Second, (and this is strictly my opinion), these businesses exist as parasites on the talent of writers and producers instead of creating content on their own. At least producers of movies like The Work and the Glory, or any of the Feature Films for Families fare are presenting something that by the standards of some shouldn’t be edited.

Finally, who gets to decide what is filth and what isn’t?

And I still don’t see any evidence that Hollywood hates you or wants to force you into anything. I doubt they even give the ideas so much as a passing thought.

That’s the whole point of this post. There IS a market for it. It has been tapped. It WAS called CleanFilms, CleanFlix, …

Hollywood doesn’t need the money from these sales, and they don’t hate us. They just hate that we don’t want to participate in the filth. The number of clean movies for them is insignificant (maybe it’s not insignificant, but it’s certainly not huge).

This isn’t about art, it’s about someone disagreeing with them and them having the financial power to suppress that disagreement. It’s about them being able to force people to agree with their way of seeing life. Yeah…I know…”I haven’t ever been forced to see anything”…you get what I’m saying.

When I can no longer get the edited movies, I’ll stop watching the movies at all. Right now I would rather watch an edited rated-R movie than a PG movie.

In my (admitedly limited) experience, they *are* compartmentalized. You only need look at the weekend paper to see individual titles and how much they’re grossing at the box office. Beyond that, most individual motion pictures are set up as their own corporation for liability reasons.

I agree that you should take an integrated look at the range of content a movie company provides (G to NC-17 as you say). But if they’re evil as you say (I disagree at least to a point), I’d argue that you shouldn’t sanction them on any level, not even the G-rated shows.

And by the way, I could swear there have been a lot of them. I’ve been to a lot of Sunday matinees with the whole family, and I can promise you I wasn’t letting my daughter see Sin City. Heck, *I* won’t even watch it.

Finally, I know you agree with the ruling. But I haven’t seen any evidence that would lead me to the conclusion that the Hollywood actually hates you (or us).

If there’s one thing we can probably agree on, it’s that Hollywood will do anything for a buck, including cranking out tons of plotless G-rated *and* X-rated content. It seems obvious to me that if there were truly the huge market potential you suggest that *someone* would have tapped it by now, if for no other reason than it helps them fund their “trash”.

Incidentally, I worked for a couple years for a local film company whose express purpose for business was to make movies for the G-rated family market. Our prices were reasonable, our selection was rather large, but our success was moderate.

More recently local films like Brigham City and The Work and the Glory have only been met with moderate success. Why? Because they just aren’t compelling. The plots are weak, the acting is bad and they don’t reach anywhere near the same level of production values (although I’ll admit they’re getting better).

My point is that these movies were offered to a national market, and the market rejected it.

Personally, I’m not nearly as concerned about arbitrary ratings as I am meaningful, well-crafted content. But then maybe we agree on that?

Regards,

Doug

I didn’t miss that. I mentioned it here:
“…these companies bought legitimate copies of each movie and are only using edited copies to reach a valuable market segment that Hollywood refuses to accommodate.”

@ Eight Hour Lunch: “You can’t call something evil on the one hand and then grant your sanction on the other by financing it. If you think those movies are bad, pay to see movies you think are good.”

I think your right here, but the same guys that make Garfeild 2 make NC17 teenage sex films, and I’m sure their investments aren’t compartmentalized by revenue source.

@ Eight Hour Lunch: “Then again, maybe I should just make a clone of your blog and cut out the parts I don’t like.”

Now that’s just silly. I said that I agree with the ruling –these companies *are* acting within their rights. I just think that there is a *huge* profitable market studios are purposely ignoring (at best), and I know that no other industry does that. What happened to “the customer is always right”?

Now if I’m the Hollywood producer, and I’m in business to succeed financially (so I can create more of my art), and I see loads of copies of Titanic flying out the window, how should I interpret that information? Your purchase, scrubbed or not sends a message to the producer: make more of it.

You can’t call something evil on the one hand and then grant your sanction on the other by financing it. If you think those movies are bad, pay to see movies you think are good. When is the last time someone forced you to see one of these movies you so strongly object to? I’m bettting never.

The reason these movies continue to exist is that people willingly pay for it. They want it, and are willing to exchange their honest work for it.

Then again, maybe I should just make a clone of your blog and cut out the parts I don’t like.