Question about how and why the Hays code started.

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I watching the movie This Film Is Not Yet Rated and they said in the movie that the Hays Code was started because of the Fattie Arbuckle manslaughter scandal. Side note, why hasn't Hollywood made a movie about that yet!?

Anyway, I did research on it later, and I just don't get how a movie production code like that would come about from a manslaughter scandal. That would be like OJ Simpson murder case, leading the American football industry to make football a non-contact sport, cause one of their former players committed a murder. It just makes no logical sense to connect one thing to another like that.

Unless I'm wrong, and this code was not as such of a reach as I'm thinking?



Actually... just checking up on something...


Hollywood and the movie business in general, was always seen as morally questionable considering how some actors and actresses would flaunt themselves in what was seen as a "sexual way"... though by today's standards was probably nothing.


It wasn't just Arbuckle though. There were a few murders and drug related deaths and even cases of rape amongst the famous circles of showbiz... and after a load of political pressure to curb the behaviour of so-called celebrities, the actual movies they were making were overhauled and put up for a kind of judgement to ensure these apparent wayward celebrities weren't corrupting the populous, and especially youths, with sex and filth.


The "trouble" that the famous circles would get up to is pretty tame by today's standards, it was still something that needed to be curbed and policed for the better of the populous.
Responsibility has to lay somewhere... and movies and music, artistic outlets, are something that could be seen as risqué.



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Okay thanks, but what I don't understand is, is how is censoring movie content going to curb the behavior of celebrities? Celebrities are still going to engage in naughty sex with whoever they want and being cast in only clean movies, will not change that will it?



I watching the movie This Film Is Not Yet Rated and they said in the movie that the Hays Code was started because of the Fattie Arbuckle manslaughter scandal. Side note, why hasn't Hollywood made a movie about that yet!?
This is off the top of my head: The Hays Code AKA The Production Code was 'enacted' by the executives in the movie industry themselves. The Catholic League for Decency was raising a huge stink about the moral quality of movies being made. By the early 30s the subject mater of movies were becoming quite sophisticated and those themes of female sexual liberation, adultery, etc. threatened the moral compass of the Catholic League for Decency which was a 'morality' watchdog group for the Catholic church. Also the off screen antics and (the seemingly) wild and promiscuous lifestyle of the movie stars further caused The Catholic League for Decency to attempt to get lawmakers to pass morality laws forbidding certain subjects and scenes in movies. To stop that type of censorship, the movie makers themselves came up with the Hays Code.



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Okay thanks, but was there really a lot of female sexual liberation going on back then? A lot of sources seem to say that started in the 60s with the free love movement, so was it really that bad in the 30s by comparison?



Okay thanks, but was there really a lot of female sexual liberation going on back then? A lot of sources seem to say that started in the 60s with the free love movement, so was it really that bad in the 30s by comparison?
The first sexual liberation in society was in the 1920s, then when the depression and later WWII hit American society became more conservative again.



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Oh okay, cause it seems in many older movies I see from the 40s and 50s, the female characters are more sexually reserved, accept for the femme fatale characters, who are suppose to be more villainous.



Oh okay, cause it seems in many older movies I see from the 40s and 50s, the female characters are more sexually reserved, accept for the femme fatale characters, who are suppose to be more villainous.
That's true. Before the Hays Code (pre code movies made before 1934) female characters could be more sexual liberated. Nothing was shown, but plenty was implied. The Hays Code changed that, but after WWII films with all it's carnage, American films started to reflect that darker mood with Film Noirs. In Film Noir you start to see more powerful female characters again, who are sexual, but still nothing is actually shown.


BTW, you should consider joining the 19th HoF which is just starting and open for people to join. I know you like to discuss movies so you might like being in an HoF as all the members watch and discuss the same movies. Think about it, it be fun to have you join



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Oh okay. Thanks, I will check it out

When it comes to movies in the 40s and 50s, are there any where women are sexually liberated, but are good characters, cause it seems that all the women characters who are in those, only are, if they are up to something, or are just being naughty for alterior motives, rather than just wanting to have sexual fun by itself, unless I am wrong?



Some things were considered very sexually suggestive for the time. For example, the line "Why don't you come up sometime and see me?" and other double entendres uttered by Mae West in "She Done Him Wrong."



Oh okay. Thanks, I will check it out

When it comes to movies in the 40s and 50s, are there any where women are sexually liberated, but are good characters...
I'm sure there were a few, I just can't think of any right now, but not many of them.

Some things were considered very sexually suggestive for the time. For example, the line "Why don't you come up sometime and see me?" and other double entendres uttered by Mae West in "She Done Him Wrong."
Mae West is a good example of how the Hays Code depowered women's sexuality in films. In her fist film Night After Night (1932) she was plenty outrageous (for the time), same with She Done Him Wrong (1933), though her character's promiscuity was toned down some for that film. Then after the Hays Code came in during 1934 her movies became much more tame and she ended up being a parody of her old self.



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Oh okay. I read that the independent film scene in the 50s started competing against the Hays code cause indie films were able to portray things that Hollywood studios could not. But why did the indie scene only start doing this in the 50s then, and why not right away in the 30s?



Oh okay. I read that the independent film scene in the 50s started competing against the Hays code cause indie films were able to portray things that Hollywood studios could not. But why did the indie scene only start doing this in the 50s then, and why not right away in the 30s?
That's a good point and yes you're correct than in the 1950s independent film companies starting making films outside of the control of the big studios. Which then eventually diminished the studio control over American movies which then brought and end to the Hays Production Code.



Why didn't they start doing that in the 30s? Well, there was a monopoly at the time between film studios and movie distribution system which was tied into the theater chains as well. So it wasn't easy to get a film a major release as the theaters and movie booking was controlled by the big boys.



Check this out
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Loews_..._Entertainment