New Censor outlines his views on films

Press, 3 September 1977, Page 4

New Censor outlines his views on films

PA Wellington Film censorship is necessary to make sure films are not too unrealistic in New Zealand terms, says the new Chief Film Censor (Mr B. C. Tunnicliffe). “Many films coming into this country show styles of life, patterns of behaviour, and attitudes which are not always in accord with the same things here in New Zealand,” he said in an interview. “At the moment, we are going through a number of American films in which the whole idea is that everything must get smashed up. Trucks, cars and buildings get written off by the score. This is something we have to look at from the point of view of what is reality in this country.” Mr Tunnifcliffe was speaking after the announcement of his successful appeal against the appointment of an Auckland teacher, Mr P. J. McHale, as Chief Censor. Mr Tunnicliffe, who is 53, has been Assistant Chief Censor since 1959. He was born in Hawke’s Bay, educated at Rotorua High School, and served two years with the Navy during World War 11. Since new legislation came into force on April 1, the proportion of films he had cut had fallen from one-third to onetwentieth. Sixty per cent of the cuts were violence and 40 per cent sex, said Mr Tunnicliffe. “The new legislation tells us to look for what is good in a film, whereas the old law made us look

for what was bad. This has enabled us to take a more positive line. “There is some evidence that films do have some effect on people, but there are obviously many other factors involved. “The public will accept so much violence because it is a part of our life today, but they will only stand for a certain amount. Sometimes it gets to the stage of sadism, which may be reality for some people, but is it in New Zealand?” He considered films had improved technically in recent years and were being made more about controversial social issues. “There has been a greater accent on reality, but I am not certain whether this has always been acceptable to a large section of the public, and in some cases it has acted to the detriment of the film. “The use of language in films, for example, has been accepted when it is necessary for the story, but in many cases in fact it has been gimmicked in and the constant repetition has acted against the film itself.” There was a world-wide trend away from general entertainment films such as “The Deep” and “A Bridge Too Far,” he said. “What I would like to see is a greater range of films catering for a wider age group. But I have been looking at a list of films now showing in London, for example, and 80 or 90 per cent of them are X-rated or Rl4. It is not peculiar to New Zealand.

“It is perhaps wrong to compare us with other

countries. We do have quite different attitudes and what may be acceptable overseas is not necessarily acceptable here, and vice versa. So we are in fact just making our decisions in relation to New Zealand Audiences." said Mr Tunnicliffe. He emphasised that his decisions depended very much on assessing public opinion, which he did when he was invited to speak to service clubs and the like. He also invited a crosssection of people and specialists in to view a film which he was finding difficult to classify. Sometimes he invited groups of school-children to help him assess a film's effects on children. “Every country that I know of has some form of censorship,” he said. “Even in Scandanavia they classify films by age group.” . Increasingly, he was giving other information apart from the classification, such as warnings about language or “sensurround.” But these warnings could not be given too often or they would lose their effect. The new law also allowed him to classify a film as "Reserved for Film Festivals” (R.F.F.), meaning the film could not be shown for more than two days at any dne festival.

This had been designed to allow festivals to pay less than commercial cinemas, but, Mr Tunnicliffe said this would have to be amended for next year so that there was an age classification as well.