Group Six Blog Post Assignment

This Dolce and Gabbana advertisement consists of two people entangled within black satin sheets. This woman is holding the sheet to cover herself because it seems as though she doesn't have any clothes on. She has blonde curly hair and by most people, she would be considered attractive. She seems to be staring off into space. The man is laying next to her and holds his gaze on her. He has brown hair and is well dressed in a suit. He has his hand on his knee which is touching the woman's back. On the bottom of the advertisement, it has the brand's name, Dolce and Gabbana, and a picture for the product that is being advertised.

The man is wearing a black suit, suggesting that he is a business man and professional. That also implies that he has a decent amount of money because suits can be expensive. The woman appears not to be wearing any actual clothing but the middle part of her body is covered up by the sheet. The couple appears to be in a bed which could explain the woman’s lack of clothing and also how their bodies are closely positioned. The woman has one hand keeping the sheet up near her shoulders, while the other rests at the top of her head. She is facing upward, showing her whole face with her eyes unfocused on something above her. The man’s hand at first appears to be reaching out towards the woman, but really it’s just resting on his bent knee. The only contact between the couple is his knee against her lower back. The man appears to be propped up on his elbow, with his arm curled to his body, and looking down at the woman. The position of his body implies that he wants to get closer to the woman.

The back ground consists of black sheets on a bed. The color black is the color power in the color wheel. The black sheets compliment the man's black suit and tie as well as mix with the sheet that is covering Scarlett Johansson. This serves to blend the major portion of her body in as part of the background. The man's black suit and tie serve to blend him in as part of the background putting the focus on Scarlet Johanson. This suggests that he is in the background and the main focus is Scarlett Johanson as her body, from mid-thigh down and from chest up, are the only contrast to the background.

Does the easy focus on Scarlett Johansson and the black sheets as background symbolize that she is the center her environment? How does her wearing only sheets and him wearing actual clothing add to the sexual implicitly of this ad? What is the purpose behind her, naked under a sheet, on a bed, having her back to a man wearing a suit with his front to her, on the same bed?

Blog group 5: Eleni, Xintan, Yamen, & Yu

In the advertisement, there is a yellow baby car seat placed upon a plain baby blue background. Next to it is a price tag with the number $217. Below it is the word durex, a condom company with a price tag $2.50. The price tag for the car seat is much bigger than the price of the condom. The words durex are written in white but has darker blue surrounding it.

This ad is depicting, in a humorous way, the two sides of sex: one being unprotected sex and the expenses that follow. Those expenses are much greater than the one car seat shown. For example, you may have a child, which in the long run will cost you a hell of a lot more than a condom that only costs $2.50. This ad is playing upon the users emotions, showing them that by investing a little bit into the company durex they will save a good amount of money in the end. So why take the risk? The other side is using protection and paying the small fee that comes along with buying one condom, because all it takes is one time. Why is it even necessary for the company to go about advertising in this way? This is a form of shock advertisement, it literally puts into perspective the consequences that arise from unprotected sex. So next time the viewer thinks about having unprotected sex, this image will arise in their head.

The color baby-blue is associated with babies. The use of yellow in the ad really makes the car seat pop, so the eye goes there first.

What is the significance of the big baby seat, is the baby big? Why is the company logo so small? Why is the background blue?

This Film is not yet Rated

This Film is not yet Rated was an interesting and hilarious look at the film industry's rating system.  First off, the documentary itself was structured very explicitly.  There were uncensored looks at NC-17 films and use of explicit language.  The manner that this explicit content was shown in, however, was light-hearted and comical.  I felt that this was a tactic for holding the viewer's attention, and I feel that the writers pulled it off effectively.  Without the explicit content and languague the documentry may have been pretty dry.  Now, from a content standpoint, the documentary was interesting as well.  The whole "secret group" of raters was a new concept to me and the PI aspects were also interesting.  There were some dry spells through the middle of the movie but it picked back up at the end when the documentary was given to the raters for a rating request.  The fact that the movie recieved an NC-17 itself was a great way to end the film.

Cliff Brady This Film is Not Yet Rated

I found the film quite intellectually stimulating. I thought they took a lot of time and energy to expose a system that is not necessarily accepted by everyone. Most people look at the ratings of a movie and just accept it for what it is. Ive never really thought about who makes those decisions or how. This movie really brings to life the problems in the film industry and for that i thank them. I just wish the rating company would do something to change.

Gabe Baumgartner Movie

It was a very interesting movie on how the rating system works. I also thought it was very strange that the members of the group were secret. There were some parts I did not agree with completely, however. One part was that there were some directors who wanted to make movies about reality in the military such as the abuse of drugs or use of vulgar language but could not because the military reviewed each movie before it came out. I think that if these movies came out showing a negative perspective of the military, many people such as war veterans or the families of men and women in the military would be extremely offended. This would also discourage people from joining the military and cause a sense of disrespect towards our military. So I am in favor of the military reviewing each movie.

Yamen Diab This film is not yet rated

This film was very interesting, it brought up many things about the MPAA and government censorship that I had never heard of before. Although I feel as if this movie was somewhat slanted in a way, catering to the viewpoints of some people about censorship in the media. Also I found the part about the investigation into the actual names of the people hired by the MPAA biased. The documentary consistently brings about points of why the board members names should be revealed, but not once says anything about why they shouldn't. I believe that people working those jobs can be influenced both ways, from film makers, and from studios. Therefore I don't believe that the names of the members should have been made readily available to the public. This adds an extra factor to the influences behind movies being rated, and could possibly even in the future allow some movies to receive a rating that may not be appropriate. Although I found parts of this documentary to be true, I am not completely convinced on the whole point of it.

Jiaqi Guo-Response to movie

This is really an interesting film telling us how American films are rated and how the filmmakers respond to the rating. There are a lot of element of sexuality and violence involved in all kinds of films. And absolutely, information in film will always has an impact on the audience, and then spreads to the whole public. Thus in my opinion, films should be carefully rated for public good, especially nowadays, young people have occupied a large part of audience. If the films are not rated, the sexual and violent scene in films may give the youth incorrect information that those things are cool to do and such thoughts will lead their action. And I think the film makers now do care too much about the profit brought by films, but ignore their social responsibility and the true impact that films will bring to the society. 

Movie (Eleni)

Everything I heard in the documentary surprised me; I had no idea that the film industry was so corrupted. I think the aspect that struck me the most was military movies and how our government deals with them. It's astounding (to me), that the government/military has so much control over movies that have war or the use of the U.S. military in the film. It makes me question if we ever really see the truth about wars in movies, especially because the military has the first view of the movie. Therefore, they can cut anything that depicts the U.S. military in bad way. Overall, I though everything in the movie was super industry and I feel like I won't be able to look at a movie the same. I will always be judging whether or not I think the movie should of been rated what it was rated.

Movie

What I found interesting about this movie was the the MPAA. This is so strange that there are only two completely confidential organizations out there, this and the CIA. THere is no reason why this organization has to be on the same level of secrecy as the CIA. THe CIA protect against terrorism, the MPAA protect against, ummm... sex, which everyone will be exposed to in their lives. I think that it is pointless to keep them confidential.

This video left me with more questions than areas of interest. It is definitely significant how a film rating scheme has almost greater confidentiality than a federal courtroom. They are just movies. We're not talking about the Sadam Hussein trial. It's funny that all these so called raters receive no training whatsoever on their duties. The fact that Jack Valenti worked in Washington alone says corruption. Why does Hollywood need secrets when it is an industry that is intended to express rather than compartmentalize? It appears that the rating board is not diversified. How messed up is it that American Psycho got an NC-17 rating yet the movie had a sequel? In the entire showing of the soldiers in Iraq, only one white soldier was shown. What does that say, exactly about how much this might be an just an attempt to win over viewers? Really? An episcopalian and a Catholic Priest? What does that say about how deep the Vatican is all things? Seriously what happened to the separation of church and state? On wait, it's not a federal court, yet it has more confidentiality. After all the appeals court is treated like a legal courtroom that takes full advantage of the fat that it is not. Seriously, they wouldn't even give the guy the names of his "jurors." Isn't that constitutional right? Violence(people dying and being slaughtered) is ok but sex(the act if giving life) is bad. What does that say about the separation of sub-cultures. It's easy, conflict brings commerce.

Yu Yoshizawa A rule makes thing interesting

Somebody (the president of MPAA? I don't remember) in the film mentioned that he wants film makers express their idea freely, but not too much freely. There should be some people or an organization in the society who consider the balance of figures of films and control the distribution of sexually and vocabulary intensive and aggressive expressions more or less as the effect of films to the public and society is tremendous. Hollywood is the one of the most representing culture of the US to the world and MPAA needs to consider its whole figure or image and value to other countries cinema. As my opinion, having a restriction is a good idea and in such a restriction or categories (NC-17, G, PG or whatever) film makers can express ideas better and better like as we enjoy watching boxing, karate, wrestling, sambo, judo and so on because they have their own specific rule.

GyoJin Kim - Film Response

I thought there is not a strict regulation in film in U.S.A. before watching the movie. In the movie, This Film is Not Yet Rated, There were many problem which is related to movie rating system and board called MPAA. In this movie, they mainly talked about NC-17. If a film is considered as NC-17 film, the movie cannot be shown in many movie theaters. It also means that filmmakers lose profit. The most controversial thing in the movie is decisions of MPAA are not fair. For example, MPAA rates the scene which is showed a woman masturbating as NC-17, but MPAA didn’t rate the scene which is showed a man masturbating by using a pie. Moreover, the movie could show a heterosexual sex, but could not show a homosexual sex. Today, many gay people marry each other also many lesbian people get married legally. I believe MPAA also should follow the world big flow.

Moose Mannarino - Film Response

I thought the film was thought provoking. I would have to side with the film makers on this argument though. By creating a rating system that tolerates violence over sex our society has shown skewed ideals. I do not think the rating system is necessary and the way it is run is sketchy to say the least. I think that creativity shouldn't be stifled and that even if a movie gets a rating of NC-17 it should still be allowed to show in theaters. I think rather than get a rating determined by an anonymous group of board members, parents should be in charge of allowing their kids to watch movies that they deem suitable. It is not a matter of what a small group of people think, people should be allowed to see what they would like to see. It is a shame that great movies get stifled and cut to appease a group of people who are only seeking monetary gain.

Xinyi Wang- Film response

After watching this film, I find that both the film maker and the rater have their thoughts and reasons to rate a film. I think that film maker should not only think about the profit of a film, but they also need to think about what effects this film will bring to all viewers including children. I believe that there should be a specific regulation of how to rate a film. The majority of the young people should be protected. It is like the limitation of drinking, we cannot sacrifice most young people and make the small group of people who want this kind of film happy.

Film Response- Jessica Cole

Something very interesting that I found from the film was how conservative the members of the ratings board are. This seems really interesting due to the fact that the entertainment industry tends to lean toward the liberal side. The fact that all the members were older and most of their children were older than the age that was told to the public is also interesting. This seems to explain why the ratings board seems to be more harsh than some would expect, and it explains why they are more concerned with some topics being in movies over others. The idea that the members are older than the public is told and that the members are more conservative than expected seem like they could be related. This is because that as people get older, it is usually true that they find more things offensive.

Rebecca Kohlruss Film Response

Before watching the movie "This Film is Not Yet Rated" I didn’t realize how much control the rating of a movie had over its success in theaters. I had never thought about how this could create a kind of monopoly of businesses in the film industry. It is pointed out in the movie how extreme amounts of violence can be shown, but outside of simple heterosexual sex is labeled NC 17. This offers a likely contributing factor as to why our culture is becoming much more violent. It seems to me that the mpaa possibly started out with good intentions, but turned out being a way to control what companies and types of movies will succeed.

Xintan Yang Film Response

The film that we watched in class, This Film is not yet Rated, is talking about disclosure of how MAPP rate a movie. Since MPAA is so mysterious that only can private detectives get information from spy ways. The board don't talk to the public any their data and criteria. Filmmakers said that if their movie was rated in the level, like NC-17, they will lost many audience even much earnings. This rate system is not fair, because filmmakers use their own way to present what they think is beautiful to audience by filming. But the board of MPAA ignore these filmmakers' rights, they only count how many times sexual plots come out rather than really understand the whole movie. At the end of this movie, there is a comparison between the rate of the movies that includes violence plots and that includes sextual plots. And the result is, many violence movies were overrated compared to the sexual movie.

Dong Kwon Yoo This Film is Not Yet Rated

The most interesting thing in this film was to compare the view of gay sex scene and straight sex scene in the movies. The Motion Picture Association of America, MPAA, classifies the movies rates in NC, R, PG, and etc. The problem occurring in the movie describes the unfairness of rating system that MPAA has. This clip shows that MPAA rates the movie about gay sex scene movie as NC (No Children)-17, but the straight movie which has almost same sex scene gets R(Restricted). With several comparing scenes of gay sex and straight sex, I, as a viewer, think that director intentionally criticizes the MPAA’s tyranny.

jingwei zhou this film is not rated yet

Even it is a documentary film, it is still impressive because it shows how different people view the movie culture in different perspectives.

People might just focus on enjoy how those movies are, but never consider about what does movie mean to others, especially for producers. the word "movies" is becoming more and more similar to the noun "money", because typical hollywood movie gains lots of money by just adding impressive special effects and fighting clips, rather than real lives or deeper ideas and thoughts.

Movie actually is not only a way to pleasure watchers, but also express producer's inspiration and enthusiasm to show their own worldview or ideas and human experiences. The MPAA can decide which film is acceptable by their own thoughts or standards, which is more or less comprised with personal attitudes or prejudice. in the documentary, some producers got shocked, knowing his(her) movie rated NC-17. especially in america, a country that mostly encourages free thinking and respects, this sort of unreasonable system seems like so unfair because members in MPAA make their own decisions in "black boxes". NC-17 means blasphemy to intellectual producers, who devote themselves to movie career to create real films but with bloody or sexual views, because MPAA member make judgements in their own perspectives. It, NC-17, could mean a disaster to a good movie, because many viewers won't choose to take time to watch them just because of the rate.

for instance, people would love wars because of seeing hollywood war movies which are not real things. however, people can't understand what war is, since those real war documentary will be rated as NC-17 and most people won't care that any more.

Anyway, the rate system for movies give much less chances for those creative and real movies.

Kelsey Warner Film Response

After watching the documentary "This Film is Not Yet Rated" I felt very enlightened. I was not aware that the people that decided film ratings were just average people. I also found it interesting that many of them were parents and even a couple were clergy men. The people that decide ratings should be move diverse, instead of very conservative people. It's not really fair to the creators of the movies. In the end, the parent's should be the ones that control what their children watch. I do think that the MPAA is ultimately a good thing because it helps to control what people watch but I think parts of it need to be changed.

Jason Na Film Response

Before watching the documentary “This Film Is Not Yet Rated” in our class, I was not aware of the fact that rating a movie was this difficult, and that it took so much work to produce it. I never knew that the movie rating NC-17 existed, which is “No Children Allowed.” Private investigator MPAA tried so hard and took humiliation from the raters on the phone to expose Hollywood’s best-kept secret. To me, the board seems to treat homosexual material much more harshly than heterosexual material. The board’s raters lacked of expertise in media literacy and child development and had no training. As a result, they lost credibility from the movie directors and got sued. MPAA contributed to the movie viewers especially to parents so that they can decide which movies or films to let their children watch.

Angela Beebe Film Response

I found it enlightening to see the behind-the-scene aspect of the rating system for films in the movie “This Film is Not Yet Rated”. The “rules” that the MPAA have put in place that of there own idea limits the film makers in what they can do with movies. By doing this that restricts the film maker to what kind of movie they can make, what can be said, and what can be visually communicated. While I do believe there should be restriction on what is shown to children. It is ultimately up to the parent to decide what their child views, and I think that the MPAA started out with the right intention to help educate parents on what is filmed. The MPAA obviously doesn’t hold the same views as all Americans and I think that other review boards should be made to rate movies. This would allow film makers to get a fair chance at a rating.

Allison Bankieris Film Response

The movie our class watched, This Film Is Not Yet Rated, explored deep inside the movie rating system and board, the NPAA, and discussed how movies get their ratings focusing mainly on the rating of NC-17. If a film receives an NC-17 rating, it cannot be shown in many theaters and loses a wide audience of viewers. Many filmmakers who received NC-17's on the films were interviewed and I found it so interesting how differently the raters viewed their films than how the movie makers intended them to be viewed. What the raters found "disgusting", the filmmakers found beautiful and passionate, such as many homosexual scenes that were in their movies. Several false claims were made by the NPAA as shown in this film. The board has a very unfair representation of people that rate the movies. For example, a former board member disclosed that when he was a rater, he never knew of any homosexual people who were on the board. It seems that the NPAA is comprised mostly of caucasian, straight, older parents. The NPAA tries to keep so many secrets as well. This is unfair to the American public who view these movies, and especially unfair to the filmmakers her put years of time and effort into these films, then receive an NC-17 rating sometimes completely without reason. The board needs some serious reconstruction and their secrets need to be let out.

Alex Sofranko, Film Response

In the documentary, This Film is Not Yet Rated, there were many issues caused by the assigning of an NC-17 rating by the MPAA for both directors and actors alike. When a film receives an NC-17 it loses its ability to advertise in many places, causing it to lose profit. What was most controversial though was how the MPAA made decisions on what the rating for a film was. They found that when there is heterosexuality in a film, it is likely to receive a lower rating than if a film contained homosexuality. I personally agree with the points that were made in the documentary. The board’s decision to rate certain films as NC-17 rather than R is entirely unfair. Since the members of the board do not view homosexuality the same as some people, they feel turned off and are much more likely to give a film an NC-17 rating. There is a terrible lack of representation on the board of homosexuals as well as people with under aged children. The MPAA claims to be comprised of average every day parents but the truth is the board is formed by only a portion of what are considered to be average people today. If there were a greater representation of normal citizens such as younger parents and homosexual parents, films would have a much better chance of receiving a fair rating and in turn producing the maximum amount of profit possible.

Blog Group #4

Blog Group #4 Angela Beebe, Alex Sofranko, Kelsey Warner, Jiaqi Guo

This is a 2007 advertisement for Budweiser. There is a white, blond-haired woman laying on top of a Budweiser beer bottle. She is wearing a low-cut bathing suit that is made out of the label for the bottle. She is pulling her bathing suit strap off of her chest with her left hand while gazing at the viewer with a seductive smile. Her right hand is behind her head allowing her body to be in an open position. Her left leg is wrapped around the bottle. She has bright red lips and the background is bright red as well. Her skin is shiny as if she is lathered up with oil and at the beach. The bottle is her towel that she is laying on. The background and the bottle have water droplets on them like they are sweating.

The woman's positioning on the bottle is very seductive. Her eyes are looking at the viewer, which seems like she is saying “come and get me”. With her legs spread and her hand behind her back she is making so the viewer can have a full look at her. This implies that she isn't shy and is ready for suggestions. The fact that she is on the bottle, which is held in a person's hand, encourages the viewer to reach out and grab her.

The background appears to be sweating which implies that the attractive woman is making this happen. Her appearance and dress is something that typically drives a heterosexual male to perspire when he is faced with his innermost sexual desires. When a man is faced with sexual fantasies he typically sweats. Like men in this situation, the background drips in perspiration.

The colors used in this ad are all-American red, white, and blue. These colors were chosen to appeal to the hardworking American male that wants to come home after a long day of labor and enjoy a beer. The wording is placed in a suggestive manner across the woman so that while looking at her the brand is imprinted in the viewers mind. This allows the viewer to recall the woman when he is deciding what beer to buy. His mind will instantly make the association that to buy this beer would allow him to have a woman like the one used in the ad.

Why is the beer bottle so much bigger than the woman in this ad? Why does the ad use a Caucasian woman instead of a woman of another race? What is the significance of using an all red background? What are the other reasons for having the woman positioned on top of the beer bottle?

Movie Day

Here are the four options for the Movie Day on Monday. Please comment on this post with your vote by Saturday at noon. Each title is linked to information at imdb.com

1) This Film is Not Yet Rated
2) Something New
3) The Business of Fancydancing
4) Shortbus