THIS FILM IS NOT YET RATED continues to roll out around the country, and I know there’s already been some work done on the DVD. This week, our man Capone chats with the acclaimed documentarian behind this new examination of the way the MPAA does business:
Hey, all. Capone in the Windy City here, with one of my favorite provocative documentary filmmakers, Kirby Dick. I saw his film SICK years ago at the Chicago International Film Festival, and it floored me with its portrait of an artist in constant physical pain, who turns his pain into his art. More recently, Dick got his first Oscar nomination for the expose on child-molesting priests TWIST OF FAITH. But his masterwork, THIS FILM IS NOT YET RATED, just opened wider this past weekend, and he sat down with me to discuss every aspect of the film, the rating board, and so much more.
I should add that I’ve read or seen nearly a dozen interviews with Dick since I spoke with him, and hopefully we cover some new ground here. Kirby is insanely passionate about this subject, and that’s the most important thing I wanted to get across. Enjoy...
Capone: I know when the film played at the SXSW Film Festival earlier this year, many on our staff, including Harry, were raving, saying, This is the best documentary I’ve seen all year. And, I’m not going to disagree with them.
I did want to say, though, I can’t imagine a critic not loving this movie. You’ve heard a lot of discussion lately about films that are supposedly critic-proof, but this film is so critic friendly, because what critic hasn’t been at some point been disappointed to find out that a movie they really loved is actually a shorter version or a somehow censored version of one the director wanted to release? So, you’ve produced this perfect little outlet for us.
Kirby Dick: Hopefully, there are 100,000 critics in the country, and they’ll all come see it!
C: It seems I’ve read about that many positive reviews of this film. Back when I was just learning about film history, I was always under the impression that in the Golden Age of Hollywood, when there was this code in the ’30s and ’40s, that somehow the restrictions of subject matter and what you could say or show somehow inspired movie writers to think and write more creatively. That’s the argument at least. Have you ever heard that?
KD: [Laughs] No.
C: …that somehow by not being able to discuss taboo subjects directly, they found very creative ways to talk around certain forbidden ideas. My point in mentioning this at all is I find today with the restrictions laid out in your film that it seems like it’s the exact is happening. What’s happening now is making people less creative.
KD: Well, I think even then it was. Any kind of stress or challenge is going to stimulate an artist, but I think, for the most part censorship as a whole hurts an art form, hurts an art form--any censorship. I think there’s also, looking back at the Hays Code films, there’s a certain nostalgia. How quaint. It’s a quaint time, you know? I think you always have to be suspicious about nostalgia. “Isn’t it sweet that those slaves on the plantation were so well behaved.” You know what I mean?
But, I know absolutely. It’s very, very clear that it’s censorship; it’s censorship of voices that are not mainstream voices. One of the techniques film artists use--and all artists use--is to try to shift an audience to look at something from a different point of view. And, often that point of view is uncomfortable. Because it’s new, it’s uncomfortable. Mary Harron talks about that in the film, how the ratings board, when it’s seeing something in a way that they haven’t seen before, it makes them uncomfortable, and they think--performing their role as censor--that it will make other people, parents uncomfortable. And, then they go ahead and censor it. So, basically, the structure is set up now, you know, the system is set up to censor artists.
C: There are so many aspects of what you present in this film that are confusing. I don’t mean your film’s confusing, I mean, it almost doesn’t make sense how the ratings board is operated and funded. You make the point in your film that it is essentially the studios paying for this. And, Hollywood is always perceived as being much more liberal, as being freer. Why is it set up this way?
KD: To begin with, the film industry probably would be fine if there were no ratings system. But, if there’s going to be a ratings system, they want to control it. And, that’s sort of the initial impetus. They want to keep control of it, because they want to make sure that they direct it so that they can make the most money. And, the way they make the most money is to make sure their films get the least restrictive ratings so they get out to the widest audiences, which is why violence gets off so easy with the rating system, because that’s the kind of films that the studios make.
Now, if you look at the films with sexuality, those films are made by independent filmmakers, foreign filmmakers, who happen to be--however small--the competition for the studios. And, so those films getting an NC-17 actually helps the studios. So, they’re running the system, and they’re going to do what any corporation is going to do--they’re not any worse than any other corporation--they’re going to go ahead and use any asset they have to increase their bottom line. This is an asset. They paid for it. It’s an asset.
C: That certainly explains why they’re not up in arms about certain films getting NC-17 ratings.
KD: Right and it actually benefits them in another way, too. The kinds of films they decided are their market…they can maximize their efforts by hitting this adolescent market, so they don’t want their filmmakers making films about adult sexuality. So, if there’s something that’s off limits, that they say, You don’t want to make that film, because not only is it not going to make a lot of money, but it won’t even get into the theaters. That corrals their filmmakers into making the kinds of films that they want.
And, there’s a third thing, there’s a political advantage to censoring films with gay themes or with sexuality, and particularly gay sex, because, as you know, the six major studios control 95 percent of the film business. And, the ratings are only a small part of what they do. Their major efforts are in Washington, lobbying Congress to pass some, in my opinion, very onerous intellectual property laws, like the VMCA and the extension of copyright. But, these laws end up adding billions to the bottom lines of the studios. So, by coming down hard on sex and gay sex, that appeals to the Right, which now controls Congress and allows those laws to get through. So, it’s a very cynical use of the ratings system.
But, again, here’s the deal: They’re just like any other industry. And, in pursuit of the bottom line, they’re going to be doing many things that are detrimental to the society.
C: You don’t actually say it in the film, so I’ll ask, Do you think there should not be a rating system at all? I mean, I’ve heard you say that, ultimately, parents are the ones who should be deciding what their children see and don’t see. But, clearly, I know growing up, for myself, that didn’t really mean a whole lot to me, especially in the era of multiplexes, where a kid can buy a ticket to one film and scoot into another.
KD: But, that’s always the case. Parents only have a certain amount of control. I have kids myself, and that control lessens as they get older. I mean this is nothing new. But, to the extent that parents do have control, they should make those decisions. That’s all I’m saying. But, what I think a rating system should be…I mean ScreenIt.com is a good model, which basically puts out, you know, sort of a concise but comprehensive list of everything in the content of the film, whether it’s sex, violence, nudity, drug use, smoking. And, again, then parents can take that information and make their decisions.
The current rating system…they argue that this is actually beneficial to parents, but they don’t give out that kind of information. And, in fact, up until very recently, they didn’t even have the short description [of the reasons for the rating]. And, Jack Valenti was pushed hard for many, many years before he agreed to do that. So, when they say this is a system that is for parents, benefits parents, that’s absolutely untrue. It isn’t, and they could change it in a second, I mean, that could be changed overnight.
C: So, you’re thinking maybe the ideal way to handle this would not be a rating, but a more detailed kind of an advisory.
KD: Yeah, I mean, personally I think, there’s no reason to have any age-based restrictions. I mean, I think that people, children of all different ages, even if they happen on something, it’s all part of an educational process. One gets exposed to the world, one learns. To have this kind of an authority figure say, You can’t do this. All it does is teach you to in some ways that somebody else should be making the decision for you. But, I don’t think society will ever accept that. I mean, I could live with the system if that was it, if it were transparent, if it were primarily information based, if it did censor art and it wasn’t biased.
C: In your eyes, who ideally would you like to see be on a board? If there has to be a ratings system, who would be the perfect person in your mind to serve on that board?
KD: That’s a big question. Actually to do ratings? You know, I think there is some advantage to having it done from within the industry. The only problem is that…well, I’m going to take that back. If the MPAA would act in a benign fashion, I think it would probably be good that it was being done, because the studios could fund it. [But] I think they’ll always exploit it, so I don’t know. That’s a big question.
C: Would other filmmakers be good?
KD: I think there’s an argument to having probably a range…my first impulse would be to have a range of people--filmmakers, I think having a parent or two on the board is good, having a child psychologist and a media expert on the board…
C: I notice you’re not saying a member of the clergy.
KD: [Laughs] No, the clergy have no business in there, no, no.
C: The thing that I found most astonishing that you mention in the film--I guess I had never really taken it into consideration--is the subject of female sensuality and how that seems to be a particular target of the rating board. What struck me about it, as you were uncovering the identities of these members, is that a lot of them were women, including the woman who’s in charge of them. It made me wonder about their sexual practices. Did you ever form profiles in your mind of these people beyond just how old their kids might be? Did you ever sort of speculate about more intimate details of their lives? Not to trash talk anybody, but…
KD: Individually? Overall, I actually don’t think it’s like this board is especially conservative. I think that what it is is that the structure is set up so that these people really don’t have power, and they’re sort of told how to apply the ratings. And there are all these forms of subtle pressure. But, if you walk into a structure, oftentimes, either you accept it and play along, or you’re viewed as a troublemaker in this group and people react negatively to you and eventually kick you out. So, they look for people who are compliant. And, they’re probably sort of middle-of-the-road compliant people who think they’re doing something that’s good for society and really don’t question any kind of structure, probably are willing to take any kind of structure that they live under, saying to themselves ‘I’ll just get along.’
C: Is there a power-trip element to the job?
KD: I think there’s a little bit of that.
C: I’ve certainly never been asked to work for the MPAA, but I’d be blown out of my seat if I was. That would be a huge deal to some.
KD: Oh, I think there’s that.
C: To go through the newspaper every day and know that you had something to do with that PG-13 rating.
KD: I think that’s very true, and I think that’s the one of the reasons they don’t talk, of course, is they’ve signed a confidentiality agreement and they have the shit scared out of them by the MPAA--but another reason is exactly that. They feel like they have this power, and they know that if they talk, they’re going to lose it.
I think that’s one of the reasons that directors in the Hollywood studio system are so compliant, I mean, this whole thing around possessory credit. This is a fuckin’ piece of bullshit. As far as I’m concerned, if there’s an auteur there, it’s the fuckin’ writer. That’s my opinion. That’s what I look at first. That’s the idea, that’s the dialogue, and probably a lot of the characters. Those are the hardest things to come up with. But somehow the directors get this thing, but why don’t the directors own up and say, This is ridiculous. Of course, I took one…[laughs].
But, the thing is, by paying directors so much in Hollywood, they shut up. Our writers, even writers in Hollywood, you meet some of these writers and you think, God, they’re not that smart or that good. But, you know what they are--they’re able to keep their mouth shut and operate in a corporate structure. And, man, pay people a lot of money, and they will do that.
C: As much as I loved the informational part of the film, the payoff--and I did not know this was part of the film when I went in--is you submitting your movie for the rating. Have you ever yet gotten a sense of what it was like in that room when they were watching your movie for the first time? Did you ever find out what the vibe was like in the room when they were sitting there seeing their faces on the screen?
KD: I think they were pretty upset. Again, I think they felt like their privacy had been invaded. To my mind, the audacity that they think that they can make these decisions for other people and not do it in public--that’s what I’m appalled by. It’s not appalling that I did what any journalist would do, getting the names of these people who are making decisions in the public interest. That’s what the MPAA says, It’s a system for the public. Well, if it’s for the public, it should be public. So, what’s appalling is that they allow themselves to be part of this system and operate in secrecy. That’s appalling.
C: Okay, so I’m just average-Joe American who loves movies. If I go to see your film and I’m as appalled as you say I should be--it’s not like it’s a government body that we can vote out--what can I do?
KD: Well, the most immediate thing is to go and sign the petition on the IFC website (with thousands of other signatures, I believe). Sign that, because it’s going to be presented to them. And, that’s one step.
C: What does the petition say exactly?
KD: It has suggested changes, like the system shouldn’t have bias, that it should be transparent, that it should be professionalized. I should have a copy with me at all times.
Another thing--I know it’s a little self-serving--but the more people see this film, the more pressure it’s going to put on Hollywood, because Hollywood reads box office reports. And, if they know a lot of people have seen this film, they’re going to know a lot of people have been pissed off. They’re going to know there’s a very irate constituency out there. Independent organizations are talking at the MPAA right now, and they hold a lot of the cards, but hopefully, with this film behind us, we’ll be able to get them to do some shit.
C: The popularity of the unrated DVD now, I mean, it comes out as an R or sometimes even PG-13. Does that undercut the power of the MPAA?
KD: Just the opposite.
C: Really?
KD: Yeah. You have, Why is the system still in place? If there were no rating system, I mean, this rating system actually generates money for them in many ways, but in one way in particular, it allows them to sell an R-rated film theatrically, and then go and sell the same film again as “unrated” to the same person, who has already seen it, in the DVD market. Basically, they get two bites out of the apple. So, why would they change this rating? It’s a system where they can sell the same product to the same person twice.
C: Right. I don’t think a lot of people understand that some DVDs are labeled unrated simply because a small change was made to the edit of a film and simply not submitted for a rating, so it’s “unrated,” because they didn’t submit it--not because it’s terribly scandalous.
KD: Yeah, but they can then still sell it as “unrated.”
C: About the ending again of your film, about submitting the film, had that always been your intention to be the ending of the film? Has that always been a part of the plan?
KD: Yeah, yeah. That was, like, right at the very end, because we came down so late, because what happened was, we submitted late to Sundance--in fact, just before I submitted, I went to everybody and said, I can’t fucking submit this film to Sundance because even if it gets in, I can’t finish it--and then I thought, Oh, god, IFC is gonna be really…they’ve been so good on this film, they’re just going to be so upset. Okay, I’ll submit it, but it’s not done, so it won’t get in. And, that’ll be okay, and then I can spend the time shooting. Well, it got in. But, we hadn’t even submitted the film; we didn’t have a third act yet. We hadn’t started shooting our third act, and it had been accepted into Sundance.
So, it was on December 3. We learned a week earlier, on December 3. So, my producer actually was saying, Kirby, do you think we should just not even go through this, and just…I mean we got a film here, it’s into Sundance. And, I said, No, this whole thing from the very beginning was, you know, we’re going through, we’re going in, this is the only way we can find out what really goes on. And, besides, it’s gonna be a lot of fun.
C: It is that, it’s rare that you generate that kind of tension in a documentary.
KD: Yeah, well, it was crazy, because we were just on the phone. I think it was on the 23rd of December that we went before the Appeals board. We went in there we wanted to bring our attorney in, right? And, they wouldn’t let him in, even the chair of the committee was there, and saying, You can’t go in. He was right there. There was a negotiation between them.
But, we still wanted to go ahead with the appeal, because we had a production to do. And, they didn’t know what was going on. And, we didn’t know quite how we were going to represent the appeals hearing in the film. We just had this vague idea of some sort of some courtroom drawings.
C: Oh the courtroom sketches are the best. The animated bits are fun, too.
KD: Yeah. Also, I want to say, because I don’t normally say this, but it was really a team effort. I mean, Eddie Schmidt, the producer, shot a lot of that stuff in the car with the private investigators when I wasn’t in there, because we were just operating on multiple levels. It was so crazy at the end that we were in on line, to mix and color correction all at the same time. And, so we just split up--the editor, the producer and I. And so, it was really a team effort.
And, Matt Clarke, who’s cut six of my films with me, was just…a lot of this stuff that you see is him. For example, that rape montage, you know, that Kevin Smith sets up--I came in one day, he’s saying, Hey, Kirby, look what I did. That was it. Done. I mean, we might have talked about the concept of it, but done. I couldn’t have pulled this off without having a good team together.
C: This film is qualified for Oscar contention, right?
KD: Yes.
C: I go back and forth as to whether I think it’ll it would get nominated. Even on something this controversial, Hollywood loves documentaries about itself. Do you think there’s a bias there? Or, do you seem to have support for award season?
KD: Yeah, well, I’m in the Academy. I don’t know, I’m not that close in on the whole process, but I think it’s a relatively fair system. You know, it’s a certain demographic--certain films appeal to them and certain film don’t--and it’s hard for me to say. And, I’m just not going to worry about it, because I didn’t think TWIST OF FAITH was going to be nominated. It was nominated. I was very pleased by that, but awards…I don’t make films for awards. Some filmmakers do, but I think most filmmakers don’t. And I think, it’ll be a fair process, and it just reflects the taste of a small group of people that I’m a part of, and you just accept that. It is what it is. It’s like a review: sometimes people like you, sometimes they don’t.
C: Your film SICK about performance artist Bob Flanagan was my favorite documentary of the year it came out. Did you come to the Chicago Film Festival with that?
KD: It showed, I don’t think I came.
C: But somebody was here with it, though.
KD: Sheree, his wife.
C: That’s right!
KD: How was that? How was she?
C: She was great. It was not a full house--at least not by end, it wasn’t. [laughs] On that film, you had to know you weren’t going to get an R rating.
KD: No, no. I would have accepted the NC-17 and not appealed that one.
C: That was unrated, yeah?
KD: Yeah, yeah. And, so is this, by the way. So, get people to come and see it.
Capone
