Implementing the Hays Code
The Hays Office, or more exactly the "The Motion Picture Production Code" and the "Production Code Administration (PCA)", established by the six major Hollywood Studios (Warner, Disney, Universal, Columbia, Fox and Paramount) in an effort to avoid the creation of state and federal censorship laws, ruled U.S. film making morals and ethics from 1934 to the mid 60ies.
This list is intended as a collection of commented censorship samples and not of course a complete directory which would contain thousands of titles reviewed over a period of 30 years.
An abbreviated list of Hays rules can be found below, in two sections: "Don'ts" and "Be Carefuls":
Don'ts
1. Pointed profanity, religious and sexual (Go, damn, hell, ...)
2. Nudity
3. Illegal drug traffic
4. Sex perversion
5. White slavery
6. Miscegenation (sex relationships between races)
7. Sex hygiene and venereal diseases;
8. Scenes of actual childbirth and children's sex organs
9. Ridicule of the clergy
10. Wilful offence to any nation, race or creed;
Be Carefuls
1. Use of the flag
2. International relations (avoiding picturizing in an unfavourable light another country's religion, history, institutions, prominent people, and citizenry)
3. Arson
4. Use of firearms
5. Theft, robbery, safe-cracking, and dynamiting of trains, mines, buildings, etc. (having in mind the effect which a too-detailed description of these may have upon the moron)
6. Brutality and possible gruesomeness
7. Committing murder by whatever method
8. Methods of smuggling
9. Third-degree methods
10. Hangings or electrocutions as punishment for crime
11. Sympathy for criminals
12. Attitude toward public characters and institutions
13. Sedition
14. Cruelty to children and animals
15. Branding of people or animals
16. Sale of women, or of a woman selling her virtue
17. Rape or attempted rape
18. First-night scenes
19. Man and woman in bed together
20. Deliberate seduction of girls
21. Denigrating the institution of marriage
22. Surgical operations
23. Use of drugs
24. scenes with law enforcement or law-enforcing officers
25. Excessive or lustful kissing
Note: Life Magazine attempted a single still showing all Hays "don'ts" in a single image: http://goo.gl/sHAbn0
Sources (Wikipedia):
Sources (TV-Tropes):
This list is intended as a collection of commented censorship samples and not of course a complete directory which would contain thousands of titles reviewed over a period of 30 years.
An abbreviated list of Hays rules can be found below, in two sections: "Don'ts" and "Be Carefuls":
Don'ts
1. Pointed profanity, religious and sexual (Go, damn, hell, ...)
2. Nudity
3. Illegal drug traffic
4. Sex perversion
5. White slavery
6. Miscegenation (sex relationships between races)
7. Sex hygiene and venereal diseases;
8. Scenes of actual childbirth and children's sex organs
9. Ridicule of the clergy
10. Wilful offence to any nation, race or creed;
Be Carefuls
1. Use of the flag
2. International relations (avoiding picturizing in an unfavourable light another country's religion, history, institutions, prominent people, and citizenry)
3. Arson
4. Use of firearms
5. Theft, robbery, safe-cracking, and dynamiting of trains, mines, buildings, etc. (having in mind the effect which a too-detailed description of these may have upon the moron)
6. Brutality and possible gruesomeness
7. Committing murder by whatever method
8. Methods of smuggling
9. Third-degree methods
10. Hangings or electrocutions as punishment for crime
11. Sympathy for criminals
12. Attitude toward public characters and institutions
13. Sedition
14. Cruelty to children and animals
15. Branding of people or animals
16. Sale of women, or of a woman selling her virtue
17. Rape or attempted rape
18. First-night scenes
19. Man and woman in bed together
20. Deliberate seduction of girls
21. Denigrating the institution of marriage
22. Surgical operations
23. Use of drugs
24. scenes with law enforcement or law-enforcing officers
25. Excessive or lustful kissing
Note: Life Magazine attempted a single still showing all Hays "don'ts" in a single image: http://goo.gl/sHAbn0
Sources (Wikipedia):
- PCA: http://goo.gl/uMnVpT
- Rules: http://goo.gl/1FWcoF
- Banned films: http://goo.gl/rRZd8v
- Censorship in the U.S.: http://goo.gl/oCWUX0
Sources (TV-Tropes):
- Hays Code: http://goo.gl/1UqRXp
- Defying The Censors: http://goo.gl/6aZZ7T
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