essay 1

“Film censorship is motivated by fears about audiences and technologies” Discuss the statement in reference to the concern expressed about uncensored and unregulated video content in Britain in the early 1980's (30 marks)

Film censorship are put in to the place to protect the audience. As VHS and betamax was around it allowed people to pirate and buy pirated films to watch at home the now fashionable thing which meant anyone of any age could watch films of any certificate.

Home video allowed the audiences to buy videos to watch on their televisions at home which saw a d decline in cinema attendance in the 1960's. With the development of VHS which played longer and beatmax which had clearer images and better picture quality which could be played int eh privacy of their own homes which was the now fashionable thing to do. Home video allowed age restricted films or censored films to be available to purchase to watch at home.

Video nasties where films of the horror genre, at the time these films were released the genre of horror had not been done before and was not socially accepted. These films were generally low budget films containing gore, deaths and repeatable story lines.

The conservative government have a right winged outlook on society supporting hierarchy and social inequality. The British board of film classification (BBFC) became restricted by the conservative government party and were told to create restrictions for film,s which contained sex and violence. The regulations n the 80's became stricter due to political demand which caused the rating system to change. Politicians considered that video nasties were affecting how the population was acting and therefore wanted to put a stop to horror films by creating a censored list which films were banned within the UK. The national viewers and listeners association was set up in 1965 by Mary Whitehouse who founded the campaign against the broadcasting of media that contained sex, violence and blasphemy with the 'clean up TV campaign'.

I think that the films when first released where too graphic for the times and as this was the first of there time they shocked the viewers creating disturbance and opened peoples eyes to more graphic killings. Nowadays horror films are more accepted as we are forced upon us within the media and society. But without these films being released we would not have the horror films we have today as they are the basis of the genre. History seems to be repeating itself with the piracy as nowadays due to the internet we can easily find any film censored or not to watch online, leading to a decline in cinema attendance once again.