Motion Picture Commission : hearings before the Committee on Education, House of Representatives, Sixty-third Congress, second session, on bills to establish a Federal Motion Picture Commission (1978)

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MOTION PICTURE COMMISSION. 191 they must receive the iipproval of the boiiid of censors, concei'iiiug whose powers the Canadian j)ress remarks: No nun-ders, no nttaeks on any relijiious body, no bursjliirios, no highway rob- beries, in I'aet, no presentation wherein vice or violation in any form tigures— such is the rule which will l)e followinl by the newly created <inebec (Canada) Board of ;\Ioving Picture Film Censors. I want to call your attention to that standard set by the Quebec board of censors, and the standards of the judirment of the national board of censors in New York. These are the elementary standards of the b(iard. The board prohibits obscenity in all its forms. Then it says: "The board prohibits vulgarity." Now, if it would stop there. ])robably there would be no objection to tiiat rule, l)ut u.n- fortunately. that is followed by this qualifying ])hrase: " AViien it offends or when it verges toward indecency, unless an adeiiuate moral purpose is served." There are two very strong qualifying phrases, so that there is no prohibition of vulgarity if it falls uiider either of the qualifying phrases. Then, in the third place, "The board prohibits the representation of crime." If it w(ndd stop there, it woidd then be on a par with the rule laid down by the Quebec board of censorship, wliich prohibits the representation of murders or burglaries, highway robberies, and other crime, but it does not stop there. The prohibition of the representation of crime is quali- fied as follows: In such detailed way as may teach the methods of connnitting crime excei)t as in the .iudpment of the board the representjition serves as a warnini; to the whole imblic. Under that rule any crime under any circumstances, however hor- rible, or whatever may be the moral turpitude involv(>d, may be rep- resented, provided it is not done—• in such a detailed way as may teach the methods (»f committing crime except as in the judjiment of the board the repi-esentation serves as a warning to the whole public. Of course, that practically an^ounts to no prohibition at all. Then, the fourth standard, or prohibition, is as follows: The board prohil)ils morbid scenes of crime, whei-e the only value of the scene is its morbidity or criminal api)eal. So that the qualifications in all of those three to v/liich I have just referred, mei-ely serve to make them negative. Do you not think that in the Fnited States we ought to h.ave at least as high a standard with regard to those things as they have in Quebec ? Mr. SciiF.cnTF.i;. T think, Jiulge Towner, that the articles of the national !)oard are misleading. That while they may, in fact, be somewhat loosely drawn, in passing upon the film subjects submitted to it the b(;ard in tlie United States is equally as strict as the Quebec board; that the Quebec board must in pa.ssing upon film take into consideration the subject in the same v/ay as does the New York boaril; and this is indicated by the fact that most of the film sent to Quebec from the United States is aj^proved by the Quebec board. Mr. T<)w>sKi{. This is the censor of the Province of Quebec, which would be analogous to State censorsliip in this country.