The Notorious Bettie Page

[karohemd]

is very good, too.
Gretchen Mol is quite impressive and portrayed the transition from the shy country girl to the successful Pinup model who knows what she's doing very well indeed.
I liked the style of the film, too and the way they used different colour grading (grainy, shaky black and white; stark, high contrast b&w and faded Super 8 style colour) for the different aspects of the film. Some of her famous shoots were lovingly recreated, too.

Something surje mentioned afterwards made me think. The audience laughed at the ridiculous accusations of pornography, "perverting of adolescents" and other such nonsense during the hearing scenes but is it much different now? Yes, nowadays you see a lot more on the top shelf of every newsagent's but the issues are still there.
Then I realised the perfect example: The film was rated 18 and I have no idea why. No, hang on, I got it: there were about three scenes with bare breasts and one short full frontal nudity shot. All of these were absolutely harmless and even the BDSM scenes were just plain funny and ridiculous.
So, massacring thousands of people, skewering them, beheading them, blowing them to bits, all right in front of the camera gets a 12A (best example: the LotR films) but as soon as there's a nipple or a pube, it's an 18. Various people need their morals adjusted, I think.

On a lighter note, I leave you with two photos of another Bettie Page lookalike, puddingcat:

  

Comments

[belak-krin.livejournal.com]

breasts get you a 15 rating, full frontal is an 18. BDSM scenes, laughable or not are 'of a sexual nature' Also, the themes of the film - questioning the objectification of women, the creation of images of a woman in a sexual setting etc. would raise the rating.

The violence withing LotR, much like that in Spiderman (the first film to gain the 12a rating) is detracted from reality, contained within a fantasy or comic-book environment unlike that of say Terminator, where although the nature of the film could be considered 'fantasy' from the point of view of it being a sci-fi film with impossible characters and events, the violence that occurs is very much based in the real world.

You may disagree with rating system, and in fact I think everyone has some examples of things they think are mis-rated, but there has to be a system in place to discern between thousands of films each year and it is far better than the alternatives.

[karohemd.livejournal.com]

If I had seen LotR at or under 12, I wouldn't have slept for days (maybe with the light on) but I don't think I would have been disturbed by BP in the slightest.
If it's possible/fantasy or not, the images are still very brutal indeed. It doesn't matter much that the blood is black/green, it's the violence that's disturbing because the victims are quite clearly suffering.

*shrugs*

[belak-krin.livejournal.com]

the ratings system is not there to stop children from getting nightmares, it is in place to safe-guard against(for want of a better phrase) issues of morality.

You don't really have to explain to a child why the orcs in LotR are killed, or at least it's very simple to do so i.e. because they are 'bad'. It is also very easy to explain to a child that they shouldn't hit people because it hurts; something the child is familiar with.

Now try to apply the same principles to the issues dealt with in Bettie Page. How do you explain to a child that although some women make their money by displaying their bodies, not all women do and it is in fact innappropriate to stare at/made lewd comments about them. More than that, trying to express mature connotations of sexual preferences (in BDSM) would be impossible - "some people like to be hit, but only at certain times, in a certain way.."?

[karohemd.livejournal.com]

I'm not saying it should be a 12A but an 18? I don't know.

Different standards and upbringing, I guess.

[belak-krin.livejournal.com]

sexual themes and content, would you want your underage daughter or son watching films with that basis, glamourising nude modelling? If you let this one take a lower rating, it affects what else can be given a 15 rating.

[pinkapplejam.livejournal.com]

Same in games. Burnout on the PS2 has subject matter and gameplay based purely upon horrendous car crashes. This got a certificate age rating of 3 years and up!! No blood and no people = young rating, despite major crashes, sparks, destruction. I find that quite ridiculous.

[belak-krin.livejournal.com]

The games world really does need a decent rating system, one that people actually take note of. The trouble is you can rate a film in 2 hours or so, a game could take weeks or months to experience all the content :(

Burnout it is a bit strange, after all it's only a computerised version of what you can see any three year old doing with their matchbox cars, when I was a kid, I had ones that even had panels that flipped round to reveal smashed up bonnets :D With the slow-mo replays, bonuses to collect and being able to drive busses, the crash mode kind of falls into the tom and jerry kind of violence.

[pinkapplejam.livejournal.com]

I guess this is the kind of thing that gave such a low rating, I did indeed think of the kids playing with their dinky toys parallel. Howevertoy cars do not spark and burst into flames! Maybe this is just me being a girl, lol. ^_-

[belak-krin.livejournal.com]

They do in our heads! xD thats why you have to make "crsssssss... kpooowww!!!" noises when you do it ;)

[puddingcat.livejournal.com]

Bah! Put up a better pic in the spotty skirt!

:p

(It appears that NOWHERE in Manchester is showing it. Bah.)

[karohemd.livejournal.com]

It's one of the best I've got and it's very Bettie. :o)