Motion Picture Association of America film rating system

The Motion Picture Association of America's (MPAA) film-rating system is used in the United States and its territories to rate a film's suitability for certain audiences, based on its content. The MPAA rating system is a voluntary scheme that is not enforced by law; films can be exhibited without a rating, though many theaters refuse to exhibit non-rated or NC-17 rated films. Non-members of MPAA may also submit films for rating. Other media (such as television programs and video games) may be rated by other entities. The MPAA rating system is one of various motion picture rating systems that are used to help parents decide what films are appropriate for their children.

The MPAA's rating system is administered by the Classification & Ratings Administration (CARA), an independent agency.

Ratings

MPAA film ratings

Since the late 1990s, the MPAA film ratings have been as follows:

Other labels

If a film has not been submitted for a rating or is an uncut version of a film that was submitted, the labels Not Rated (NR) or Unrated (UR) are often used. Uncut/extended versions of films that are labeled "Unrated" also contain warnings saying that the uncut version of the film contains content that differs from the theatrical release and may not be suitable for minors.

Motion Picture Association of America

The Motion Picture Association of America (MPAA) is an American trade association that represents the six major Hollywood studios. It was founded in 1922 as the Motion Picture Producers and Distributors of America (MPPDA) to advance the business interests of its members. In its formative years it took on the role of devising guidelines for film content which resulted in the creation of the Production Code, and currently administers the MPAA film rating system.

More recently, the MPAA has advocated for the motion picture and television industry through lobbying to protect creative content from piracy and for the removal of trade barriers. The MPAA has long worked to curb copyright infringement, including recent attempts to limit the sharing of copyrighted works via peer-to-peer file-sharing networks. Former Democratic Senator Chris Dodd is the chairman and CEO.

History

Foundation and early history: 1922–1929

The MPAA was founded as the Motion Picture Producers and Distributors of America (MPPDA) in 1922 as a trade association of member motion picture companies. At its founding, MPPDA member companies produced approximately 70 to 80 percent of the films made in the United States. Former Postmaster General Will H. Hays was named the association's first president.

Rating

A rating is the evaluation or assessment of something, in terms of quality (as with a critic rating a novel), quantity (as with an athlete being rated by his or her statistics), or some combination of both.

Rating may also refer to:

Bechdel test

The Bechdel test (/ˈbɛkdəl/ BEK-dəl) asks whether a work of fiction features at least two women who talk to each other about something other than a man. The requirement that the two women must be named is sometimes added.

Only about half of all films meet these requirements, according to user-edited databases and the media industry press. The test is used as an indicator for the active presence of women in films and other fiction, and to call attention to gender inequality in fiction due to sexism.

Also known as the Bechdel-Wallace test, the test is named after the American cartoonist Alison Bechdel, in whose comic strip Dykes to Watch Out For it first appeared in 1985. Bechdel credited the idea to a friend, Liz Wallace, and to the writings of Virginia Woolf. After the test became more widely discussed in the 2000s, a number of variants and tests inspired by it have been introduced.

History

Gender portrayal in popular fiction

In her 1929 essay A Room of One's Own, Virginia Woolf observed about the literature of her time what the Bechdel test would later highlight in more recent fiction:

Nostalgia Critic

Nostalgia Critic is an American comedy webseries created, written, edited, directed and performed by Doug Walker. The series initially launched on YouTube in July 2007 before moving to Walker's own site That Guy with the Glasses, then to Channel Awesome. The show follows Walker as the titular Nostalgia Critic, a bitter and sarcastic film critic who reviews films and television shows from his childhood and recent past, usually with comically exaggerated rage. The show often alternates the Critic's angry rants and juvenile humor with legitimate analysis of the episode's subject.

Walker briefly retired the series in August 2012 to work on other projects, even writing the character out of existence in the Channel Awesome film To Boldly Flee. However, on January 23, 2013, Walker announced the show's imminent return in a narrative video called "The Review Must Go On". The show subsequently returned with a more narrative and sketch-driven sixth season, beginning on February 5, 2013 with a review of The Odd Life of Timothy Green.