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Convert Movies From R to PG13 to PG On The Fly
uchi writes "Trilogy Studios announced the launch of its "Movie Mask" web site - www.moviemask.com , which will eventually lead up to the release of its "Movie Mask DVD Player" and "Movie Mask Director" software. The Director software will allow users to selectively add/edit a video adding graphics and special effects, which is nothing special in my opinion. The Movie Mask DVD Player, on the other hand, will allow its users to download a movie config file(for lack of a better term) which will have various portions of the movies to bleep/cut out depending on the rating which the person set. It can be changed on the fly while watching the video. This seems like a good idea - it would allow many people who don't wish to be subjected to violence/nudity/language a chance to watch any movie they want without waiting months for it to be released on network television, already PG-13ized."
Does it have a "reverse" option so I can add more meaningless nudity and cussing?
That's Mr. Eradicator to you.
trance-port
This is a fantastic idea but just like other things it means that parents and people sensitive to things have to use it. Most likely, instead of using these tools they will just complain about the content in the programs instead...
Of course we torture people, we need the information --Gen. Pinochet
This is good - the copyright control freaks and the "think of the children" advocates can fight it out in the corner while we get on with our lives with "real" DVD players and films.
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"Pinky, you've left the lens cap of your mind on again." - P&TB
"I can see my house from here!" - ST:
Well well, i guess it may be useful in some cases atleast, and it sounds like its quite simple to implement, just tag each "scene" in the movie with a "recommendated age tag" and skip those which are improper.
Probable impossibilities are to be preferred to improbable possibilities.
Aristotele
Honestly, any PG-aged kid I know would either STILL know what's going on, or if not, would be curious enough to ask WHY they are smkoking. What is it we're trying to prevent here? The actual knowledge of the subject, or an example of it?
What we really need is a system that will automatically skip to the "good parts..."
Can it go the other way, as the dual headed arrows suggest?
Well, that seemed an OK idea, but I was thinking "Why can't you already do this within the current DVD framework?" I mean, the editing bit is really simple. If you can stick different camera angles and stuff on DVD's, why not this?
Anyway, it says on their website FAQ that this will be included in "Next Generation" DVD players. What is a NG player? Apparently "A next generation DVD player is a DVD player that has a hard drive and internet capability. They are 25 companies currently that plan to release these type of players within the next 12 months."
Ah joy. I love the thought of needing a DVD player that can store stuff and dialup companies for me. Maybe I will be able to get streaming advertising or something when I press the pause button.
Why oh why do we need a new generation of DVD players?
Tales from behind the Lagom Curtain
Now, my 4 year old children can benefit from watching my XXX movies tuned down to a G rating. And a 2 minute movie of random people talking and closing credits is perfect for their attention span.
No boom today. Boom tomorrow. There's always a boom tomorrow. - Cmdr. Susan Ivanova
I really like this idea. Personally I have no problem with sex, nudity, etc., but I'm really squeamish about certain types of violence. It would be really cool if I could set my personal viewing preferences to "maximum sex, minimum torture", while still allowing other people to watch "no sex please, but lots of violence". It's a brilliant idea.
It is tempting, if the only tool you have is a hammer, to treat everything as if it were a nail. - Abraham Maslow
I think this would be a much better product if they allowed you to set levels for each of language, sex, violence, etc. Although, it does seem that you can make your own "masks", so I guess a third party could do that.
Those who fail to understand communication protocols, are doomed to repeat them over port 80.
Then maybe we'd finally get to see Princess Leia out of the gold bikini...
Maybe we could use this technology for good instead of evil...
We could make a more "official" jar jar-less Episode I without scouring (no pun intended) for phantom edit copies/files. Because, jar-jar is truly offensive to me. =P
E.
Build Your Own PVR/HTPC news, reviews, &
I thought that DVD could already do this? Most DVD players have a parental lock feature which can result in by-passing scenes in the movie, e.g. the pie scene in American Pie. What's this offering that we don't already have?
Some movies should have limits. Like "Goodfellas" should not be able to go to a PG13 rating, it should stay 'R'. Cause, quite honestly, you wouldn't have a clue what the story was if they bleeped all the words out!
* *censored*!!! *censored*!!
Come'ere you mutha*censored**censored**censored**censored*!! I'll bust your *censored**censored**censored**censored**censored
You'd have to remove Joe Pesci all together!
Good quote, too many chars. Seriously, the slashdot 120 char limit sucks!
In order to use it, the system "will allow its users to download a movie config file". Why would kids go through the trouble of downloading a config file to avoid seeing nudity and cursing?!
The only way to actually implement it is with a password system that allows parents to set the rating, and automatically downloads the correct config file. It would still be a pain, though.
As an alternative, we might see different ratings become a standard feature on DVDs, with password protection built into the player. That way, you wouldn't need a computer to get the protection.
Still, within a few weeks after the release of the player, we'll probably see hacks posted everywhere that mess up the config file so 12-year-old script kiddies can see the nudity. Never underestimate kids in search of pr0n.
Ceci n'est pas une sig
Ratings are a really weird moral artifact - I sometimes wonder why they still exist.
Oh sure, everybody wants content labeling so they know what they're getting, and god forbid some little kid should see guts splashed on the walls, but there are things about the rating system that seem to ooze enforcement of a moral standard nobody voted on.
For example, most scenes of full-frontal nudity or drug use automatically get you an R, regardless of the context. You probably couldn't film Michaelangelo sculpting "David" without getting an R. If you do a movie about drug use and how it will lead you down the path of destruction, you're going to get an R if you show anybody smoking a cigarette that is *insinuated* as being a joint. Better not show a person taking allergy shots, because that heroine abuse will get you an R!
And then there's the all-feared NC-17. The rating that knocks things out of theaters, makes studio execs cower in fear, and little babies all over the nation cry. Mostly sexual content lands you an NC-17. And not "pornography". Anything that has sexual content outside of what you see in "morally wholesome" movies will get you an NC-17. Since NC-17 is such a financial death sentence, no movie wants one and consequentially no content that would get you an NC-17 is ever released to the general public.
Now I'm not saying that I like all of my movies to have porn, violence, and drug use, but we're adults here. (Well, maybe I shouldn't say that on slashdot, but you know what I mean) Ratings seem appropriate *MAYBE* to protect little kids, (we'll ignore the fact that the parents should be doing that instead of the MPAA, but anyway) but I'm an adult and I don't want to be protected from anything.
Ratings make me uncomfortable because I know for a fact that there's content I don't see due to them, (like some things getting NC-17s) because it's a system built upon a "moral foundation" that I don't share. (Guns & death are better than sex and drugs) and because they're shoved down the throats of all age groups despite the fact that they only really pertain to a small subsection of the population.
Let's not figure out methods of moving from one rating to another, let's figure out how to fix or eliminate them.
-- Truth goes out the door when rumor comes innuendo. -- Groucho Marx
Yes, directors voluntarily choose to destroy their movies for the sake of the censors, but there still is pressure put on them from the studios. While I don't have a particular problem with this technology (it's technology, therefore it's morally neutral), I do see this as a negative for the film industry. This is especially true for films where the director (or some other single visionary) doesn't have the final say on post-production. I think of "Eyes Wide Shut", a film which was bastardized in large part by Blockbuster and the major movie theatres which refuse to show NC-17 films.
Again, it's technology, it's voluntary, so there's not much you can do about it, but it's by no means a positive thing.
ok then your [sic] infringing on my copyright! Could you as [sic] me next time before STEALING my comments for your own?
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Of my two parents, one (my mother) had no problem with nudity in films but didn't like violence, while the other (my father) has no problem with violence in films, but didn't like nudity. My tastes are closer to my mother's: it's a screwed up world that deems it okay for a youngster to watch someone getting their brains blown out, but not someone taking their clothes off.
The point is, creating a branched film which incorporated various versions of scenes could be a great idea, as long as they allow you to select *what* you do or don't see at a fine grained level.
-- Help Digitise the Public Domain at DP.
Damn, are slashdot readers sarcastic and pessimistic or what? I think the first 25 comments I read thought this was a laughable product.
I see a real use in this. My wife is a highschool history teacher. There are many movies that she would like to be able to show, but because of some bad language, nudity, or violence, she is not able to use the films. Community standards are a bitch. If she could pop a DVD in, hit the PG rating and let it roll, that would be great.
Beyond that, there are some movies that I think my nieces and nephews would enjoy that I have seen, that have bits in them that are just not appropriate at their age. This would help with that too.
I'll probably get flamed all to hell from the slashdot (everything must be free!) zealots now...
Casca
That doesn't mean I'm going to have my kids watch an R rated movie with this thing. Sure you can take out cussing, violence and nudity - but what about mature themes? Kids aren't immune to those.
Besides, why would I want to ruin a director's vision of what s/he would like the audience to see?
None for me, thanks.
As with so many other neat things, this is in the DVD spec; you can assign a rating to a section of audio/video, and tell the player to play only a certain level or below. Or, use seamless branching. Or, buy your movies at Wal-Mart or Blockbuster where they're pre-censered for your convenience and safety.
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Not everybody hunkers down on the family couch for a shared evening of goat sex and snuff films.
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This seems like a good idea - it would allow many people who don't wish to be subjected to violence/nudity/language a chance to watch any movie they want without waiting months for it to be released on network television, already PG-13ized.
:)
Imagina using this option on the south park movie. You'd be watching a black screen for 90 minutes
I intend to live forever, so far so good.
Easier? Hardly. Far easier for the parent to rent a DVD, pop it in at PG or PG-13 setting, and let the service do the trick. Pre-screening and editing would take forever!
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Movie making is an art form that very few people can do well. What about the impact of deleting out violent scenes has on the overall impact of the movie? Doesn't this device impact on screenwriter/director's rights?
Could we also rip out pages of a book to eliminate the offensive materials without the author's permission?
Suddenly Star Trek Generations would be worth watching :)
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There are movies every now and then that I would like to watch with my under-8-year-old kids, but the few spots with fu*k type words and/or scenes with excessive gore nix that option.
In my opinion, you can pull these things out many times without affecting the plot in any way. I'll buy this box as soon as it shows up at Walmart.
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I think a bad aspect of this is that it allows viewers to muck with the director's vision at will. (And yes, the MPAA does it all the time.)
Movies are made from a script with certain events and dialogue, and the director has the unifying vision that drives how it's all shot and put together. When the viewer can select what is in the movie and what is cut, it's no longer the movie the director made, unless the movie was made with this in mind.
Just like viewing a pan-and-scanned movie (you don't see the movie that was shot), this changes the movie you watch. Should we extend this technology so in an art museum we can wear special glasses that allow us to put clothes on the nudes?
(I recently saw an exhibit that happened to feature some nude paintings and there was a big warning out front - "Might be offensive!")
OK, here's a very debatable point: movies are art. Not necessarily good art, but art nonetheless. Even if you don't agree, they are very complex creations requiring the effort of many people over long periods - surely so much effort is worth something.
I don't know -- certainly people have the right to choose not to see/watch things that offend them, but do they have the right to change works of art? To screw with the artist's vision? Even to change very complex creations that may not be "art" but took a helluva lot of effort...?
Hmmm.
I thought that cinema was form of art. In the future, will museums provide glasses to selectively block genitals and breasts on certain paintings? Will e-book readers have settings too? Must everything be compromised and converted into interactive fiction?
I seriously doubt any claims that violence and sex in various mediums are the root causes of any ills of society. But I think that the lack of any concept of artistic integrity points to where humanity's problems DO come from.
LS
There is a fine line between being a cultivated citizen and being someone else's crop. - A. J. Patrick Liszkie
Anybody is free to make NC-17 films, they just shouldn't be surprised that major theatres don't consider them worthwhile. Let them send their films to the art houses and indie theaters instead, if they want them shown that badly. If they prove to be a hit, the major theaters will follow.
The way I see it, this technology will allow films to be seen that otherwise would not have been, with the only cost being the snipping of some "naughty bits." Who cares?
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Actually, this is done already all the time... but by hollywood. When a film is made, the MPAA reviews it and gives it their rating. Frequently, Hollywood will submit a movie and it will come back with an 'R' rating. The studio may decide that an 'R' rating would make them less money by restricting it from a large portion of their target audience, and if they decide that, the movie goes back to editing (sometimes in extreme cases, scenes are re-shot) and a new version is submitted, one that will get them their "target rating". The perfect example of this is the film Basic Instinct. When that film was submitted for review, it became the first movie to recieve the then new, NC-17 rating. The studio decided that since they wanted the money of the under 17 crowd, that they would re-edit it and shoot for an R, which they got. Later that decision was (partially) reversed, when the studio actually released the film in BOTH NC-17 AND R versions to theaters, and home video. So as far as I can tell, this would broaden up the spectrum of available movies for a lot of parrents who are paranoid^h^h^h^h^h^h^h^h concerned about their children seeing what they want^h^h^h^h shouldn't.
Now granted, I doubt it will do much for some films, like the Southpark movie or such great "classic" films like Strip to Kill. Seeing as those films would probably be about 8 minutes long and have nothing even resembling plot if they were cut down a rating... But there are THOUSANDS of films out there that only have content that people find objectionable for their children to watch in a couple scenes which can be cut without significantly dammaging the plot. Take one of my favorite films for example, Top Gun. Most people would probably think that the violence is the worst part of the film, but there is lots of language that I never even realized would have to be cut for TV. I just never thought of it when enjoying the film. Everything form "Mother Goose, you Pussy!" to "You'll be flying a cargo plane full of rubber dog shit out of Hong Kong" Most parrents don't mind their kids seeing violence as long as it's not overly graphic. But lots of parrents DO mind swearing in movies because their children tend to emmulate it. They tend to emulate some of the violence too (through play, etc) but for whatever reason, this is more acceptable, but that's another discussion entirly...
Another example, Starship Troopers I think, probably a better example... there are about a dozen scenes in that film that add to the atmosphere of the film, but take nothing important away by being cut. The nude scenes (shower and sex scene), for instance, and some of the more graphic scenes of soilders being literally torn apart. You can have a war movie without these scenes. I personally would rather see the movie as it was intended to be seen, but I can understand the choice of parents that want to control what their kids see. In many ways it's not censorship at all, think of it as browsing the films at 4 or 5 rather than ar -1.
Touch everywhere, even when inappropriate.
It doesn't look like the same company, but there is a company that makes this kind of device for TV watching. What it does is it monitors the closed caption signal and bleeps out words that could be considered offensive. I think you can set it to display replacement words on screen, like darn instead of damn.
It's made by a Christian company so in addition to curses, you can filter stuff like using God's name in vain. Personally I think it's a decent idea. If it's a choice between devices like this, and lobbying congress to censor our music, tv, and movies I'll take the devices. Of course you still run into the same problems with internet censorware - some parents will inevitably see this as a replacement for actual supervision, and they won't be aware of what their children are viewing.
In my opinion, it's a lot worse to not supervise your kids, than to have them hear a curse or two..
Quite a few Hollywood movies are otherwise excellent productions that have been ruined by the addition of gratuitous sex, nudity, violence, coarse language, and so on. Why? Hollywood believes that it sells. But the truth is that most people don't appreciate the garbage, and would go see movies without it, and would be just as entertained. That's why edited movies are so popular.
There are plenty of adults who prefer not to be exposed to unnecessary filth. Call us old-fashioned, uptight, naive. But the fact is that we're the ones holding the country together by raising good strong families.
And don't excuse the garbage that Hollywood pushes by saying that movies just mirror reality. If anything, they present a selective view of reality -- there is much more to life than sex and violence!
I just hate it to see those 'home-videos' that just last forever because the owner hasn't got the equipment (or time) to make a nice edit.
Now that we'll be having DVD recorders it is quite easy to jam your home video from the camera onto the DVD
and use software like this to cut out the boring pieces. Not as good as the professional solution but you would also
not need 2 VCRs, editing equipment and 4 weeks holiday
I can't imagine how this is going to work well. If the player automatically strips out violence/sex/offensive language, what will this do to movies where certain such scenes are integral ?
I'm thinking of movies like "Saving Private Ryan", "Apocalypse Now", "The Matrix", "Terminator", "The Wild Bunch", "Rocky", "Scarface", - heck, even "Star Wars", where the movies turn crucially on scenes that would be deleted. In the above movies, for instance, if you delete the violence you end up with something that is incomprehensible.
How about players that autoskip/mask:
1) FBI warning (Film Buisness Investigations?)
2) Those annoying commercials at the beginning
of the movie.
3) The "Feature presentation" crap...let me watch the fricking movie already!
Pardon me for pointing out the blatantly obvious, but did anyone notice that saving private ryan was on the front of the page?
Kind of silly as it have to simply eject the disk once it was put in. Good movie, but deeply distrubing.
cheers
If it is not on fire, it is a software problem.
Well since we're talking about DVDs here, why not have it available in separate (off-disc, available on the net) config files which are made by the objecting parties? They won't be that large (unless you're supporting alternate scenes and language), you could download them in large batches and load them automatically. You'd just need a specially configured player with maybe a compact flash or small hard drive to hold them. Just distribute advance copies to certain groups so that they can make their modification files in time for the DVD release, and let the right-wingers deprive themselves of their movies instead of doing it to the rest of us.
---If you can't trust a nerd, who can you trust?
Most DVD players have a parental control feature that can be set between 1 and 7 and then password locked.
Current discs are capable of not being played at all if the disc level is higher than the rating allowed HOWEVER using the "branching" function within the DVD spec it is IIRC possible to branch based on the parental control level.
This way the director can just put alternate chapters both on the disc and setup the branch points and there you go!
No special DVD player, no special software.
I gather however that this raises all sorts of complications with ratings classification.
[)amien
I know I'd like my kids to be able to watch Forrest Gump without the sex scene. While I'm fine with them knowing about sex, and knowing that characters in the film are "doing it" - I don't think they need to watch it (and this is a much better solution than fast-forward).
Being able to control and choose what you watch seems like "freedom" not "censorship".
Implementation might not be done perfectly here, but it's got the right idea (ie, we should be able to choose our editor and not be stuck with the one the studio provides).
Let's not stir that bag of worms...
This is a very powerful tool for parents wishing to take responsibility for what their children see and hear, rather than making big brother do it for them, this appears to be a completely configurable option for exposing children to wanton, gratuitous sex and violence in otherwise great films, which in my opinion, sometimes spoils the entire experience. I am in no way a prudish censorist, as anyone who knows me will attest, but I rather like movies that don't resort to sex and violence as a shock value, because it becomes more and more difficult as time goes on to top yourself, just let the plot and the story do the talking, then it will be decided whether your movie is worthy of being viewed.
I hate sigs.
In the case of decency standards, take the words "screw" and "fuck" -- which mean the same thing, but one of them is considered so harmful that films and CD's containing the word actually carry warning labels. "Fuck" is just a syllable -- the notion of what is considered a dirty word is completely arbitrary. When I was ten, I had an idea for solving the problem of "foul language" in movies: just declare that at midnight on the next January 1st, all swear words are reclassified as "slang" so they're not swear words any more.
The entire "Why we do this" page [rant :)] is quite interesting; well worth a read. Not like any of it would ever happen. :)
A government is a body of people notably ungoverned - AC
My toddler daughter absolutely loved the South Park movie. With the songs and animation, it's a perfect kids movie -- well, except for the violence and profanity.
I absolutely love this movie too, and for adults, the extreme violence and profanity help make the movie's point very well. It would have been the most socially relevant movie of the year had it not been for American Beauty.
But since before she started to speak, we cut her off because we didn't want her patterning her speech after the movie or wondering about the toys in Saddam's bedroom, etc. I am now in the process of ripping the DVD, pulling it into an editor, and bleeping, masking and cutting what I don't want her to see to produce a kids movie she loves and I approve of.
This might just make it easier for those without the editing resources.
What I would like to see are multiple datapaths through the DVD of varying "appropriateness" levels that would make more "family-rated" entertainment available. Multiple datapaths are the DVD spec now, and should be supported by every player...all it would take is for the producers of the DVD to include the "mangled for TV" video datapath, dubbed audi and an appropriate menu selection, and we could have family movie night without need for parental preview and fast-forward. Plus, the original theatrical release could be included along with the director's cut, as well as the now-common commentary audio track.
Aside: I do not know if the DVD rating system supports different ratings for different datapaths...anyone have an idea? That may still limit the use of DVDs that those who lock down the rating ceiling on our DVD players. I don't really have any experience, as the version of (Xine) that I run doesn't do ratings. At any rate, I'm still a believer in participating in my child's activities, so that won't slow me down any--but it would be more convenient as a whole. Your kid want to watch "Top Gun?" at his slumber party? Fine...it's just 5 minutes shorter, and the story is just as compelling.
The only obstacles to this, AFAIK, are the additional work requirements of adding the extra dubs, and (perhaps) the objections of the directors/producers/artists involved. It might not be of monumental import...but I do believe that it would help sell more DVDs to parents with young children.
Of course, me and my wife are making bets on how much shorter the movie will be. I'm guessing minimum 15 of the 81 minutes are going to be bleeped or cut.
So you've got a puritanical bug up your ass, and you cut out the nudity. But wait! There's some essential dialog in that bedroom scene that ties the whole plot together! What do you do?
I'm sure we can all do without Jar-Jar, no matter what he says, but in general, I can't see this working. Just who are these talented editors, who will cut and snip the patient so well that no one will even know surgery took place?
I told my mother to watch the movie "Brazil" when it was on television some years back. You know what they did? They chepped the ending, to make it a happy one!
How many copyright holders are going to agree to publishing their art in this bastardized format? The opportunistic greedy ones, like Sony et al, will be delighted, I'm sure. And an ugly mess it will be.
From "Brazil":
Dr Jaffe: "Can you believe it?! Just me and my little knife! Snip - snip - slice - slice - Can you believe it?"
and elsewhere:
Mrs Terrain: "My complication had a complication, but Dr. Chapman says I'll soon be up and bouncing about like a young gazelle."
Yeah, right.
--Lawrence Lessig for Congress!
It's no more illegal than a pen to modify a book. Or a paintbrush to modify a painting.
They are selling technology that _allows_ the user (who already has the mmovies) to make small (?) modifications to the film. It's nothing that I caouldn't do with the mute button and fast forward, just a lot more convient.
If they were reselling films they've edited, that would be. But that's not what they are doing.
Well, actually it was a buddy's idea, but I've been working on it. I have hacked Xine to do on-the-fly edits of DVDs. My code can do various edits now, but I'm just beginning to work on the "edit script" stuff that tells it what to do. My approach is to use a pair of XML files, one that documents the content of a DVD movie, along with links to files with replacement video, audio and subtitles, and one that is a sort of a movie-watching "stylesheet", that specifies how you want the player to handle various kinds of content. Rather than just allowing you to select an MPAA rating level, I'd like to allow you to specify what kinds of things you don't like, what degree you'll accept, and how to deal with it when the movie exceeds those bounds. For example, should the player just fuzz out the boobs, or skip the scene entirely? Or should it go into slow motion so you can watch every jiggle? The content script will also have to have some sort of a "relevance to plot" rating for each section, so that the stylesheet can specify different actions for stuff that matters.
I'm also making the script engine pluggable because I see value in other kinds of scripts. For example, with a more procedural type of script you could string together snippets of video from one or more DVDs, interspersing other bits of video, splashing words or other images over the top, etc., to make collages, artwork, etc.
There seem to be a lot of people questioning whether or not any of this is useful, and I've run into a suprising amount of opposition when I talk to people about it. Here are some uses:
To me, this is about freedom of choice. I like to watch movies, but I may or may not want to watch them in exactly the way Hollywood makes them. This is really going to piss off directors who will feel that the "artistic integrity" of their movies is damaged, but I'm interested in my own entertainment, not in their "artistic integrity", and since I'm paying them, I think it's my choice that matters. Others may be more interested in the message the director is trying to convey, and they're welcome to watch the thing in its entirety. Others may be interested in an easy way to create derivative artworks (until Fair Use is abolished, of course).
I guess I'll abandon my vague ideas of productizing my work (I was quite enjoying the idea of people buying a DVD player and recieving a CD-ROM full of source to all of the GPL code that rus it, "Martha, what in hell is this crap" ;)), but if anyone is interested in helping me work on this, send me an e-mail.
Note to ACs: I usually delete AC replies without reading them. If you want to talk to me, log in.
Is there anyone else who thinks that this has the possibility of killing the intended story? Or at least, killing how it was intended to be told?
Movie directors and editors spend thousands of hours in the editing room, cutting a scene here, splicing one back in there, all in hopes of achieving the best story.
Fast foward about a year, with this technology in place in all DVD players and VCRs. People are able to add and delete scenes at will. Yes, you've given choice to the people. Yes, you've made videos that were previously unwatchable in schools available for educational purposes.
But there's a large chance that you may have destroyed the story as it was intended to be presented.
I know this sounds like a fine hair to split. But we the Public pay these guys a heckuva lotta money precisely because they know how to tell a good story. Second guessing them is probably a bad idea.
Just my two cents.
Finally years later when it came out on TV, I was surprised to see how they 'fit it in'. There were obviously some scene crops, but the party across the ravine was topless in the movie, but they were wearing bikinis on TV. They must have shot the TV scenes at the same time as the theatricals. Obvious, but it's the first time I'd seen it that glaringly.
The living have better things to do than to continue hating the dead.
As an adult, who is competent to choose what things I want to put in my head, I appreciate a ratings system which helps me make an informed decision about what movies are possibles, which ones are likely viewable, and which ones are completely off the radar screen.
All of the things that we watch and listen to shape us, even if that shaping is in a very very minor way. They affect the way that we perceive the world around us, and the way that we make decisions. This is the origin of the idea of the "important film."
I choose not to be shaped by violence, drugs and rampant sexual permissiveness. This is part of my freedom. The movie makers are free to make whatever films they want, and we are free to patronize them or not. I respect your right in the US to make and watch films which are focused on ideas and world views that are in conflict with my world view. I'm glad you have that right.
WRT to the issue of movies being edited so that they meet some criteria in a raings system, I believe that the digitization of movies will allow much greater freedom in the area of "director's releases." This should do a great deal to alleviate your concerns about having someone else's world view shape your choices.
On the topic of the financial death sentence of the NC-17 rating - it boils down to what the customer wants.
Interestingly, the American public is apparently less interested in movies with "R" content than those with "G" content. This report shows that "G" rated movies make a 78% better ROI than "R" movies.
Hollywood is more interested in doing a poor job of telling a story and livening up the movie with explosions, guns, and of course, bare breasts in sexual settings, than it is in making money. These things lead to pats on the back from their "artistic peers" and statistically this must be more important than making $$
After using the ratings system to assist with the triage process, I then choose to refer to information-based websites like Screenit which give me a tremendous amount of information about the movie's contents and lets me make an informed decision about whether I want to see what the director wanted to say.
Thanks for taking the time to read this.
Regards,
Anomaly
PS - God loves you and longs for relationship with you.
If you would like to know more about this, please contact me at tom_cooper at bigfoot dot com.
But Herr Heisenberg, how does the electron know when I'm looking?
I bet they could add an option to *just* view the R portion of the movie. Skip that boring stuff, bring me the violence and gratuitous sex!
Obviously it censored the dictionary, in your case.
Learn to spell.
Adequate editing is more than chopping. While you might get away cutting out certain scenes, in general you are going to lose flow and context. Plus, anyone who is offended by a particular scene that a director included is likely to not want to watch the movie as a whole. Very few films are "ruined for the squeamish" by a single scene. The larger context of plotline, setting, character development etc. set the whole mood for a film. You aren't going to get a "family friendly" version of "Pulp Fiction" by chopping it up. Even if you tried, in the process you will lose the power behind the movie as envisioned by the director. Can you imagine "The Crying Game" with THE SCENE removed? People will walk away going, "What's the big deal?"
Sure, it might be fun to turn movie watching into an interactive effort, but I shudder at the "cleansing" of art. If something disturbs you, walk away and watch PAX, or learn to deal with being a little disturbed; it can be an enlightening experience.
It said , in big letters 'FUCK'.
Then, underneath, in smaller letters,
'If this shirt said 'murder', you wouldn't have a problem with it, would you...'
So yes, I like this. The movies that I could watch with my kids would be an extra. I'd use it myself.
hawk
Converting from R to PG-13 results in the loss of nudity and language, but you'd probably keep all the same levels of violence. Roger Ebert rants about this all the time.
From his Movie Answer-Man column on November 4th:
The fundamental problem with the MPAA is that it avoids making any kind of common-sense evaluation of a film, and simply counts f-words and evaluates nudity. ''Waking Life,'' one of the most affirmative and challenging films I can imagine for smart teenagers, gets the R rating, while the thriller ''Domestic Disturbance,'' which shows a small child exposed to a murder, an incineration, the beating of his mother (leading to a miscarriage) and the beating of his father, after which the kid himself causes an electrocution, gets the PG-13--presumably because there is no nudity and the language stays below the cut-off point. What sane parent would prefer their teenager to see ''Domestic Disturbance'' rather than "Waking Life''?
To me, this is absurdity. Parents cannot rely on these crap ratings. If you are truly concerned about your children/family, you need to watch the movie yourself beforehand and then make an honest judgement.
Man, I'm late getting into this thread. Oh well...
While I think the technology behind this is a fine idea, it leaves me wondering as to the overall effectiveness and, more importantly, the point.
I can see this being used in schools, I suppose, like when I was in high school and my Literature teacher fast-forwarded past a somewhat steamy love scene in a film version of Romeo and Juliet. And I suppose one could use it to throw out types of scenes one finds distasteful (foul language, for instance). A parent could, indeed, filter an R movie down to a PG movie this way.
The question it leaves me with is: why view the movie in the first place? If foul language or sex scenes offend you, you're going to miss the delivery of the story by cutting them out. You'd probably have a more enjoyable movie-watching experience by simply watching something that is already rated at the level you wish to watch.
As a parent, I can't think of one good reason I'd want to bother with snipping out pieces of an r-rated film so my kids could watch it. Chances are, the R-rated movie has adult themes on purpose and if removing the R-rated content actually affected the adult overtones of the story at all, it could only make less sense. I'd be much better off by allowing my children to watch something that is already made with the intention of children watching it.
As always, there are plenty of exceptions (I'm sure kids get a hoot out of Shrek, but I'd cut out some of Donkey's language for my kids), but for the most part this seems like a technology that might be nice to have, but IMHO seems silly to even bother using.
My sigs always suck.
This is the horrific result of what happens when :)
a society becomes so inhibited that it develops
specific tools to allow people to remain naive.
An entire family of people who have automatic
reactions to certain language. They're just words!
They're just combinations of sounds that, for some
odd historical reason, some religious freaks and
other prudes have somehow decided to focus on..
I'd bet that if there were a language without them,
these kind of people would be the ones to make them
up in order to be able to whine about people using
them
For every problem, there is at least one solution that is simple, neat, and wrong.
Source: ACLU Texas in file report.doc (Word doc)
=========
Banned and Challenged Books
In Texas Public Schools
Title: Puppies (Baby Animals)
Author: Petty, Kate
Synopsis: The book discusses how puppies are born and fed, and how they grow and communicate. Photographs are used to enhance the descriptions.
School District: Columbia-Brazoria ISD, West Columbia
Use: Library, Curriculumn, Wild Peach Elem.
Reason: Profanity/Inappropriate language
Result: Alternative book allowed
Notes: Parent said text referred to female dog as "bitch"
======
We need some kind of device to insert before the eyes of those vulnerable children, that would remove all curse words so that they are not exposed to the abomination of referring to a female dog as a "bitch".
The top ten grossing movies ever (from www.the-movie-times.com):
Interesting how none of these were rated R.
I'd rather have someone respond than be modded up.
Now I'll be able to quickly find out the answer to that question that has been bugging me since I firs tsaw porn - Did she get the job or not?
- If This Peace Is Fictious, I Shall Destroy It
Well from a teenage boy's perspective (I was at the time I saw), the inexplicably PG-13 rated Logan's Run, which is chock full of nudity and sex, was a godsend. I guess the philosophical themes and 70s sensibilities won over the ratings board...
---If you can't trust a nerd, who can you trust?
Despite what a bunch of idealistic teenaged know it all's think, this is a decent product. There are all manner of people who don't want to see certian things. That is their right. I have the right not to see read or listen to whatever I choose not to see read or listen too. You have no right to force me to see it.
/. crowd is pissed because someone wants to not watch it in the privacy of their own home.
This product gives people to see and enjoy movies that they otherwise wouldn't want to see because they object to things in the movie. It isn't censorship. It gives people a few more options. That's all.
There have been a lot of stupid arguments. "Kid's won't use it", "What happens if one of the objectional scenes has a critical piece of dialog"... My response is so what if it does? If someone wants to watch a movie and is willing to make that trade, what right do you have to say they can't? You get pissed when they say you can't watch it in your own home, but suddenly the
"The artistic vision of the creator of the movie shouldn't be altered." Anyone that can use the word artistic in relation to nearly any American movie without negation and hold a straight face is either insane or someone I wouldn't want to play poker with. American movies are made to get maximum ratings. Most of the time sex and violence scenes have no 'artistic' value to the movie. They're there to get the R rating, because R rated movies make more money.
Now if someone were trying to say that these scenes shouldn't be allowed in movies, I'd be pissed at censorship, but that isn't the case here. No one is telling you that you can't do something, they are just saying that they don't want to participate in a particular activity. This in no way violates your rights.
If someone wants to buy and use a product, so what? Why should you care?
There is a civil war coming in the United States. Remember which side has most of the guns
I can't say I don't have some misgivings about this. Generally speaking, I think technology is making life just a tad too customizable, and that has some disadvantages.
It used to be that we only got our news from three or four major sources. This was bad, but the advantage was that everyone was on basically the same page.
Now we have a wide variety of different news sources, of widely varying competence. Does this help keep everyone honest? Or does it offer recipients the ability to ignore just about everything they don't always agree with?
The answer, of course, is both. It's up to you whether you get all your news from a Rush Limbaugh/James Carville*, or select from a wide variety of sources to get a full picture of events.
So what happens when you get to decide precisely what you see and what you don't? Imagine being able to alter the CNN feed to bleep out any stories about errant bombs or atrocities by the Northern Alliance. Or filtering so that all you got was stories about Open source, school shootings, and the Microsoft/DOJ settlement. How skewed could your worldview get if you're only subjected to things which confirm it.
So inasfar as this allows people to see only that which they are comfortable with, I'm not comfortable with it. Most people, myself included, generally only seek out information which supports whatever memes are already lodged in their brains.
For example, if you liked what I've written so far, you could filter out the final paragraph which might change your opinion:
This is an evil weapon of intolerance, and it must be wiped off the face of the Earth! Death to all fanatics! Make me your king and bootlegged DVDs will flow through the streets!
*I almost said "George Carlin." Weird.
You want the truthiness? You can't handle the truthiness!
> Don't play censorship cop, be a parent...
Unfortunately, sometimes being a parent is playing censorship cop. Giving them values is a matter of course, but that takes time, and in the interim it's sometimes necessary to censor. I take the view that it's better to preview a movie myself to decide if it's appropriate for my kids, but sometimes there's a movie of much value that has inappropriate parts, and (like the original story said) I don't necessarily want to wait for the sanitized version to appear on network TV. In this case, my goal isn't to prevent them from watching the movie, but to let them watch the movie but cut out the few parts that are not appropriate for them. The best example is "The Name of the Rose", which is a really good murder mystery, but has one rather graphic sex scene. I'd let a thirteen year-old watch the movie, as it's a good film, but that one scene throws the whole thing, and IMHO removing it is a better approach than simply forbidding the whole movie.
Virg
"This seems like a good idea - it would allow many people who don't wish to be subjected to violence/nudity/language a chance to watch any movie they want without waiting months for it to be released on network television, already PG-13ized."
Look, if there is some part of the movie you don't like, just don't watch the movie. A movie (well, a good movie, at least) is an artwork and it probably meant to be seen as a while. In the case of good movies, sex and/or violence is rarely free. Take, say, Clockwork Orange. It is extremely violent, but the whole point of this violence is to make people react to the movie and think...
In some movies, there are some scenes that I literaly hated, but I would have been even more pissed if I wouldn't have been given the chance to see them.
I guess the kind of people who are going to use these features are the same as the one who don't mind watching a dubbed movie...
Glad to see that a lot of people here can appreciate the value of something like this.
I'd have thought that more people would "thumbs-up" something that:
1. Isn't imposed by the government
2. Doesn't restrict the original film
3. Could point the way to MORE freedom in films.
Face it, films are commercial enterprises. There is a lot of pressure to make money and DVD sales are a growing source of revenue.
Think of a movie like "From Hell," the Jack the Ripper flick.
That may be exactly the movie that it's makers wanted. Or, it may have been toned down so that more people could stand to see it.
Imagine a "less gore" configuration that would let those with strong stomachs view the original while those who get queasy would get just enough hints and quick cuts to understand what was done.
A voluntary technology ADDS freedom. It doesn't take freedom away.
/flame on
This may lose a few Karma points but dammit its worth it....
I am SICK AND TIRED of people using ART as a license to be idiots! I have the right to watch what I want, when I want, and HOW I want. How many of these directors are in this because of the ART of directing? Few if any. They are going for that all mighty dollar and make choices that give it to them. Sure you have the Oliver Stones that try to make every movie a political statement, but its only used to make the statement into hartd cold cash.
Stop using ART as your excuse for being an ASS! If I want to watch a movie without being subjected to language/nudity, or other material that I may object to, I will.
If you really feel this strong about the artist intent, then no more scene jumping on the DVD. No more slow/fastforward/pause etc. If the artist wanted you to see the movie that way they would have made it that way ahead of time.
/flame off
Razzious Domini
I could be a GREAT KARMA WHORE if I could just shed the few morals I have left.
What about a player that lets you re-cut a movie with the footage on the DVD? Say so that you could make a version of SW:TPM without JAR-JAR.
Or how about a cut-sheet for Memento that shows the movie in the correct order? (Something they didn't do in the DVD)
Or a hundred other movies that you could show in different orders for dramatic/comedic effect. You could re-cut the simpsons dvd and make a whole new episode. mmmmmm Simpsons.
How can you be subjected to nudity? How would you handle having a bath??
"Encyclopedia" is to "Wikipedia" what "Library" is to "Some people at a bus stop"
I may be off here, but seems like it only locks the machine from viewing the disks that are rated higher than the limit you set. IE. Password allows me to watch PG13+ but without PG13-
Razzious Domini
I could be a GREAT KARMA WHORE if I could just shed the few morals I have left.
Just currious, where you got this list. It *looks* right to me. That is to say that it looks liek the top 10 highest grossing movies... but the order seems wrong. For instance, I know that when it was in theaters, Jurrassic Park became the number 1 film, which means that although Titanic could be higher (since it came out later) ET and Star Wars couldn't be... Perhaps what I read didn't account for later home video sales or something. Not saying you're wrong, since it looks so damn right, but it seems to not jive with some of what I've read...
Oh and by the way, great sig.
Touch everywhere, even when inappropriate.
One of the most disturbing scenes I have ever witnessed in a film was the scene in American History X, when Ed Norton curb stomps one of the black guys who broke into his home.
I still get chills thinking about that, and I literally broke down at the end of that movie. I certainly *never* want to see that movie again, but I can also say without a doubt that had I *not* seen that brutal scene, the movie would not have affected me as deeply.
If someone *chooses* to edit content, so be it, but there are some things that must be seen in order to gain perspective.
Don't tell me you've forgotten the tunnel of love orgy? And there was some other stuff as well... The best part of the movie is since it's rated PG people often don't bother to edit it before it ends up on TV!
---If you can't trust a nerd, who can you trust?
Most DVD players have a parental lock feature which can result in by-passing scenes in the movie, e.g. the pie scene in American Pie.
That's like taking the gigolo out of American Gigolo, the Werewolf out of American Werewolf in London, the beauty out of American Beauty, and the Grafitti out of American Grafitti.
Come to think of it, I don't recall any actual grafitti in American Grafitti, but the movie was already 20ish years old by the time I saw it- damn, they must have censored it out already!
microsoftword.mp3 - it doesn't care that they're not words...
at least they can't claim that it glamorizes drug addiction ;-)
"Biped! Good cranial development. Evidently considerable human ancestry."
You know, like when there's an anonymous informant on TV they put that gray bubble over his face and disguise his voice?
;-)
"Biped! Good cranial development. Evidently considerable human ancestry."
Imagine you have set your DVD to no violence, and you pop in 1984, you miss the last scene and the entire point of the movie. I'd be pretty angry if my children watched this sanitized version over another childs house, I would rather my kids wait until they are old enough to handle the violence than to screen it out.
Children have been raised for generations without this shit, there's no reason for it now.
I'm the big fish in the big pond bitch.
Now all the kiddies will be able to watch Episode II without the gratuitous pr0n. In this version, Luke and Leia are delivered in a basket by an annoying talking stork.
While the original poster is out in left field (hey, it's /. :) there's an interesting issue that's brought up here.
Under European continental copyright law, especially French law, the original creator has a set of rights that can't be waived. One of them is the right to control how the work is presented. This technology could be used to override that.
Odds are, to be legal in France/Germany, and maybe Canada (we've got a wimpier form of moral rights in our copyright legislation), any edits like this would have to be done with the consent of the director.
Interesting. Any European copyright lawyers here?
my old sig used to be funny, but then slashcode ate it and now it's not funny anymore
You know, I am not sure how I feel about this. I think it's great that someone is trying to do something (other then the folks who SHOULD know better, namely hollywood), but I am not sure if this is the right idea. You see, I was allowed to watch things like Star Wars, and other similar movies when I was a kid and if we did swear or use terminology from the movie, we were punished or talked to or both. I think it can hurt a child to shelter them from things that are considered bad.
One example is the World Trade Center thing. There are so many people out there now who cannot function because of this. They are depressed, afraid to work in their building because it's a high rise or much worse. Could all of these people been sheltered from violence and then when confronted a real situation like the WTC attack, they can't handle it? I don't know.
I DO agree that as a parent, I should be the one in contol of the situation. I should be there the first time my son sees a boob on a video. I should be there with him so I can explain what is happening.
ANY history teacher should never show a movie to help teach the class unless it's pretty much historically accurate. How many movies are there that are accurate from a historical standpoint? Not many. One only needs tolook at all of the inaccuracies in the movie Apollo 13. The rocket was not even painted correctly for that mission (If memory serves). Not to mention the fact that the anachronisms of trying to emulate a time in recent history were rampant. I don't understand why this would be a teaching tool in school. Don't get me wrong, the outcomes were the same, but if you actually have read the book it's screenplay came from, it wasn't even close. Hollywood has to embellish history because, let's face it, sometimes stuff that happens during it is quite boring. Imagine what a movie about George Washington's Valley Forge encampment would be about. It would be a bunch of guys with bloodied feet huddling in a bunch of tents and just hanging around camp with the occasional emergency. It would be pretty boring, as well as graphic for being shown in anything but a R rating.
This thing still won't quite those that are trying to get Hollywood to make all movies family movies. Why? They require action and you know as well as I the default will be to show everything, or people will complain when things are cut (hey there's supposed to be a boob there....ahh this thing doesn't work!). Also, people will be too lazy to turn it on or won't want it. It's easier for them to bitch and complain abut every movie soming out the it is for them to go out and MAKE their own movies.
This option will fail to appease the right wingers as much as the V-chip failed. It's doing real well ain't it?
There are so many PARENTS that DON'T want to do their job and only want kids as a posession instead of having kids so they can LOVE them. They also want machines to do their job like machines can cook food for you. You get the things such as Columbine because of this selfish reason to have kids. I mean, yeah, I take pride in things my kid does and I well show him off as much as I would show off my new computer, but I love him more then any computer I have owned and would really be heartbroken if he was gone. I love him as much as I love my wife and more then anything else. That's the truth and I will raise him as I want to and not as the powers that be want him raised.
Gorkman
Please do us all a favor and release your code now. I totally don't care what state it's in, what we need is the prior art so that nobody else can patent this stuff later and hit you with a suit when/if this takes off.
Just tarball it and post it somewhere with a good timestamp on it. Please! Release a good version later, or not at all, but the sooner prior art simply exists, the better!
Be careful what you do with your final product. According to their FAQ they have patented this process.
However, since they don't list the patent number, I'm wondering if it's merely patent pending. What would it be under "Patent for automated mute button"? I'm surprised that this hasn't been brought up by someone already.
Of course, before you go and rail on MovieMask for frivolous patents, consider that they are planning to release this program for "any Linux based system" (from the same FAQ). I'm also surprise no one has mentioned that! Now, do the two things cancel each other out?
Regarding the idea itself...I would like to see a third option beside mute and fast-forward: zoom. This is what a lot of TV releases do to allow a scene with important content but hide objectionable content. If the woman talking is topless, zoom in to cut off everything below the neck. If I guy is going to be shot to a bloody stump, zoom to focus on the look of horror and not the blood gushing from the squibs. Many, many objectionable scenes can be fixed in this manner.
- JoeShmoe
-- I wonder which will go down in history as the bigger failure: the War on Drugs or the War on Filesharing
It's really funny to see a product like this
come out, because I've seen movie studios get
VERY upset when individuals and organizations try
editing a movie to their liking.
I live in the Provo/Orem area of Utah. Because of the religious nature of the community, lots of people/institutions here prefer films with less cursing, nudity, sex, violence, etc (and please, for the sake of discussion here, suspend any reverse propensities you may have and just realize that for whatever reason, some people prefer this).
So several businesses sprang up to meet the demand. Brigham Young University, for example,
had the "Varsity Theatre" which edited movies down to a PGish/PG13ish... and it did really well.
A couple of video rental stores also sprung up,
where they'd offer edited versions of popular
rentals.
But about 4-5 years back, the movie studios suddenly became aware people were doing this. They issued BYU, BYU's distributor, and the video stores an ultimatum: stop showing edited films or face lawsuits, plus you'll never get a chance to show anything we license again. BYU complied, and tried to get by showing classics and various other "safe" films for a while. The stores stood up to the idea for a bit, but eventually caved in. Now they edit videos that people have already purchased -- which is apparently still on solid
legal footing.
I think I understand the desire of an artist/creator to see their work distributed w/o being pressed/chopped/smoked beyond recognition (anyone remember that part in "Reality Bites" where whatshername watches her documentary hopelessly mainstreamed?). But it's also rather scary how insistent the movie studios really are about having total control over the way their content is delivered/presented.
So I'm surprised to see a device like the one in the article in existence... and I'll be even more surprised if non-MPAA edits ever make it to market.
Libertarianism is rich wolves and poor sheep playing gambler's ruin for dinner.
This reminds me of an idea I had when the V-Chip was first introduced.... add a 'Not' gate. By inverting the output of the V-Chip, you would never again be subjected to Barney...
I do not deploy Linux. Ever.
Isn't this part of what the DMCA was desinged to prevent. If a movie is show with edited scenes (from a non offical source)wouldn't the movie possibly be taken out of context.
Assume for a second that it was a biography, is that not slander?
Thanks for saying it.
Most mindboggling thing about 9/11 - a moment where the censors just popped in raw video footage from a guy who had a handicam pointed in the right/wrong place when the second plane went in.
The reaction of the camera holder was predictable: A scream of "Holy fucking Christ!"
The news guy apologized profusely for the language. I blurted out in shock and laughter at the patent absurdity of that ("What the fuck?"), and a person next to me said, in a concerned voice, "Well, you know there might be children watching"
Yeah, lady, your crotchfruit have just spent the past three hours watching 6000 people get incinerated, crushed, and splattering on the ground like sacks of wet cement, over and over again, live and on replay on National TV, and you're worried about them being emotionally damaged by hearing naughty words?!?!
Holy fucking Christ indeed. Holy fucking Christ.
95% of movies being produced are utter garbage who's plot couldn't be hurt if you forced the producer at gunpoint to edit in 2 aliens, a flamboyant gay roomate, and a cheerleading squad into the movie after filming was complete... and the other 5% won't sacrifice vision for clarity.
but then again, i've almost completely limited myself to watching independent films for quite a while...
A: None. The Universe spins the bulb, and the Zen master merely stays out of the way.
But nobody does it.
This was one of the big "cool features" promised way back when DVD was still being introduced. You'd be able to select different "versions" of a film, from a normal DVD player menu, and the player would pick-and-choose specific scenes automatically, and seamlessly (or just about so). The promise was to be able to have a single disc, with a single "super-duper-extra-beyond-director's-cut" version that you'd never, in practice, see. Then you select the "Theatrical Release" and see what you saw in the theater. Select the "Director's Cut" and see what the movie house didn't think would sell but all the rabid fans prefer. Select "TV" and see a cleaned-up version for TV. Select "Morman" and -- oh, nevermind.
Of course, I've never seen this happen, except on one movie (Crash), which allowed you to pick an R or NC-17 version of the same film.
I can think of MANY movies where I wish this feature was used. A good example is Blade Runner. There was the US theatrical release, there was a foreign release (with some additional, gorier footage), a later US release (basically the foreign release), a "Director's Cut" (with the unicorn in and the voice-over out), etc. Wouldn't it be great if you could get all those on a single disc? Or could mix-and-match? Gimme the director's cut, but WITH the narration. I won't even go into what you could do with Brazil (what, didn't the Criterion LD include three separate, complete, full-length cuts?)
Personally, I'd like to see this for many "normal" movies, too. For example, I'd love to recommend "Wild Things" to my mom -- it's a great mindfuck movie. But the sex scenes would probably make her want to stop watching. So she's missing out on a terrific movie.
And the worst of it is that all this capability already exists. The studios just don't want to do it.
So, something like this project seems really cool, especially for people using their own DVD player software to drive their home theater screen. Someone else talked about "Fan Edits." This might even make a good argument for an additional "Fair Use" for DeCSS technology -- providing a value-added service for DVD owners that the studios don't feel like doing.
DVD had such great promise, but very rarely do the studios actually deliver on those promises. How many movies nowadays come with alternate language tracks? With OBSCURE alternate languages? With decent subtitle selection? Now, how many come with "making of" featurettes, stupid storyboard-to-final "worksthops", or animated menus? Which delivers better value to the end user? Which is cheaper to produce?
gah. I gotta find something useful to do...
we want porn! porn for kids!
(tv funhouse reference)
"Remember when the U.S. had a drug problem, and then we declared a War On Drugs, and now you can't buy drugs anymore?"
Hell, at 2pm on a Sunday a local station showed predator, including Carl Weather's character's severed arm flying off, still firing an automatic weapon. Yeah, *that's* good family fare...
Ooh, a sarcasm detector. Oh, that's a real useful invention.
If you have been working on a project like this then you might have read the dvd faq. It mentions some similar projects that died from patent disputes.
The two most common things in the Universe are hydrogen and stupidity. -- Harlan Ellison
There's a fellow on the Xine-devel mailing list who'se already got a working prototype of an app that does exactly this - easily scriptable modified playback, with he ability to cut or subsititute audio and video.
The main use for it is airlines - ever watched an in flisht version of Pulp Fiction and noticed how it didn't offend anyone? That's what he's automating.
Jump on the mailing list and have a chat if you're interested.
The edit list for a good Phantom Menace release wouldn't fit on a DVD.
My God, it's Full of Source!
OUTSIDE_IP=$(dig +short my.ip @outsideip.net)
personal choice is horrific?
they're just combinations of sounds? No, they're sounds in the context of language, and consequently carry a meaning. Your post makes about as much sense as saying that people shouldn't freak out about violent scenes or sexual scenes. They're just pixels... If someone doesn't want to listen to that meaning, you should stay out of it.
Your freedom of expression does not mean that you have the right to make everyone listen to you. Nor does it negate someones freedom to ignore certain "expressions", or to remove any "expression" they want from their living room.
man, the stupidity of some people these days...
. --- If you're looking for free e-mail you won't find it here! http://www.noemailhere.com
Just think - Apocalypse now without Marlon Brando!
Selective edits could improve a lot of movies.
This one comes awefully close.
As copyright owner of this comment, I authorize everyone to defeat any technological measure which limits access to it.
Hey, people can still watch the original if they want. If you have faith in the pros, you can always Just Say No to this feature. But it's neat that you don't have to. Selection itself is a potential medium for creativity.
Hmm.. this isn't any different than "smart tags", ad filterers, over-riding stylesheets, etc on web pages. The viewer gets to decide what they see, not the content creator.
As copyright owner of this comment, I authorize everyone to defeat any technological measure which limits access to it.
I'd like it if Hollywood would provide alternative scenes, so that people who would prefer not to have cursing, sex, violence, etc., could watch scenes that make sense with the movie and don't include those. Hollywood could also make versions with extended sex scenes or particularly graphic violent scenes for people who are into that kind of thing. Seems to me like it could be an easy way to make more people really like a film.
It seems like they might be interested in going along with it, since that would increase the potential market for their film. For example a children's film could have a version with nothing remotely objectionalable for very little kids, a little implicit violence and/or sexual inuendo for older kids and adults who would prefer to avoid more objectionable material, and a another version with cursing and explicit violence and sex that teenagers wouldn't be embarassed to watch with their friends.
Another type of films that it might be particularly good for would be classics and "educational" films that parents and/or schools would like to share with kids.
But I would guess that the films that would gain the most extra profits from making multiple versions are you the "normal" films. I'd guess there are a lot of people who wouldn't want to go to an "adult theater", but would like to rent a normal DVD from Blockbuster- just like they'd rent the normal version- and from the privacy of their own home enjoy the "lots of extra graphic sex scenes" version. And people like me who are disturbed by violent scenes would be less likely to object when friends want to watch a movie, if we could compromise on watching the movie with the the "no explicit violence" option.
I'd guess Hollywood would choose do this on their own. It could simultaneously placate complaints about their content and sell even more copies to the masses.
Can it get a movie past this guy? This man has a sick, sick mind. He manages to read filth and blasphemy into everything.
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