Who rates the movies? Alberta Film Ratings!

[Thorin]

My son went to Transformers 2 last night with a birthday party group, and came home today telling me that there's a lot of sexual humour in it.  That prompted me to look up the rating, as my daughter wants to watch it.

Looking on the official website, I learn that it's rated PG-13.  Looking on IMDB it has lots of different ratings for different countries, and that for Canada (Alberta/British Columbia) it's rated 14A.

Wait.  14A?  What's that now?

Wikipedia to the rescue!  Turns out movies in Alberta are rated by the Alberta Film Classification department of the Government of Alberta, more commonly referred to as Alberta Film Ratings.

The way Alberta Film Ratings works is they assign a film a G, PG, 14A, 18A, R, or A rating, and then include up to 16 "advisories".  Anyone can view a G and PG rated movie.  14A and 18A require an adult to accompany anyone under 14 or 18 (and it's up to the theater to check ID).  R and A ratings are only allowed to be shown to adults (and it's up to the theater to keep the kids out).

What this tells me is that the ratings have more to do with setting a minimum age limit for un-chaperoned viewing, while the real information is in the advisories.

Sure enough, the theater (according to edmoviguide.com) says Transformers 2 is 14A (with no explanation why) while Alberta Film Ratings says it's PG but with the following advisories: Violence, Crude Content, Not Recommended For Young Children.  Guess which one I found more informative as a rating?

Anyway, I learned today that there is no such thing as a PG-13 rating in Alberta (or even Canada).

I also learned that Saving Private Ryan was rated as 14A (in Alberta) with one advisory: Graphic War Violence.  I'm surprised at that rating...  I would have expected an 18A rating, more inline with the USA's R rating.

[Lazybones]

The US ratings are Wildly all over the map historicaly. I prefer knowing the content over just locking out the age.

Think about it 14A requires an adult up to 15 year oldsters which are a year away from driving.

[Darren Dirt]

"There Will Be Blood" was slow-paced and with "mature" themes, but not much "R-Rating" content (i.e. very little swearing or violence, no boobies)

and yet "Tropic Thunder" was very much full of "R-Rating" content, yet as far as I know it was "PG-13" (i.e. 14A)... wtF...

[Thorin]

"There Will Be Blood" was slow-paced and with "mature" themes, but not much "R-Rating" content (i.e. very little swearing or violence, no boobies)

and yet "Tropic Thunder" was very much full of "R-Rating" content, yet as far as I know it was "PG-13" (i.e. 14A)... wtF...

As per Alberta Film Ratings:

There Will Be Blood: PG (Violence, Not Recommended For Young Children)
Tropic Thunder: 14A (Coarse Language, Crude Content)

I think I'd agree with the rating for Tropic Thunder; I can't comment on There Will Be Blood, as I haven't seen it.  (for those reading this thread, both films got R ratings in the US)

As for "R" rating, are you referring to the American R rating (as defined by the MPAA) or the Albertan R rating (as defined by Alberta Film Ratings)?  Because they have different standards.  The American R is like the Albertan 18A, while the American NC-17 is like the Albertan R.  I think that if you start looking at the Albertan ratings, you might find they represent your views and outlook better.  Also, movies in Alberta are actually marked as per Alberta's ratings, not as per America's ratings...  So whether a 12 year old kid is allowed to see There Will Be Blood or not has nothing to do with the MPAA giving it an R rating.

The US ratings are Wildly all over the map historicaly. I prefer knowing the content over just locking out the age.

Think about it 14A requires an adult up to 15 year oldsters which are a year away from driving.

I agree with you that I prefer to know the content - I like the advisories as they give some explanation as to why the movie received its rating.  I've noticed there are a lot of parents that just don't even bother looking at ratings, though.  They're just happy when the kids aren't pestering them.

14A requires an adult if the child is under 13, so once they're 14 they can see that movie without an adult.

[Darren Dirt]

"There Will Be Blood" was slow-paced and with "mature" themes, but not much "R-Rating" content (i.e. very little swearing or violence, no boobies)

and yet "Tropic Thunder" was very much full of "R-Rating" content, yet as far as I know it was "PG-13" (i.e. 14A)... wtF...

As per Alberta Film Ratings:

There Will Be Blood: PG (Violence, Not Recommended For Young Children)
Tropic Thunder: 14A (Coarse Language, Crude Content)

I think I'd agree with the rating for Tropic Thunder; I can't comment on There Will Be Blood, as I haven't seen it.  (for those reading this thread, both films got R ratings in the US)

Aha! That's what confused me.

I have the DVD for TWBB and just looked and yes it is "PG"... But it almost makes sense why it was "R" in the US since it is really not a "kids" movie, not even a "teenager" movie (unless the teenager is deep thinking and into Paul Thomas Anderson slow-paced epics...) so I guess based on the commercials on the US TV channels and on the Internet Tubes I presumed it was "R" in Canada too, but I would rather share that movie experience with my 13 year old son than the often-times overly-crude TT (which I laughed out loud countless times, btw, not like I only laugh at 'sophistimicated' humour, just a few of Jack Black's lines were completely unnecessary i.e. embarrassing to watch...)


:sigh: such confusing times, I wonder if it was better/simpler for parents back when it was either "PG-or-R", so movies [with boobies!] like "Trading Places" were silly enough to be a "hard PG" and not quite crude enough to be even a "soft R"

[Thorin]

Err...  Just to make it more confusing, the rating on the DVD comes from the Canadian Home Video Rating System, which is similar to but not the same as the Alberta Film Rating service.  Movies to be shown in theaters are assessed and rated by each province, while movies intended for home consumption (DVD, Blu-Ray, HD-DVD, Laser Disc, VHS, Beta) are rated by averaging the provincial ratings and applying the closest rating.  Thus, if a movie is rated 18A by two provinces but PG by the other 8, then it will get a PG rating for the home video.

Most of the time the theater and home video ratings will match, but at times they will not.

[Darren Dirt]

@%&# it, I give up 

[Lazybones]

Most of the time the theater and home video ratings will match, but at times they will not.

Well more often then not these days the DVDs contain EXTRA content, or the "Unrated" cut of the movie.

[Thorin]

That content's not rated.  The only content that is rated is the original movie as it was shown in the theaters, and then only by averaging all the provinces' ratings.

@%&# it, I give up  

Yeah, I wish they would just have one national rating system for all movies shown in all provinces, whether in theaters or at home.

By the way, separately from all that there's also TV ratings:

Canadian broadcasters are required to provide a rating for certain types of programming; some types of information and non-fiction programming are exempt from classification.  Even if a Canadian station is airing an American or other foreign program, it must put a Canadian rating on the show.

But not all broadcasters in Canada use the same classification system.  Different broadcasters use different classification systems depending on what type of station they are and in which language they broadcast.

   * English and third-language conventional and specialty broadcasters use AGVOT?s classification system
   * French-language broadcasters use the classification system of the R?gie du cin?ma du Qu?bec, which is Qu?bec?s provincial film board
   * Pay, pay-per-view and video-on-demand services use the classification system of the provincial film board in their home province
   * American stations that are directly available in Canada use the United States TV Parental Guidelines; other foreign stations directly available in Canada use their home countries? rating systems, where such systems exist

I've seen this where on one channel The Simpsons is rated PG and viewable on my partially-blocked TV, while on another channel the same episode is 18+ rated and not viewable without an unlock code.

[Darren Dirt]

[Mr. Analog]

All these various rating systems and yet when I went there was at least 5 children under the age of 10, much to my surprise.

It was a pretty bloody, noisy, scary and innuendo filled movie, I wouldn't take a 10 year old there unless I knew they could handle it first.

It was ok, but I still prefer the original animated film.

[Thorin]

I haven't seen it yet, but I don't think Transformers 2 is a PG film.  But then, was Back To The Future PG, what with all its swearing?

"bloody, noisy, scary and innuendo filled" is pretty much what I was expecting after reading the advisories from Alberta Film Ratings: "Violence, Crude Content, Not Recommended For Young Children".

All these various rating systems and yet when I went there was at least 5 children under the age of 10, much to my surprise.

[..] I wouldn't take a 10 year old there unless I knew they could handle it first.

Well, some parents are selective to the extreme what their kids watch, others are just happy to get some peace and quiet.  If Alberta Film Ratings had at least classified it a 14A movie, then those parents would've been required to watch the movie with their kids, or at least arrange for some other adult to accompany the kids.

For the record, I'm the kind of parent that would probably not take little kids there - although my 9 year old wants to see it now that my 12 year old has seen it.  But I tend to talk to my kids about what they're going to see/what they've seen on the screen, to try and help them make sense of it and understand it.

[Lazybones]

Transformers Contains:
- clothed collage girl trying to aggressively kiss / mount a main character
- lots of occupied military and civilian vehicles being destroyed and the talk of deaths
- shouting, don't recall swearing much but I sort of tune that out naturally.
- character getting high on special brownies.

[Mr. Analog]

In retrospect it was better than the first film but it's still VERY SILLY.

In a decade the animated film will still be more fondly remembered I'm sure.

[Melbosa]

My opinion of the films are very different than Mr. Analogs.  I put the movies in my top movies list.  I completely enjoyed them from beginning to end, although I do agree that the second is definately not a kids movie.

I can't wait for the third!