Hays Code: Difference between revisions

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'''''The Hays Code''''' (the informal name for The Motion Picture Production Code), adopted in 1930 but not seriously enforced until 1934, was a set of rules governing American filmmaking that stifled American cinema for over three decades. After a wave of complaints and rulings about the content of movies in the early 20th century, which included the US Supreme Court ruling in ''Mutual Film Corporation v. Industrial Commission of Ohio'' in 1917 (which said that film had no First Amendment protection as a form of expression) -- as well as a number of perceived immoral people within the industry itself (most infamously, [[Fatty Arbuckle]]) -- the Hays Code was a self-adopted censorship code designed to preempt a government-run censorship program. Will H. Hays created the Code, which placed a number of restrictions on all films to be produced by the Motion Picture Association of America. These were:

 

** In one especially [[Egregious]] example, the novel and the stage play ''[[The Bad Seed]]'' end with Christine Penmark, mother of the sociopathic Rhoda, giving her dangerous daughter an overdose of sleeping pills and shooting herself -- but Rhoda survives, with the implication she will kill again (even more likely now that her mother, the only person aware of her true nature, is out of the picture). In the Hays-Code-compliant film version, Christine survives her suicide attempt, while, in an incredibly contrived and implausible instance of [[Karmic Death]], Rhoda goes to the lake in a thunderstorm to try to find the penmanship medal for which she killed a boy, and a bolt of lightning knocks down a tree bough which falls on her head, killing her. This was apparently lampshaded in the final casting call, when Nancy Kelly (Christine) takes Patty McCormack (Rhoda) over her knee and spanks her.

** The Hays Office also made the ending of ''[[The Big Sleep (Film)|The Big Sleep]]'' more violent and decisive than the one originally planned.

** Another word banned in practically all contexts was "virgin," which was [[Bowdlerise|Bowdlerised]] out of the film versions of ''[[Carousel]]'' and ''[[The Rose Tattoo]]''. It was mostly because of this word that ''The Moon is Blue'' ended up being released without [[Hays Code]] approval.

* Profanity of any kind was prohibited. Like the above, this would lead to supposedly tough and gritty protagonists using mixtures of [[Unusual Euphemism]] and [[Gosh Dang It to Heck]]. This was so bad, the word "damn" was completely disallowed, and any usage of profanity would be likely to result in a hefty fine (which is why Rhett's famous line in ''[[Gone With the Wind]]'' was considered a big deal back then).

 

These rules could be slightly skirted in film adaptations; for example, they managed to keep the famous line "Frankly my dear, I don't give a damn" in ''[[Gone With the Wind]]'' because the (mild) swearing was in the original novel. (David O. Selznick was still fined $5000 for it, though.) This was especially true for faithful adaptations of [[William Shakespeare]]'s plays, which were probably considered too artistically significant to censor; ''[[Hamlet]]'', for instance, was filmed over a dozen times despite its main theme of revenge, something normally prohibited by the Office.

 

 

Since the Code did not apply to the stage, aspiring screenwriters could and did write plays about subjects too sexy or politically controversial for Hollywood. In New York (at least), stage censorship -- though not unheard of -- was far less of a threat than it had been in the 1920s, and comedies quite freely made fun of the movie censors.