Production Code

The Production Code (also known as the Hays Code) was a set of guidelines governing the production of motion pictures. The Motion Pictures Producers and Distributors Association (MPPDA, later to become the Motion Picture Association of America or MPAA) adopted the code in 1930, began effectively enforcing it in 1934, and abandoned it in 1967. The Production Code spelled out what was and was not considered morally acceptable in the production of United States motion pictures.

The 1950s and early 1960s

Hollywood worked within the confines of the Production Code until the late 1950s, by which time the "Golden Age Of Hollywood" had ended, and the movies were faced with very serious competitive threats. The first threat came from a new technology, television, which did not require Americans to leave their house to watch moving pictures. Hollywood needed to offer the public something it could not get on television, which itself was under an even-more-restrictive censorship code.

Related Topics:
1950s - Golden Age Of Hollywood

~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~

In addition to the threat of television, there was also increasing competition from foreign films, like Vittorio De Sica's The Bicycle Thief (1950). For that film, there was a censorship controversy when the MPAA demanded a scene where the lead characters talk to the prostitutes of a brothel be removed, regardless of the fact that there is no sexual or provocative activity.

Related Topics:
Vittorio De Sica - The Bicycle Thief - Prostitute - Brothel

~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~

Vertical integration in the movie industry had been found to violate anti-trust laws, and studios had been forced to give up ownership of theatres by the Paramount Case. The studios had no way to keep foreign films out, and the foreign films weren't bound by the Production Code. The anti-trust rulings also helped pave the way for independent art houses that would show films created by people such as Andy Warhol and others working outside the studio system.

Related Topics:
Vertical integration - Anti-trust - Paramount Case - Andy Warhol

~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~

Finally, a boycott from the Catholic Legion of Decency no longer guaranteed a commercial failure, and thus the Code prohibitions began to vanish when Hollywood producers would ignore the Code and were still able to earn profits.

~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~

It was a time that the Production Code needed to become more flexible. The MPAA revised the code in 1951, not to make it more flexible, but to make it more rigid. The 1951 revisions spelled out more words and subjects that were prohibited, and no doubt increased the opposition of movie-makers to the code.

~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~

At the forefront of challenges to the code was director Otto Preminger, whose films violated the code repeatedly in the 1950s. His 1953 film The Moon is Blue, about a young woman who tries to play two suitors off against each other by claiming that she plans to keep her virginity until marriage, was the first film to use the words "virgin", "seduce" and "mistress", and it was released without a certificate of approval. He later made The Man with the Golden Arm (1955), which portrayed the prohibited subject of drug abuse, and Anatomy of a Murder (1959) which dealt with rape. Preminger's films were direct assaults on the authority of the Production Code and, since they were successful, hastened its abandonment.

Related Topics:
Otto Preminger - The Moon is Blue - The Man with the Golden Arm - 1955 - Anatomy of a Murder - 1959

~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~

Alfred Hitchcock's Psycho (1960) was also released without a certificate of approval due to its themes, and further weakened the authority of the code.

Related Topics:
Alfred Hitchcock - Psycho - 1960

~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~