PG Isn’t What It Used to Be

In “Spider-Man,” a goblin is impaled, a cable car full of children hangs from a bridge, and a father and a father figure die. In “Star Wars: Episode II Attack of the Clones” a mother dies in her son’s arms; a father is decapitated and his boy finds the severed head in a helmet.

Does this sound like appropriate fare for young children? To some parents, the answer is a resounding no.

“I’ve never had so many e-mails about a movie as I have about ‘Spider-Man,’” said Nell Minow, a Washington, D.C., mother whose 5-year-old Web site Moviemom offers alternative movie ratings. Her second-largest number of queries concerned “Attack of the Clones,” she said.

Part of the problem, as parents are well aware, is that “Spider-Man” and “Attack of the Clones” aren’t just movies. They’re also cultural phenomena, and the child who isn’t throwing a “Spider-Man” or “Star Wars” birthday outing will undoubtedly be invited to one. There’s no escape from avenging heroes, superpowers or the battles of other galaxies, no matter how far away.

Mark Applegate, a father of two from Torrance, said his 4-year old daughter Amanda saw commercials on television for “Spider-Man” and started begging to see it a week before it opened.

“I wasn’t sure if it was a good movie for her or not,” said Applegate, who had heard that some scenes might be too intense for children. “I said we couldn’t go, and she started crying,” he said.

Compounding the problem, some parents say, is that they can’t always trust the MPAA ratings to tell them what they need to know. A number of media critics have pointed to what they refer to as “ratings creep,” a belief that films are given less restrictive ratings than previously.

Another problem is that the MPAA offers only “opaque” explanations for the ratings, according to Minow, who has written a book on the subject. “My favorite [ratings warning] is for ‘mild thematic elements.’ I don’t know what that’s supposed to mean. You need a degree in semiotics to understand it,” Minow said.

The MPAA rates the “Star Wars” prequel PG (parental guidance suggested) for “sustained sequences of sci-fi action/violence” and “Spider-Man” PG-13 (parents strongly cautioned; some material may be inappropriate for children under 13) for “stylized violence and action.” Media critics also blame ratings creep, believed to have resulted in downgrading movies that would have formerly been R-rated to PG-13, and PG-13s to PG.

For example, “Midnight Cowboy,” which was rated X in 1969, would surely be an R-rated film today, said MPAA chief Jack Valenti.

The “Star Wars” film’s PG might not be the same sort of PG that parents recall from the earlier films, due to ratings creep, according to media critic James Steyer, author of “The Other Parent.” “For parents, it’s a big problem,” Steyer said.

Ratings creep is also evident in language, Minow said. “It’s stunning. Words that would get [a film] an automatic R now get PG-13.”

Valenti, however, said the MPAA panel that determines the ratings--a group of a dozen local private citizens who make the initial ratings, which are subject to appeal by the studios--are only trying to keep up with what is socially acceptable. “Society has changed, no question about it,” he said. “TV is the common denominator. The ratings system cannot be sterner than TV.”

Now parents complain they don’t know what they’ll find in a PG-13 movie. “PG-13 encompasses so much,” said Julie Shy of Calabasas. “It’s hard to find places to go to find out why it’s a PG-13.” To help them decide whether to take their 9-year-old son to see “Spider-Man,” she and her husband turned to a comic-book store owner in Fillmore. He advised them the movie was a cross between the “squeaky-clean” old Superman type of movie and the darker “Batman.” They let him go.

Parents familiar with the “Star Wars” series said they were fairly certain about what sort of violence they would find in the latest installment. But Laura Nuchols of Torrance, who took her children, ages 10, 8 and 6, to “Star Wars,” said she was surprised to see the decapitation. What bothered her about it was not so much the violence as its unreality. “It’s too sanitary. It makes it look really neat, fantasy-like,” she said.

Ironically, it was the very bloodlessness of the violence that undoubtedly saved it from a PG-13 rating. “In all the ‘Star Wars’ movies, there’s a lot of chopping going on,” said Jim Ward, vice president of marketing for Lucasfilm, which produces the series. “We’ve had limbs chopped off. In the last film, Darth Maul was cut in half. Yet it all exists within this fantasy world of ‘Star Wars.’

“It’s far from us to say whether it’s appropriate for kids. At the end of the day, parents know their kids the best. Every child is different. As the PG rating suggests, every parent makes the judgment whether it’s appropriate or not,” he said. “It comes down to parents knowing their children and making the best judgment.”

Steve Elzer, a spokesman for Columbia Pictures, which released “Spider-Man,” said the studio wouldn’t comment on the rating for the film. “The MPAA rating is a guideline for parents and consumers, and they are the appropriate organization to discuss the rating that any film receives.”

Valenti reiterated the studios’ stance that the ratings are guidelines, not strict regulations.

“In all of our definitions for PG-13, we say, ‘Do not take your young child to this picture.’ Only the parent knows the maturity resident in their child. They should read Parents magazine, talk to friends, read reviews,” he said. He said MPAA surveys show parents are happy with the ratings system. “I get a lot of criticism from producers, distributors, critics, directors, writers. The people for whom it is designed seem to find it a pretty good compass course for them to steer by,” he said.

Minow and other critics, however, think there’s a need for change.

“The MPAA has no special expertise. They see so much of this material, they have honestly lost touch with the rest of what America thinks,” she said. “They have become desensitized.”

Last year, a move to seek congressional support for a single content-based ratings system for all media was derailed by the September terrorist attacks, according to Douglas Gentile, director of research for the National Institute on Media and the Family. Parents do like ratings, he said. “But they would like better ratings even better.”

Meanwhile, Applegate said Amanda is still upset that they haven’t seen “Spider-Man.”

“I’ve been making excuses. I tell her we’ll see it another time. Or that it’s too late,” he said.

“Then I remind her that we’re going to see ‘Scooby Doo’ when it comes out.”