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Chapter 3
Causes and Special Effects: The Political Environment of Film
The purpose of this chapter is to show that movies are not created in a political vacuum
but are directly and profoundly impacted by the social, political, and economic
environments of their times. Two instances of intense self-censorship receive special
attention: the Hollywood blacklisting and HUAC era, and the Production Code era. Other
topics include the use of film as propaganda, the shift in business models from the
vertically integrated studio era to the current period of global media conglomerate
dominance, the state of independent filmmaking, actors as politicians, and the effect of
films on politicians and political rhetoric.
Objectives for Chapter 3:
1. Explore forces external to the movies that have affected their creation.
2. Cite instances when Hollywood actors inserted themselves into national politics and
analyze the impact of these collisions between movies and politics.
3. Describe the Red Scare era and the House on Un-American Activities Committee’s
(HUAC) targeting of the movie industry.
4. Identify the Hollywood Ten and the effect of blacklisting on the industry.
5. Chart the history of censorship and regulation of the industry from 1906 to the
present.
6. Identify Will Hays and the Motion Picture Production Code.
7. Identify “pre-Code” Hollywood as well as the Classification and Ratings
Administration (CARA) or film-rating board.
8. Explore the instances of actors becoming politicians and times when politicians have
assumed the role of actors in their political personae and rhetoric.
9. Chart the relationship between Hollywood and the U.S. military with films used as
propaganda and the military subsidizing film production.
10. Explain the centralization of the film industry and the movement to digital
production, distribution, and exhibition and suggest the effects of these developments
on political films.
Discussion Questions for Chapter 3:
1. What does HUAC refer to and why was the film industry one of its targets?
2. How did the film industry respond to the Red Scare?
3. What are the main reasons civic, municipal, and political groups wanted to control
and censor the movies?
4. What is the Motion Pictures Producers and Distributors of America (MPPDA), why
did it form, and what purpose did it serve?
5. Who is Will Hays, what role did he play in the formation of the Production Code, and
what was his attitude toward his role?
6. What are some of the inciting incidents that caused the industry to form the
Production Code and, later, the Production Code Administration?
7. How do the film industry’s responses to censorship and regulation efforts amount to
political considerations?
8. Which American political party does Hollywood tend to favor and why?
9. Why do actors and politicians, movies and politics, occasionally overlap?
10. Explain the significance of, and the logic to, these two Supreme Court decisions:
Mutual Film Corporation v. Ohio Industrial Commission and Citizens United v.
Federal Election Commission.
Assignments for Chapter 3:
1. Create a timeline of the events leading to the creation and later enforcement of the
Production Code, citing specific movies that represent each point in the chronology.
For example: The Birth of Nation exemplifies a film that incited early city and state
bans while Baby Face illustrates prostitution during pre-Code Hollywood, when the
Code was in existence but not effectively enforced. Different students or small groups
of students should be responsible for researching the films selected for the timeline
and presenting/screening to the rest of the class what they determine are the
objectionable or defining moments.
2. Compare and contrast a PG-rated popular film from the 1970s with one from today
regarding use of language, nudity, violence, and sexuality. How did films like these
lead to the creation of the PG-13 rating? For example Jaws (1976) or The Bad News
Bears (1976) vs. Alexander and the Terrible, Horrible, No Good, Very Bad Day
(2014). Or compare/contrast The Bad News Bears of 1976 to the remake of 2005, or
the original Star Wars (1977) with a PG rating to Star Wars: Revenge of the Sith
(2005) rated PG-13. What can we learn about each decade’s social values and
Hollywood’s (or CARA’s) perception of them in the contrast between 1970s and
2000s regarding the ratings system?
3. Small Group Task: Pick a rating (G, PG, PG-13, R) and write a list of at least 5
behaviors, images, ideas we would never see in a film with that rating.
Take that list and adjust it for a different rating. For example, if you put “swearing” on
a list for the PG-13 rating, how does that behavior change in an R-rated film?
List at least 3 things we would never see in a Hollywood film of any rating.
Free write: what values and morals do these seem to enforce? What are the political
implications of these restrictions and categories?
4. Put the following images in to a history of censorship and regulation, especially as
regards gender. Why are images of women so dominant in the history of the
Production Code?
http://ladailymirror.com/2013/11/04/mary-
mallory-hollywood-heights-mdash-a-l-whitey-
schafer-simplifies-portraits/
http://www.pictureshowman.com/a
rticles_genhist_censorship.cfm
