The Most Controversial Films Of All Time?

[onager]

Serendipity strikes again. While looking for Other Stuff, I ran across this article from 2010.

Thought it might fit in the A/A group because a couple of these movies are often discussed in here. The List:

A Clockwork Orange (1971)
Triumph of the Will (1935)
I Spit On Your Grave (1978)
Salò, or the 120 Days of Sodom (1975)
The Warriors (1979)
The Last Temptation of Christ (1988)
Birth of a Nation (1915)
Basic Instinct (1992)
Last Tango In Paris (1972)

http://www.dailykos.com/story/2010/11/12/918928/-The-Most-Controversial-Films-Of-All-Time#

Mentioned in the article, and a must-see for movie fans: Kirby Dick's hilarious and infuriating 2006 documentary, This Film Is Not Yet Rated, about the shenanigans of the MPAA - a collection of the most craven and useless people ever gathered in one conference room, even by Hollywood standards.

Those "average parents" who rate movies? Some aren't parents at all, but just friends of other MPAA employees. They can collect about $30, 000 per year in free money for watching - and deciding the fate of - movies.

And let's not forget, in the words of one IMDB reviewer: ...the MPAA is entirely financed by the six largest studios (responsible for 90% of the films released domestically) and their conglomerate corporate media owners (who control 95% of all media outlets in the U.S.) Details of all rating board and appeal decisions are kept secret. To create the illusion of transparency, two clergymen, representing Roman Catholics and Protestants, always sit in as observers at appeals hearings. But they too are required not to disclose information on the appeal decision process.

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0493459/?ref_=fn_al_tt_1

[marym625]

1. A Gentlemen's Agreement

[NeoGreen]

2. How about that schmek piece...

...

1) The Innocence of Muslims (trailer only) - I seem to remember some controversy or "outrage" related to it

or, how about on the other end...

2) God On Trial (BBC production)

Does anyone know if God on Trial has been shown in the US on a mass market scale (i.e. HBO)?
Might be a good one for its potential to have some controversy develop here in the US.


Why do the standard list(s) of movies all have to be one that include issues related to "prurient" interests? (knickers in a wad much?)
(maybe my list includes "religiosity" focused films because when I think of religion I get a little ... oh never mind)

[NeoGreen]

3. Just thought of another one...

...that Mel Gibson blood bath, snuff film...passion of the christ...hooolllieee crap....who took their kids to that one?

NC-17+100 baby

[Ron Obvious]

4. "The Warriors"?

I can't even begin to understand how that one made the list.

[onager]

6. Same reaction here.

I think the article was mostly about movies that were controversial to the MPAA and its arbirtary rating/censorship policies. I was puzzled about some of them being controversial myself.

ETA - not thinking clearly (as usual). Birth of A Nation and Triumph of the Will obviously didn't involve the MPAA. And got on the list for making racism and the Nazis look good, (dis)respectively. I once saw an interesting debate between two movie critics about Birth of A Nation. A white critic wanted it banned and never shown again except in very limited circumstances. A black movie critic thought it should be shown everywhere as evidence of how ugly racism really is.

For you geezers who remember video rental stores: here's a weird experience I had when "Last Temptation of Christ" came out on video.

With much hoopla and self-congratulation, Blockbuster announced it would not stock the movie.

Thought I'd check that out. Went to my local Shlockbuster and asked for "Last Temptation."

The young woman at the counter looked around furtively, like I was trying to rent "Kinky Nuns In Bondage" or something. Then she whispered: "Yes, we have it, but we don't put it on the shelves. Would you like to rent it?"

I love the smell of hypocrisy in the morning...

[Curmudgeoness]

10. Unfortunately, I did get around to seeing it.

It was gory and pretty much over the top, although I suspected it was true to the story, or at least true to what the story intended us to imagine. I just think that putting it out of the mind and on the screen was brutal.

[bvf]

21. I remember pics of protest lines.

Probably fueled by Robertson and the like.

To your point: another reason among many to dance on Blockbuster's grave.

[AlbertCat]

7. Films that have been completely forgotten

...
...
I Spit On Your Grave (1978)
Salò, or the 120 Days of Sodom (1975)
The Warriors (1979)
The Last Temptation of Christ (1988)
...
Basic Instinct (1992)
Last Tango In Paris (1972)


No controversial films from the 21st century? Wait...from when is this article?

[PeaceNikki]

11. This list was published in 2010 - I wonder if "The Interview" will be added

I would definitely add "Passion of the Christ".

"Natural Born Killers" is up there, too. I have some super creepy awful memories tied to that movie so it tops my list.

Oh, did you guys know that Ben Hur is banned in China for containing "propaganda of superstitious beliefs, namely Christianity"?? I just learned that.

And the following are banned at The Vatican:
Life of Brian
The Last Temptation of Christ
South Park: Bigger, Longer & Uncut
The Da Vinci Code

[onager]

14. "Da Vinci Code" was banned in Egypt...

...while I was living there. Both the book and movie.

In a wonderful display of ecumenicalism and religious solidarity, the Coptic (Xian) Church asked the govt. to ban it, and several Muslim loudmouths joined in to demand a banning too.

Since politics works the same everywhere, and a display of hypocritical holiness always trumps actually DOING anything useful, the Egyptian govt. got the book and movie banned in about 10 nano-seconds. I believe the specific charge was "insulting religion."

But this was Egypt. So I could buy that Evil Banned Book in lots of bookstores, and bootleg DVD copies of the movie were on the streets in no time.

Speaking of movies...the Copts and Muslims working together reminds me of a scene from John Sayles' flick Lone Star.

A Sergeant is retiring from the Army, and telling a friend he's very happy that he can finally marry his fiancée, also retiring. He's white and she's black.

Friend: "Uh...does her family know you're white?"
Sergeant: "Nah. But that doesn't matter. They'll be so glad she's not a lesbian, they won't care WHAT color I am."
Friend: "It's always heartwarming to see one irrational prejudice defeated by another irrational prejudice."

[Curmudgeoness]

12. I remember a few other very controversial films

as well as not having heard of a few of their list.

"Rosemary's Baby" caused quite a stir when it came out, as did "The Exorcist".

I was also tickled by the explanations of what goes into how the ratings come about.

For example:

"One Fuck Rule" - With very few exceptions, under the MPAA rating system a movie is allowed to use the word "fuck" once and maintain a PG-13 rating. If the word fuck is used twice, no matter the context, it's usually an automatic R rating. There are some exceptions to this. If the one use of the word "fuck" is part of a compound expletive ("I've had it with the Motherfuckin' snakes on this...&quot then it can still be an automatic R, or if the one use of fuck is used in a sexual manner instead of an excited one (yelling "Fuck You!" in anger versus a character saying "You fucked him?&quot then it can still be an automatic R.

[bvf]

19. LOL!

Imagine the legalese behind this!

What if a character gets out "Fu--" before being talked over, etc.?

[Act_of_Reparation]

13. Though the controversy may have died down a bit...

...Fight Club caught a lot of shit when it was first released. Still my second-favorite David Fincher flick, behind se7en, of course.

[Lordquinton]

17. With so many people hating on Fight Club

for being some teenage boy's wet dream it's easy to forget just what the film is about, and how good it really is.

[bvf]

18. Did "Fight Club" really stir up controversy,

or was that buzz? I don't recall much outrage about it, but maybe I just wasn't looking in the right places.

[Act_of_Reparation]

24. It was raked over the coals for being "violent", and to a lesser extent misogynistic

Even though it really wasn't either of those things.

[Lordquinton]

26. It was violent

but not the violence wasn't there for violence sake. There are some lines and scenes that they were forced to change because of controversy, like one of the famous book lines "I want to have your abortion" was forced to be changed, so they went with the much less offensive "I haven't been fucked like that since grade school."

[Act_of_Reparation]

27. I would say there was "some" violence

But was it more violent than, say, the significantly-less criticized Braveheart?

I think what got to people was the nature of the violence: a kind of therapeutic brutality.

[Lordquinton]

28. And it's on HBO again, "Meet Bob"

In High school I took a psych class based around the book, it was scheduled around the same time the movie came out, learned a lot about mental illnesses.

[Warren Stupidity]

15. Battlefield Earth!

[bvf]

20. I recall that sinking into obscurity so quickly

that almost nobody noticed it, though I'm sure it stirred up dust in scientology circles and some Travolta fan sites, if such things exist. (It was Travolta, right?)

[onager]

22. One good reason to love Battlefield Earth...

It cost John Revolta a load of his own money. And since he sunk that money into a shady production company that went bankrupt, he probably didn't get any of it back. Thus sparing us any attempted sequels, etc.

Travolta, a long-time Scientologist, had sought for many years to make a film of the novel by Hubbard, the founder of Scientology. He was unable to obtain funding from any major studio due to concerns about the film's script, prospects and connections with Scientology. The project was eventually taken on in 1998 by an independent production company, Franchise Pictures, which specialized in rescuing stars' stalled pet projects. Travolta signed on as a co-producer and contributed millions of dollars of his own money to the production, which was largely funded by a German film distribution company. Franchise Pictures was later sued by its investors and was bankrupted in 2004 after it emerged that it had fraudulently overstated the film's budget by $31 million.

And if you need another reason to hate Quentin Tarantino, which I don't, already have plenty:

Travolta had converted to Scientology in 1975 and subsequently became one of the Church of Scientology's most prominent supporters. Hubbard sent him an autographed copy of Battlefield Earth when the book was first published in 1982; he reportedly hoped that Travolta would turn the book into a film "in the vein of Star Wars and Close Encounters of the Third Kind". While Travolta was interested, his influence in Hollywood at the time was at a low after participating in a series of flops. He gained renewed influence with the success of the 1994 film Pulp Fiction, which garnered Travolta an Academy Award nomination for Best Actor.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battlefield_Earth_(film)

[bvf]

23. Thanks for the background.

While I may generally disagree with you on Tarantino, I did have a serious problem with Travolta's appearance in Pulp Fiction, and its boost to his career.

Personally, I would have rather seen the role go to Tom Hanks.

Not being sarcastic, btw, if there's any question.

[beam me up scottie]

16. Freaks (1932) didn't make the list?

"We accept her, we accept her. One of us, one of us. Gooba-gobble, gooba-gobble".


From Wikipedia:

Cultural influence

Frank Zappa used images from the film on the sleeve of his album Tinseltown Rebellion, as it was a source of inspiration to him in his dichotomic vision of freaks versus hippies.

The Ramones' song "Pinhead" was inspired by a screening of the film by the band.

In the final episode of Clerks: The Animated Series, two characters made to resemble Pip and Zip enter the QuickStop and interact with Dante and Randal.

The film was parodied in the season premiere of the 25th season of The Simpsons, "Treehouse of Horror XXIV".

South Park episode "Butters' Very Own Episode" spoofed the film.

The famous line "We accept her, one of us", was referenced in Bernando Bertolucci's The Dreamers, with the scene from the original movie alternating as the characters in The Dreamers said it. In Robert Altman's 1992 Hollywood insider murder/mystery The Player, Detective DeLongpre (played by Lyle Lovett) mentions watching Freaks the previous night while he and his partner (Whoopi Goldberg) question Griffin Mill (Tim Robbins). As DeLongpre repeats the line "One of us. One of us", Griffin Mill experiences extreme anxiety which the detectives interpret as guilt and fear. Characters in Martin Scorsese's The Wolf of Wall Street also reference the famous "One of us" chant from the film.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Freaks

[Act_of_Reparation]

25. I would put "Dogma" on that list as well.

I had the opportunity to meet Kevin Smith while I was in college, and he recalled some the hate mail he received in the days before Dogma debuted. A number of them threatened Smith with death.... all for making a movie that was, essentially, pro-faith.