So there is a question that I get all of the time. I am a member of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints, and there's a misconception that I run into sometimes. I'm a film critic, and love it. It's one of my favorite things that I do. I love stories, watching, reading and telling them myself. There seems to be a misconception that LDS members are required to not watch R rated films, or higher. It's not a requirement. There is a church booklet called For The Strength of Youth that is kept and read by everyone ages 12 to 18. In it, it talks about media, and that we should seek entertainment that is pleasing, and to avoid R rated movies. After many conversations and investigations and study, there is no document or requirement to not watch R rated films. The only mention of it is in that booklet because there are things in R rated films, such as language, violence, sexual situations and nudity.
Those things are against what we believe. I completely agree with the For the Strength of Youth booklet because as children, which also includes teens, they tend to learn things fast, and get themselves into trouble. R rated movies do have characters or situations where these issues come up, but children and teenagers tend to act out what they hear and see. I know that language is impossible for children and teens to avoid, and as children, it's easy to get into habits you can't break very easily. Same with teenagers. R rated films show things that the world deems normal and acceptable, whereas we learn from the Gospel, we should not do, at any age.
So, I often get asked why I am a film critic that watches R rated movies, and don't I feel guilty for it. The short answer is, I don't. The long answer is, I wish that films didn't have content in them that makes them R rated. The rating system for film is very fickle. I have seen R rated films that are cleaner, or more wholesome than PG and PG-13 rated films. The rating system makes absolutely no sense half of the time. However, there are two examples I bring up.
Number One. I love the movie Grese. It's rated PG, although it was rated PG before the PG-13 rating, thanks to Steven Spielberg for that because of Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom, and Gremlins, and I think that Grese would now be rated PG-13. On the other hand, one of my favorite movies of all-time is The Green Mile. The Green Mile is rated R. It takes place in a prison, where a man named John Coffey, is on death row for a murder he didn't commit. As the prison guards get to know John Coffey, they witness him perform miracles, like the Tom Hanks character is sick with a terrible UTI, and John grabs his arm, and heals him. An atrocious guard that you just hate the whole film stomps on a prisoner's little pet mouse, and kills it, and John Coffey brings it back to life. However, when the execution date is set, and John Coffey is sent to the electric chair, the guard offer to help him escape and hide, but John doesn't take them up on the offer, and is executed while onlookers call him bad names and terrible things.
John Coffey's initials are J.C., just like Jesus Christ. Jesus was also on trial for crimes he didn't commit, and when he could have ran, he knew he had to suffer for everyone and had to conquer death. The film has terrible characters, bad language, and dirty discussions. The electric chair scenes are very hard to watch, however, it makes me remember Christ, and the choices he made for me to have eternal life.
Now, let's look at the PG rated Grese film. Basically, the whole show is the high school students mocking Sandy because she's a "Goodie Goodie", and they bother her enough that she changes her personal beliefs to fit in. There's a little bad language, but there is a lot of sexual conversations and songs. Given between the two films, I think The Green Mile has a better message and lessons it teaches about being a good person.
Number Two. There is a Jim Carrey film called Bruce Almighty, where he is visited by God, who Morgan Freeman plays, and Bruce gains God's powers for a couple of days. This is a fun, but sweet film. However, there is a wonderful deleted scene that I wish was left in. You need to have the DVD or Blu-Ray to see it. In the film, Bruce hears everyone's prayers, and they are driving him crazy because there are so many. He decides to answer his prayers by typing up and email that just says "Yes", and sends the "blessing" to everyone.
However, God intervenes, and shows Bruce something interesting. There is a mean, grouchy and shady car mechanic who is miserable. God tells Bruce that when this mechanic was young, he was bullied really bad, but that the bullying helped shape his life where he would become a very famous poet, and that millions would find beauty in the world because of his poems, but instead, when he asked Bruce, who was acting as God, to make him strong so that he would be able to fight off the bullies, that Bruce actually turned him into a bigger bully, and that shaped his life to become a deplorable person. Then Morgan Freeman says an amazing line. "Sometimes you need to use dark colors to paint a masterpiece."
Now, I'm not saying I am sticking up for R rated content. I'm not. I do get bothered by the content, especially sex and nudity. I try to avoid that stuff as much as possible. There are movies I choose not to review because I do my homework and know why they are rated the way they are. Life isn't always beautiful, and sometimes the film world portrays those ugly things in ways that I feel shouldn't be. However, to completely stop watching movies, just based on the R rating can sometimes inhibit me from viewing the world in a new and beautiful way, even if there is some bad language or violence. Film is art, and sometimes you come across paintings or statues in the greatest museums on earth that have nudity, sex, and especially violence. It doesn't mean we should stop going to museums altogether.
I do have to say that this blog post doesn't exactly mirror what my faith teaches us, but my faith does teach us to look for the good and beauty in the world. Not everyone is LDS like I am, but I don't judge others who aren't. My faith might tell us to be cautious of content in the entertainment we seek, but there's a huge majority of the world that doesn't have the same faith and belief system that I have, but it doesn't mean I shouldn't be friends with them. It doesn't mean that I should judge them because they don't believe the same way I do, and I would find it sad to lose great friends and great art just because of the things I believe. We are taught to love our fellow men and to love one another. I may not mimic what I watch or hear, or see all of the time, and that's why I don't feel guilty for watching films with an R rating. There are even sometimes where a film portrays something ugly or gross that reaffirms my faith. We wouldn't know holiness without knowing wickedness. There is opposition in all things, and like that quote, sometimes those dark colors I see in film are actually helping me to become a better person.
That's my answer. I know not everyone agrees with it. I do want to say, I didn't see my first R rated film until I was about 22 years old. There are other R rated films I love that I feel show the beauty of life in this world that can be ugly at times, and this post is just a very small example of others I could give. I hope that everyone who reads this post will be nice and not judge me by the way I think and feel on this matter. I can promise you that the very fact I have this blog, and a lot of it's posts come from viewpoints of things I love on this earth, and some of them include things I have learned in R rated movies. Most recently, I went to one that was violent and had some bad language, but the message that I walked away with was, love your family and freinds, no matter what, and if we are going to fight, fight with kindness. I love those things, and even though I know those things anyway, seeing them presented in a different way made me revisit those thoughts and feelings, and it was a great experience.
Well, That's all I've got for tonight. I usually go and post on Facebook when I have a new post out. I hope I am not bothering people. Especially like tonight, I released a podcast episode reviewing a film I saw earlier tonight, and that would mean two different posts to bother people. I really hope this post is read by many of you because maybe it will answer some questions about me that you might have. Anywho, I hope you are all doing well, staying safe and praying for Ukraine when you are praying for other things as well. Speaking of R rated films, what I see on CNN and MSNBC about Ukraine are worse than a rated R film because it's really happening. The evil is real, and it's very visible.
Alrighty. I hope you are all asleep and resting. I should be. It's almost 3:00 in the morning, but I have had a lot of thoughts flood my brain, and I had to write a post to help me focus and get ready for sleep. Have a good day/night!
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