Hollywood Censored

Hollywood Censored PDF Author: Gregory D. Black
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
ISBN: 9780521565929
Category : Performing Arts
Languages : en
Pages : 354

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Book Description
After a series of sex scandals rocked the film industry in 1922, movie moguls hired Will Hays to clear the image of movies. Hays tried a variety of ways to regulate movies before adopting what became known as the production code. Written in 1930 by a St Louis priest, the code stipulated that movies stress proper behaviour, respect for government, and 'Christian values'. The Catholic Church reinforced these efforts by launching its Legion of Decency in 1934. Intended to force Hays and Hollywood to censor films, the Legion of Decency engineered the appointment of Joseph Breen as head of the Production Code Administration. For the next three decades, Breen, Hays, and the Catholic Legion of Decency virtually controlled the content of all Hollywood films.

Hollywood Censored

Hollywood Censored PDF Author: Gregory D. Black
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
ISBN: 9780521565929
Category : Performing Arts
Languages : en
Pages : 354

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Book Description
After a series of sex scandals rocked the film industry in 1922, movie moguls hired Will Hays to clear the image of movies. Hays tried a variety of ways to regulate movies before adopting what became known as the production code. Written in 1930 by a St Louis priest, the code stipulated that movies stress proper behaviour, respect for government, and 'Christian values'. The Catholic Church reinforced these efforts by launching its Legion of Decency in 1934. Intended to force Hays and Hollywood to censor films, the Legion of Decency engineered the appointment of Joseph Breen as head of the Production Code Administration. For the next three decades, Breen, Hays, and the Catholic Legion of Decency virtually controlled the content of all Hollywood films.

Hollywood's Censor

Hollywood's Censor PDF Author: Thomas Doherty
Publisher: Columbia University Press
ISBN: 0231512848
Category : Performing Arts
Languages : en
Pages : 441

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Book Description
From 1934 to 1954 Joseph I. Breen, a media-savvy Victorian Irishman, reigned over the Production Code Administration, the Hollywood office tasked with censoring the American screen. Though little known outside the ranks of the studio system, this former journalist and public relations agent was one of the most powerful men in the motion picture industry. As enforcer of the puritanical Production Code, Breen dictated "final cut" over more movies than anyone in the history of American cinema. His editorial decisions profoundly influenced the images and values projected by Hollywood during the Great Depression, World War II, and the Cold War. Cultural historian Thomas Doherty tells the absorbing story of Breen's ascent to power and the widespread effects of his reign. Breen vetted story lines, blue-penciled dialogue, and excised footage (a process that came to be known as "Breening") to fit the demands of his strict moral framework. Empowered by industry insiders and millions of like-minded Catholics who supported his missionary zeal, Breen strove to protect innocent souls from the temptations beckoning from the motion picture screen. There were few elements of cinematic production beyond Breen's reach he oversaw the editing of A-list feature films, low-budget B movies, short subjects, previews of coming attractions, and even cartoons. Populated by a colorful cast of characters, including Catholic priests, Jewish moguls, visionary auteurs, hardnosed journalists, and bluenose agitators, Doherty's insightful, behind-the-scenes portrait brings a tumultuous era and an individual both feared and admired to vivid life.

Censored Hollywood

Censored Hollywood PDF Author: Frank Miller
Publisher: Turner Publications Incorporated
ISBN:
Category : Performing Arts
Languages : en
Pages : 320

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Book Description
Sex and violence have been part of films right from the start. Guns were brandished in the first widely-viewed movie, The Great Train Robbery. Jean Harlow, Bette Davis, and Barbara Stanwyck are a few of the stars whose early roles, while modest by today's standards, garnered backlash from critics and the public alike. Here is the history of Hollywood's notorious Production Code, the film industry's attempts at self-regulation, and the development of the present-day rating system. Examines how film censorship reflects the morals, sexuality, and politics prevalent in society during each decade of the past century, and explores how violence has replaced sex as the target of censorship today. Photos.

Operation Hollywood

Operation Hollywood PDF Author: David L. Robb
Publisher: Prometheus Books
ISBN: 1615924515
Category : Performing Arts
Languages : en
Pages : 384

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Book Description
Directors of war and action movies receive access to billions of dollars worth of military equipment and personnel, but it comes with a hidden cost. As a veteran Hollywood journalist shows, the final product is often not just what the director intends but also what the powers-that-be in the military want to project about America's armed forces.

Controlling Hollywood

Controlling Hollywood PDF Author: Matthew Bernstein
Publisher: A&C Black
ISBN: 9780485300925
Category : Social Science
Languages : en
Pages : 314

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Book Description
Explaining the major forces at play behind the making of Hollywood films, this text assesses how changing values have influenced censorship in Hollywood. The text also analyses the major cultural, social, legal and religious changes and their effect on Hollywood.

Movie Censorship and American Culture

Movie Censorship and American Culture PDF Author: Francis G. Couvares
Publisher: Univ of Massachusetts Press
ISBN: 9781558495753
Category : Architecture
Languages : en
Pages : 356

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Book Description
From the earliest days of public outrage over "indecent" nickelodeon shows, Americans have worried about the power of the movies. The eleven essays in this book examine nearly a century of struggle over cinematic representations of sex, crime, violence, religion, race, and ethnicity, revealing that the effort to regulate the screen has reflected deep social and cultural schisms. In addition to the editor, contributors include Daniel Czitrom, Marybeth Hamilton, Garth Jowett, Charles Lyons, Richard Maltby, Charles Musser, Alison M. Parker, Charlene Regester, Ruth Vasey, and Stephen Vaughn. Together they make it clear that censoring the movies is more than just a reflex against "indecency," however defined. Whether censorship protects the vulnerable or suppresses the creative, it is part of a broader culture war that breaks out recurrently as Americans try to come to terms with the market, the state, and the plural society in which they live.

Censored Screams

Censored Screams PDF Author: Tom Johnson
Publisher: McFarland
ISBN: 0786427310
Category : Performing Arts
Languages : en
Pages : 222

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Book Description
As Dracula (1931) and Frankenstein (1931) ushered in the golden age of horror films in the United States, studios and distributors were faced with a major problem in their number one overseas market: the British Board of Film Censors (BBFC) were demanding extensive cuts, enforcing age restrictions, and banning outright many of Hollywood's horror movies. The issue most often used to limit the showing of horror films was their "unsuitability" to children. With that in mind, the BBFC developed specific film codes--the "A" (for adults) and the "H" (for horrific), both of which restricted viewing to those 16 or older--and then applied them liberally. This work examines how and why horror films were censored or banned in the United Kingdom, and the part these actions played in ending Hollywood's golden age of horror.

Censoring Hollywood

Censoring Hollywood PDF Author: Aubrey Malone
Publisher: McFarland
ISBN: 0786489391
Category : Performing Arts
Languages : en
Pages : 226

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Book Description
Censorship has been an ongoing issue from the early days of filmmaking. One hundred years of film censorship, encompassing the entire 20th century, are chronicled in this work. The freewheeling nature of films in the early decades was profoundly affected by Prohibition, the Depression and the formation of the Legion of Decency--culminating in a new age of restrictiveness in the movies. Such powerful arbiters of public taste as Will H. Hays of the Motion Picture Producers and Distributors of America and Joseph Breen of the Production Code Association fomented an era whereby films with contentious material were severely censored or even condemned. This held sway until rebellious filmmakers like Otto Preminger challenged the system in the 1950s, eventually resulting in the abandonment of the old regime in favor of the contemporary "G" through "NC-17" ratings system.

Red Carpet

Red Carpet PDF Author: Erich Schwartzel
Publisher: Penguin
ISBN: 1984878999
Category : Business & Economics
Languages : en
Pages : 401

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Book Description
"This is a fascinating book. It will educate you. Schwartzel has done some extraordinary reporting." — The New York Times Book Review “In this highly entertaining but deeply disturbing book, Erich Schwartzel demonstrates the extent of our cultural thrall to China. His depiction of the craven characters, American and Chinese, who have enabled this situation represents a significant feat of investigative journalism. His narrative is about not merely the movie business, but the new world order.” —Andrew Solomon, author of Far from the Tree and The Noonday Demon An eye-opening and deeply reported narrative that details the surprising role of the movie business in the high-stakes contest between the U.S. and China From trade to technology to military might, competition between the United States and China dominates the foreign policy landscape. But this battle for global influence is also playing out in a strange and unexpected arena: the movies. The film industry, Wall Street Journal reporter Erich Schwartzel explains, is the latest battleground in the tense and complex rivalry between these two world powers. In recent decades, as China has grown into a giant of the international economy, it has become a crucial source of revenue for the American film industry. Hollywood studios are now bending over backward to make movies that will appeal to China’s citizens—and gain approval from severe Communist Party censors. At the same time, and with America’s unwitting help, China has built its own film industry into an essential arm of its plan to export its national agenda to the rest of the world. The competition between these two movie businesses is a Cold War for this century, a clash that determines whether democratic or authoritarian values will be broadcast most powerfully around the world. Red Carpet is packed with memorable characters who have—knowingly or otherwise—played key roles in this tangled industry web: not only A-list stars like Matt Damon, Angelina Jolie, and Richard Gere but also eccentric Chinese billionaires, zany expatriate filmmakers, and starlets who disappear from public life without explanation or trace. Schwartzel combines original reporting, political history, and show-biz intrigue in an exhilarating tour of global entertainment, from propaganda film sets in Beijing to the boardrooms of Hollywood studios to the living rooms in Kenya where families decide whether to watch an American or Chinese movie. Alarming, occasionally absurd, and wildly entertaining, Red Carpet will not only alter the way we watch movies but also offer essential new perspective on the power struggle of this century.

Forbidden Hollywood: The Pre-Code Era (1930-1934)

Forbidden Hollywood: The Pre-Code Era (1930-1934) PDF Author: Mark A. Vieira
Publisher: Running Press Adult
ISBN: 0762466758
Category : Performing Arts
Languages : en
Pages : 660

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Book Description
Filled with rare images and untold stories from filmmakers, exhibitors, and moviegoers, Forbidden Hollywood is the ultimate guide to a gloriously entertaining era when a lax code of censorship let sin rule the movies. Forbidden Hollywood is a history of "pre-Code" like none otherA name=_Hlk518256457: you will eavesdrop on production conferences, read nervous telegrams from executives to censors, and hear Americans argue about "immoral" movies. /aYou will see decisions artfully wrought, so as to fool some of the people long enough to get films into theaters. You will read what theater managers thought of such craftiness, and hear from fans as they applauded creativity or condemned crassness. You will see how these films caused a grass-roots movement to gain control of Hollywood-and why they were "forbidden" for fifty years. The book spotlights the twenty-two films that led to the strict new Code of 1934, including Red-Headed Woman, Call Her Savage, and She Done Him Wrong. You'll see Paul Muni shoot a path to power in the original Scarface; Barbara Stanwyck climb the corporate ladder on her own terms in Baby Face; and misfits seek revenge in Freaks. More than 200 newly restored (and some never-before-published) photographs illustrate pivotal moments in the careers of Clara Bow, Joan Crawford, Norma Shearer, and Greta Garbo; and the pre-Code stardom of Claudette Colbert, Cary Grant, Marlene Dietrich, James Cagney, and Mae West. This is the definitive portrait of an unforgettable era in filmmaking.