I found the reading about the movie code very interesting. I never stopped to consider that there was a strong restriction before the current rating system was developed. The strong repressive nature of the code seems to have been a little too restrictive. I say this because they were deciding for both the movie makers and the viewers what was acceptable and what was not. I am not against limiting young audiences from see inappropriate material but, I think in the end it is the responsibility of the parent to monitor their children and not the movie industries job. It seems that the code like today’s movies that many films are made to push the limits of the rating system and get away with putting in just enough of what they want to while maintaining the rating they need to attract viewers.
I had not seen the movie Easy Rider before and really didn’t find the description on the dvd case very interesting. Under the rules of the movie code most of the content of Easy Rider would have been banned. For example the drugs that seemed to play a very open role, to the criminal smuggling activity, as well as the symbols of sex and religion that were mixed together. I found the scene changes and editing techniques to be harsh, I am guessing this is what the director had intended. The pace of the move seemed to speed up and slow down almost like in a rollercoaster. The foreshadowing is also interesting that Wyatt (Peter Fonda) after reading a painting about how only death closes a mans life and determines whether it was good or evil, sees his own crash with his bike burning in the grass next to the side of the road.
4 responses so far ↓
1 Diane Cantalupo // Jan 28, 2006 at 9:13 pm
Nora: I, too, was surprised by the Production Code, as well as amused. I think the film industry would have died eventually, had the Code stayed in place. Your feeling to how how the filmmakers push the envelope on the current rating system had not occurred to me, but I agree that this is the case in many instances. I have seen some content in today’s PG films that would have garnered an R rating 15-20 years ago. Although Easy Rider was rated R, R-rated movies now go much further. I wonder if the standards surrounding each rating have been changed, or if they’ve simply relaxed the initial standards to meet the needs of a constantly evolving audience.
The first time I saw Easy Rider was in the 80’s and, like you, I found the pace of the movie to be almost annoyingly erratic. I put the editing and flickering scene changes down to a low budget, but thought these gritty techniques were also reflective of the experimental and changes nature of not only the film industry, but America as a whole.
You seemed to have grasped the foreshadowing scene immediately, but at first, it almost got right by me. Peter Fonda’s vision was so brief, I thought maybe I was seeing things! So, I rewound the film to watch it again, and the end of the film certainly tied it all together.
2 Jeanne Donnely // Jan 29, 2006 at 1:40 am
Nora, I was suprized to find out that the rating system did not go into place until 1968, I would have thought with such a high moral standard something along those lines would have gone into effect much sooner then that.
3 Diane C.’s HUM210 Blog » Module 1: Reflection on the Module // Feb 8, 2006 at 5:21 pm
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