Thursday, August 25, 2005

What's up with the PG-13 rating?

I never paid any attention to rating other than to give me a basic idea of what to expect from a movie. Since I became a mom, it's one of those things I notice a lot more. The PG-13 rating reeeeally bothers me. I had noticed a few people griping about what is allowed in a PG-13 movie and I've been paying close attention to it now. The first movie that really made me angry was The Perfect Score. I have no problem with the movie, I actually thought it was pretty amusing. I do think that it really needed an R rating as it was shown OR clean it up a little bit. It had every cuss word in it, not to mention liberal pot smoking. So over the weekend I watched Jersey Girl. Again, no problem with the movie, I thought it was pretty cute. Again though, it had every cuss word, not to mention liberal alcohol consumption, and it was rated PG-13.

Since I've been paying attention to this I've figured out why this happens. It's no secret that the Box Office has been having serious financial problems. Smart people just don't go to the movies that often anymore because it's becoming a miserable experience. High Ticket prices and obnoxious people just ruin it. The biggest theater attenders are the teenie boppers. PG-13 rated movies bring in more Box Office dollars than R rated movies (Although, I think last year was the first time that PG rated movies surpassed PG-13 movies because of Shrek 2). So in order to make sure they get these kids in the theaters they have "cool" movies, but keep the rating low so that they can get in.

The other day I was flipping through Entertainment Weekly and they had a spread about the upcoming Harry Potter movie, The Goblet of Fire . The Goblet of Fire is going to be rated PG-13 for "scary scenes". Hello?? A movie like Harry Potter and a movie like The Perfect Score are going to have the same rating?? How much sense does that make?

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

Even Shrek 2 was extremely sexual in
nature. Even my 17 yr old noticed.
She didn't like the movie and didn't
recommend it for her younger siblings.