Media Regulation Certification

In the role of a BBFC examiner, I chose three films that I had recently watched that all had an R rating and the probable reasons why they were given it. 

Being John Malkovich is the first feature film by director Spike Jonze about a puppeteer that discovers a portal that leads into the actor, John Malkovich's head. The reason Being John Malkovich got such a high certificate is for it's high use of a range of profanity and it's potentially distressing scenes of characters held captive in a chimp cage and of general mental decay. There are suggestions of sex and violence in the movie also but nothing explicitly showed which I believe could argue it to have a lower classification.

 The Fisher King, arguably Terry Gillliam's best film is about 'A former radio DJ, suicidally despondent because of a terrible mistake he made, finds redemption in helping a deranged homeless man who was an unwitting victim of that mistake.' The Fisher King achieved it's classification of R, due to it's depiction of sex and violence. The Fisher King does explicitly show violence of a man being shot and another man being beat and cut with a knife, although only briefly. However, the main basis for it's classification i believe is probably the full minute of Robin William's character fully frontal nude shown clearly on camera, although I could understand this as being distressing or confusing to a younger audience his naked body is not sexualised but simply emphasis his character's free personality.

Buffalo '66 starring Christina Ricci who played Wednesday from The Adam's family and The Adam's Family Values, justifiably deserved it's R rating. It received this rating for it's high level of, sexual references and female nudity, graphic shootings, profanity, some alcohol and cigarette consumption and distressing scenes including kidnap and domestic abuse. Although I agree it deserves this certification I would not agree to any of the scenes being cut because some of the scenes that could be represented as harmful to the audience show huge creativity in the way they are shot that often takes away from the shock of the scene and overall the film has a very positive and happy message in which the man choses against violence.

Copies of the IMDB classification for each of these films;