BBFC and Film Regulation

Film regulation


Films around the world are regulated by independent or state run organisations that deside weather a film is appropriate  for the puplic and what age rating it would get.

For example in the UK the organisation that regulates films in the UK is the BBFC (British board for film classification)

The points that a film is rated on are:

• Sexual content, anything from kissing to implied sex scenes 
• Violence, from slapping to dismemberment)
• Bad language
• Anything that brakes the law, if the film shows something ilegal like murder or theft it is fine but it is only if the film its self breaks the law in the UK that would be insisting violence but in other country's it could be anything.

This leads to debates about Censorship VS Free speech/ creative freedom

Because each country has its own regulators which means that each country could have its own rating for the same film, a good example of this is the Recent film "JOKER" which had a rating of 15 in the UK but in the USA it had an R rating (equivalent to an 18 in the UK).

In the UK there are Severn different rating for films:
A U stands for unrated or safe for viewing for anyone

PG or Parental guidance means that the film is safe for viewing under guidance from a parent or guardian. 

12 and 12As: 12A is a cinema rating for a film in cinema and is suitable for 12 and above and 12 is for a DVD release.

15: suitable for 15 and above:

18: suitable for 18 and over:

18R: legal adult films get this rating and some very grafic films:

Regulators don't just rate films on the 4 points stated early for some films they will look at puplic opinion and adapt the rating appropriate to the puplic response, for example the film Jurassic Park 3 "The Lost World" was shown to children and their teachers and parents to see what their response would be, it was overwhelmingly positive so the film was rated PG.

The biggest issue for regulating films is modern technology for example Netflix and DVDs, Netflix does have a system in place that allows parents to regulate what their children see on the platform but it is left up to the parents what they allow/ban, DVDs once bought who views them can't be controlled. this leads to the problem that if they try to regulate what people watch on the internet they run into the potential difficulty of breaking international human rights laws on privacy.