Censorship Issues

A report from Paris says that the French Cabinet has approved measures that would allow nearly all sexual activities to be shown in cinemas. The Secretary of State for Culture, Michel Guy, said the only scenes to be banned would be those 'degrading to human dignity', presumably scenes of sadomasochism or those involving children. Straight pornographic films, however, will be barred from receiving state aid which customarily goes to all French film productions. M Guy said films of extreme violence or dealing too heavily with drugs would continue to be subject to the censor's scissors.

In Britain, censorship came under discussion in the Greater London council, which had before it a motion to abolish censorship for adult audiences. The motion was lost on a 50 to 44 vote, but has started a move in the Commons by a group of Labour MP's who have called for a new Cinematograph Bill which would place film censorship on the same basis as theatre censorship under the 1968 Theatres Act which ended the Lord Chamberlain's role in theatre censorship.

Here in New Zealand, the Prime Minister says he wants to see wide discussions in both Cabinet and Caucus before there is any change in our censorship laws. Mr Rowling told a crowd of more than a thousand students at Auckland University on his return from his overseas tour, that a bill is coming up which will re-draft film censorship. But, he said, because a bill is prepared doesn't mean that it will necessarily go before Parliament.

After six months without a Cinematograph Films Censorship Board of Appeal, the Minister of Internal Affairs finally appointed three new members last month. The new Chairman will be Mr A J L Martin, who is chairman of the Social Security Appeal Authority, the Taxation Review Authority and the Chiropractic Board. He is claimed to have had a long personal interest in the arts and theatre. The other new members are Mrs M R Nolan and Dr R A Sharp. Mrs Nolan, a mother of 10, is an executive member of the Christian Family Movement and a director of the Tourist Hotel Corporation. She was a member of the Commission on the Liquor Industry and a foundation member of the Race Relations Council. Dr Sharp, 34, is Senior Lecturer in the Political Studies Department at Auckland University. He was a foundation member of the Merely Players, a professional theatre group, and was for many years active in the Canterbury University drama society. Their terms will expire on February 1, 1978.

Warwick Roger, in assessing the new board in The Dominion, made the following points: "The choice has all but dashed the hopes of those who had hoped for a more liberal era of censorship. The reconstituted board - which can reverse or uphold the censor's decisions to cut or ban films - is a case of more of the same. The new board looks to have a token conservative (and token woman), a token liberal and a conservative chairman.

"As such it is a copy of the old one which had a conservative woman in the form of onetime headmistress Miss Maida Clarke, a liberal in the form of former Arts Council chairman Mr Bill Sheat, and a conservative chairman in retired magistrate Mr Bill Carson. On two occasions in the past two years Mr Sheat was over-ruled by Miss Clark and Mr Carson. The most celebrated case was the board's majority decision to uphold the censor's ban of Last Tango In Paris. (The other was the board's majority decision to uphold the censor who had demanded two cuts to the Film Society film Paarungen. -Ed).

""Censorship reformers had hoped people with a knowledge of film as an art form would be appointed to the new board. The New Zealand Federation of Film Societies went so far as sending a list of people it considered suitable to Mr May late last year, but all were rejected, as was an offer by Mr Sheat to serve again. The former board's term of office ran out last August 31. Since then there has been no appeal board - and a pile-up of films, including a re-submitted Last Tango In Paris, await decisions. In the period since the old board went out of existence Mr May, one of Cabinet's most conservative members, came under intense pressure from both sides of the censorship argument. His appointments show that the conservatives - mainly in the form of the Society for the Promotion of Community Standards - carried the day."

David Gascoigne, chairman of the Working Committee of the New Zealand Federation of Film Societies, speaking on behalf of all filmgoers, expressed what he termed 'predictable disappointment' at the composition of the new board. 'The Minister's announcement doesn't attribute any particular knowledge of film or interest in films to the new members. This is a specialist tribunal, and though we recognise the validity of having the views of the ordinary citizen recognised, we still think it a good idea to have some people with particular knowledge on such a tribunal.'

- reprinted from Sequence April 1975.