Your Handy Home Censorship Kit

By ZP Heller, AlterNet. Posted May 26, 2005.

Imagine watching When Harry Met Sally without Meg Ryan's orgasmic deli scene, or The Shining without Jack Nicholson uncovering the horrors of Room 237. Imagine watching The Godfather, only Jack Woltz never wakes to a bloody horse head.

To true cinephiles, the absence of such iconic moments might ruin these films completely. To directors and Hollywood studios, such modifications are gross violations of copyright laws and artistic visions. Yet to Bill Aho, CEO of ClearPlay, these classic scenes epitomize the kind of degenerate sex, violence and foul language of Hollywood entertainment that consumers should have the power to purge from their movies.

"It's really a matter of personal choice in your home," Aho told me. "Should you have the right to experience media your way, or should the preferences of the director follow you into the living room?"

Aho is not alone. Bowing to the growing number of Americans who demand "family-friendly" entertainment, President Bush signed the Family Entertainment and Copyright Act (FECA) a couple of weeks ago. On the whole, this legislation benefits Hollywood by making it a federal crime to videotape films in movie theaters. FECA also imposes stiff penalties of up to 10 years in prison for anyone caught distributing movies or songs prior to their commercial release dates. The part that has the Directors Guild of America (DGA) up in arms, however, is the controversial Family Movie Act.

"This exception to copyright protection," said DGA spokesman Morgan Rumpf, "could have far-reaching implications that cannot fully be comprehended today -- allowing third-party editing companies to change the political content of a film, to revise the historical record, to profit from abridged versions of films, and even to make versions of films that focus on violent and sexually explicit content."

In essence, this bill, which was tacked onto the Family Entertainment and Copyright Act by Rep. Lamar Smith (R-Texas) and sponsored by Sen. Orrin Hatch (R-Utah), completely legitimizes Aho's business. Moreover, it will soon nullify the lawsuit that the DGA, eight Hollywood studios, and over a dozen directors including Steven Spielberg, Steven Soderbergh, and Robert Redford brought against ClearPlay in 2003.

Unlike companies such as Clean Films, Family Flix and Clean Flicks, which actually distribute bowdlerized versions of Hollywood DVDs (a clear-cut copyright infringement), ClearPlay sells DVD players with 14 built-in filters that are designed to mute or skip over foul language, nudity, violence and other "inappropriate" behavior in hundreds of commercial DVDs. What content will be expunged is theoretically left to the viewer's discretion. For example, if you load When Harry Met Sally and select the "Vain References to Deity" or the "Sensual Content" filters, you will skip right over Meg Ryan's ersatz, "Oh God!" orgasm.

Since the Family Movie Act allows imperceptible changes to "limited portions of audio or video content of a motion picture ... from an authorized copy of the motion picture," ClearPlay is now authorized to continue manufacturing its DVD players, which are available from their site as well as from that purveyor of all things wholesome, Wal-Mart.

By lobbying for the passage of the Family Movie Act -- Aho personally contributed a substantial amount of money to Lamar Smith's campaign in 2004 when the Act was still pending approval -- ClearPlay didn't merely dodge a hefty suit from the DGA. According to Professor Thomas Doherty, chair of the film studies program at Brandeis University, the impetus behind this legislation was clearly, "to protect and stroke a loyal Republican constituency -- but let's not construct it as a purely right-wing plot -- you don't see many Dems coming out against the right of private individuals, who legitimately purchase a copy of a DVD, from editing it. I think in another context the usual suspects would support the right, say, of an artist to monkey with the original after he paid for his own copy."

ClearPlay also managed to skirt the age-old issue of censoring Hollywood films by giving viewers the ability to self-censor in a way the fast forward button never could.

"As I understand it," said Doherty, author of Pre-Code Hollywood, "the wildcat editors want to censor material for themselves and their customers -- not for you and me. This is different from most previous efforts where the censor wanted to censor material for you and me."

In other words, a private company is seeking, albeit indirectly for legal purposes, to censor this material for its subscribers alone.

Most of these family entertainment companies, ClearPlay included, have emerged from Utah. As Aho said, "There is a concentration of families and religiously oriented people [in Utah], and I think that had something to do with the early video editing companies starting here." In a recent USA Today article, Jason Crop, who founded MovieShield technology, said of this cluster of companies that got their start at Brigham Young University, "I think what happened is the melting pot lent itself to these ideas. I think it honestly comes down to the Mormon culture. You don't watch R-rated movies, or you be very careful what you watch."

Zack Pelta-Heller is a freelance writer living in Astoria, New York.

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