the only institution of its kind, the MPAA decisions about a movie’s rating are not only a helpful hint for parents about what to allow theird kids to see and what not – these ratings influence decisions about marketing budgets, releases etc. heavily and ultimately can make or break a movie.
But what are their rules? And why are the identities of the raters kept secret?
Dick hires a private detective to find out these identities. While this work slowly progresses, he interviews film makers about their experience with the MPAA and makes some astonishing conclusions.

This Film Is Not Yet Rated is an entertaining and educating documentary. It uncovers thigns you never really thought about before. I didn’t care that much for the narrative structure (or more the lack of a consequent one), but I heartily recommend this movie to anyone interested in the industry.

What I found especially interesting was the whole problem the MPAA apparently has with female sexuality (and homosexuality). In a very interesting comparative montage, the film showed basically the same scenes (regarding camera angles, length etc) from different movies. For example, orgasm scenes. If it was a woman having the orgasm, the rating was invariably NC-17. If it was a man, it was R (or even PG-13). If it was a heterosexual couple: R or PG-13. Homosexual: NC-17.

But Dick doesn’t limit himself to examining sexuality. He takes a look at violence and it is surprising how violence gets far less rigid ratings than sexuality. He points out how independent film makers have a much harder time to achieve an R rating instead of a NC-17. He shows the bigotry of the system that tells big studios exactly what needs to be changed about a movie so it can get a less restrictive rating and tells smaller studios and indies how they can’t comment on how their decision was reached. 

And then of course there’s the whole anonymity of the raters thing, which Dick leads professionally ad absurdum.

There were scenes where I laughed, and there were scenes were I wanted to cry, but most of the times, I wanted to slap Jack Valenti around. A lot.

As I said before, if you are interested at all in the movie industry, watch this.