"They also cut out parts that may not be offensive just so they can get in some more commercials. I would also add that, typically, they edit them very poorly as to content. The director and studio probably doesn't have much say in that process."

I assure you that the studio and the director have plenty of input as to how the movie is edited for television.

And about your statement regarding commercials; a television station or network is in the business of playing commercials for their sponsors. The programming in between the commercials is just filler. Hopefully it's entertaining enough filler so that the it attracts an audience to watch the commercials. Nevertheless, commercial TV and radio is all about playing commercials. The same could probably be said of newspapers and magazines as well.

...otherwise we would have anarchy - Absolutely, without those laws we would have just that.

All of the laws you cite are intended to protect people from being injured or killed. Most of them came out of bitter experience.

The laws of copyright are there to secure people's work, income and reputation.

I have no idea why people have such a hard time with the concept.

Andrew

dpayne, upon further research, due to the lawsuits against CleanFlicks, Family Flix, Clean Films and Play It Clean, technically it would be against the law to edit the movie, in the way you described, for distribution.

However, according to the Family Movie Act of 2005, you could create a DVD player which was programmed to skip or blank out certain parts of the movie. As long as it doesn't affect the original DVD you could distribute the player to the world - if you so choose. You could do this with the complete blessing of the federal government. The FMA '05 also states, several times, that you can't do what CleanFlicks was doing for profit or distribution. It doesn't specifically state you CAN'T do it for personal use but it doesn't specifically allow it either.

And, to flip the legal coin, if any movie offends the common morality of your community, you could have the movie deemed obscene and prevent the studios/theatres from showing it in your town. IDK but perhaps an animated movie about a woman living with 7 men out-of-wedlock that eventually gets posioned and put into a coma and then mystically brought out, is obscene where you live. Then there are always boycotts of theatres, movie rentals (blockbuster, et al), walmart and the studios for creating and/or releasing content deemed obscene in your community.

Just a reminder for some of the purists that the law can go both ways...

Which is *exactly* what happened in Utah. The LDS owned Miller theater chain in Utah decided to not show "Brokeback Mountain" in any of its theaters (which is the largest chain in Utah) and they came under tremendous fire for having made the decision. And they survived. The owner of the chain felt this was the best thing to do, and also indicated that he couldn't support edited movies such as those that Cleenflix was generating.
I have great respect for the owner of the chain; he chooses to not show a movie he doesn't agree with (in a moral sense) and also speaks out against editing movies.

Just a reminder for some of the purists that the law can go both ways I don't quite see that as a reminder, it upholds the argument for staying within the law.

The law is primarily to protect people, and the laws that protect people from obscenity are just as important as protecting someone's work.

The provision in the Family Movie Act was intended for adults to censor what children watch, with the cooporation of the DVD distributor who would have to encode their movies.

I'm sure you are aware that there is a version of Snow White that would certainly offend many people ;-)

Andrew

Geez this is still going on, well anyways like i said before i was going to share it w/ my parents in my HOME , i'd never put it on the internet or share it with others.

What sucks is that the Directors and/or Large Corporations , don't release a toned down version of their movies when they come out for video , it's always the Director's Cut /Unrated version and think more ppl will purchase the video , which doesn't happen where I live it , since I'm surrounded by Mormon's.

But let's say if they release a movie and it has a R rating in the theatres , when it comes out to video why not release a Uncut/Unrated/Director's Cut/R/PG-13 and maybe even a PG vers of the movie IE: covering all their bases and ppl/religions etc so they can maximize their profit and not to have to worry about ppl ripping and editing their films.

I don't know but it makes perfect sense to me. The Director's etc that don't think this would be a good idea , would really need to go to the hospital and have a colonoscopy to find/remove that stick that's shoved up in there so far.

I mean I'm no director but maybe some day I will be , I'd want to share my work w/ anyone/everyone I could find that wanted to see it , and if that means sacrificing some nudity,blood splatters, limbs and heads being chopped off, without ruining the movie ,I'd do it.

They're alot of companies that edit movies out there and are still in business and making alot of money doing it, but personally I'd rather see that money go to the ppl that made the movie...

/rant off

/hug

Having gone on about the legalities of your original proposal, I do agree in principle with what you say.

In general the Picture companies are only interested in making money from specific and targetted audiences.

The problem with most Directors is that a degree of being 'up themselves' and having a dogmatic creative vision that drives the film forward, go hand in hand.

Andrew

Here's EXACTLY what your parents need and it will accomplish the same thing you were attempting to do for them.

http://www.clearplay.com

John