Explicit Content

My television binge has led me to HBO's new show, "Tell Me You Love Me," a melodrama about couples with various couple issues--primarily sex, in this case. From the first episode, I can say I find it rather compelling, to say nothing of its controversial nature that even made a Drudge Report headline some months ago.

What spurred it, of course, was its willingness to show the male genitalia, the organ which is so often missing from television and film, and what will at once nominate you for a safe NC-17 rating. For once, a television show balances the sexes and revels in the fact that it takes two to tango. It also seems so obvious now that our concepts of decency is incredibly sexist--that the total display of the female body is somehow less erogenous or profane than the naked male body.

I recommend the documentary film, "This Film is Not Yet Rated" if you'd like to see not only how nonsensical the MPAA really is, but how dangerous it is to the very art of cinema. One scene claims that a rater on the MPAA board seems to believe that their censorship "made the film better," instead of simply just censoring it.

You might also find "Inside Deep Throat" a fascinating film about the first lucrative film that made pornography mainstream, and created a straw man for the religious right for years to come.

NC-17 seems to brand films as sinful, and therefore many studios will not release a film that earns this rating, despite the inherit quality of the film. One recent notable exception is Ang Lee's "Lust, Caution" which has the NC-17 rating, and is winning awards just the same. This is a great first step towards free artistic expression.

I modestly propose a choice: that I might be able to choose between the NC-17 cut, or the R rating. If only theatres had the imagination to offer this choice. The public already prefers their DVDs in unrated forms over MPAA cut fests, so why not offer the same choice in theatrical release? There's plenty of reasons why they won't, and almost all of them involve the mighty dollars of the soft drink industry.

Obscenity is relative; every day you witness content that, if filmed, would be considered profane. Showering for one, sex another. If we do not consider our daily rituals obscene, then why should we in an artistic context?

Maybe it's time we treated each other like adults.