1976 Censorship Review

It was an interesting year for censorship. The language barrier was beaten down at last, with the Appeal Board reversing censor decisions and allowing films such as Dog Day Afternoon to be seen (and heard) uncut. However, the Appeal Board was selective in what language it allowed - it refused to reverse the censor's decision on language in Shampoo, which was therefore seen here in a duly bowdlerised version. In Goodbye Norma Jean it put back language which the censor had cut, but it supported other excisions. The Appeal Board also introduced a 'warning' about language which was used for some uncut films.

In other decisions of interest the board passed What Do You Say to a Naked Lady - twice banned by the censor - though with substantial cuts. The Last Detail was passed with most of its language intact. It passed WR - Mysteries of the Organism for festival-only showing, but with cuts to protect festival-goers. It passed Warhol's Heat with substantial cuts as well as an R20, but it refused to pass Warhol's Flesh, brought here after a successful Australian season.

Tim Burstall's Australian film Peterson was banned by the censor and by the board. One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest was passed by the censor with a shameful number of destructive language cuts, and the producers later said they were not told they could have appealed against the cuts. Ferreri's Grande Bouffe was banned by the censor and Appeal Board when brought in for film festival screenings.

The late Pier Paolo Pasolini's last film 120 Days of Sodom was banned by the censor and the distributors did not choose to appeal; an appeal against the banning of Bawdy Tales, scripted by Pasolini, was not successful. Other films banned included Inserts, Flesh Gordon, Story of O and Drive He Said (for a second time).

Not all was negative, however. A Mexican film showing cannibalism was passed with no age restriction, though with a warning of its unsuitability for children. Borowcyk's Story of Sin was first passed (without subtitles) for film societies only, and then a few months later (with subtitles) with an R20 for the Auckland Film Festival only. And then, of course, there was the decision on The Sailor Who Fell From Grace With the Sea, to which the censor restored four minutes of excised material at the end of its first week in Wellington; the resulting publicity helped ensure a long run.

Censorship Reform

In the dying stages of the 1976 political year, Parliament passed the new Cinematograph Films Act, which film society members should welcome with cautious enthusiasm. Though it fails to abolish censorship for adult New Zealanders, it gives hope of a more serious and a more adult attitude to the censoring of films when it comes into force next April. For this we must thank the Minister of Internal Affairs Alan Highet who has carried through a project first mooted by the film society movement during his term as Minister in the previous National administration.

The old Act told the censor he must not allow anything contrary to public order or decency. Under this administrative burden, the film censor felt forced to make cuts in a great many films of serious intent which altered the effect of the films. The new law gives the censor a more positive set of guidelines. It says he must consider 'the dominant effect of the film as a whole, and its likely effect on the audience likely to view the film; the extent to which the film has artistic merit, or is of value for social, cultural or other reasons...' These are positive gains, which one hopes will ensure that worthwhile films can be shown in their original form without the need for the censor to remove words, or sentences, or to reduce or remove sequences, Those who feel concerned about the effect of films on New Zealanders should be reassured by a further clause which instructs the censor to consider, as well as other guidelines, 'the extent and degree to which and the manner in which the film depicts, includes, or treats anti-social behaviour, cruelty, violence, crime, horror, sex, or indecent or offensive language or behaviour...' The Act still allows a film to be banned or cut, but it says that if cuts are not acceptable to the distributor of the film the censor must advise him of any more restricted classification possible if the cuts were not made - this is a further advance.

Of particular interest is the fact that the censor is now empowered to 'have regard to the nature of the audience likely to view' films restricted to film societies only, and he is also permitted to 'have regard to the fact' that films are intended for screening only at film festivals. One trusts that these two considerations will be a further means by which serious adult filmgoers can see meritorious films as their directors made them.

The new Act does mark a step forward for filmgoers, film society members should ask their MPs to send them a copy - it is worth a close study. Film societies continue to believe that the censorship of films is not necessary for adults - we believe that adults would soon learn to reject anything of low quality without the need for the government to appoint someone to do this decision-making for us. However we expect that the new law will (from April 1, 1977) offer an improvement on the way films have been treated for so long.

- Lindsay Shelton, WFS Annual Report, 1976.

Douglas McIntosh

The chief film censor, Mr Douglas McIntosh, died suddenly on Christmas Day. In paying his respects, the chairman of the Working Conmittee of the N Z Federation of Film Societies (Mr David Gascoigne) said that the Federation had developed a working relationship with Mr McIntosh in recent years. "I found him a warm and good-humoured man who did a difficult, if not impossible, job, but I thought he did it very well," Mr Gasgoine said. He took a very serious approach to the job and any criticism the film societies had of any of his decisions were levelled more at the law under which he worked than the man himself. "Mr McIntosh felt that some parts of the Cinematograph Act were out of date and needed change. It was a shame that Mr McIntosh should die shortly before the new Act came into force." Mr Gascoigne said he felt it was sad that Mr McIntosh was unable to mould the new law the way he wanted to.

Appeal Board

Since the last issue of Sequence in November, the Appeal Board has released decisions on three features and one advertising film.

Three decisions are dated 12 October, 1976, and were heard by only two members of the Board, Mrs M Nolan (Chairman) and Dr R Sharp.

The first two upheld the censor's decision to ban Paul Morrissey's Flesh and George Armitage's Vigilante Force on the grounds that both films depicted 'matter which is contrary to public order and decency and that exhibition would be undesirable in the public interest.

In the case of Cash Harmon's Number 96, New Zealand Film Services had appealed against certain cuts the censor had requested in the Australian film. The appeal board decided 'that an excision determined by them should be substituted for the Censor's decision in the rape scene and that the Censor's decisions concerning the two homosexual scenes should be reversed.' The Board's instruction reads that: 'the Censor substitute for his decision on the rape scene, an excision of the remainder of that scene to be made from the point where the woman is dragged off screen and the group is standing by the car laughing.

On 10 December the full Appeal Board with Mr A Martin as Chairman, considered an appeal by Kerridge Odeon Promotions against cuts required by the censor in the advertising film Get To Work On a Honda. Their ruling: 'It having been conceded by the appellants that the scene of the woman giving the "fingers up" sign should be deleted, the Board consented and agreed to such deletion. Further the Board being of the opinion that the other deletions required by the Censor were not contrary to the relevant section of the Act determines that those deletions requested by the Censor are unnecessary, and the Censor is therefore directed to issue a 'G' certificate for the film Get To Work On a Honda with the one deletion only as above set forth.

Under the new Act which comes into force on 1 April, the Appeal Board becomes the Films Censorship Board of Review and will have seven members, but five members, including the Chairman (or acting Chairman), are sufficient to examine a film.

- Sequence, February 1977.