| · Sex/Nudity: people’s bare buttocks; a man has an erection (while clothed); sexual conversation, comments and innuendo; sexual touching and gestures; scantily-clad women
· Drugs/Alcohol: people smoke cigarettes and marijuana
· Violence/Scariness: slapstick violence includes people fighting, being beaten up; gunplay, threats with knives, people being shot with tranquilizer darts and an explosion
· Objectionable Words/Phrases: well over 350
– Taken from the Rogers Video Parents’ Guide for Jay and Silent Bob Strike Back
As you walk through Rogers Video with a potential rental in your hand, it’s possible that you could flip the box over and read a warning much like the one above. You might wonder: does somebody actually have to sit there and add all that stuff up? The answer is yes. His name is Michael Seidelman.
His official title is "interactive marketing assistant," (though he would be just as happy with "movie guru") and his job makes him responsible for writing the copy that appears on all the cover boxes at Rogers Video, which includes the parents’ guides.
"I do parents guides for the biggest titles, the ones that are going to have the biggest audiences," says the 27-year old Seidelman, who watches one to two movies a night. "It sounds a little ridiculous, but we want to be really broad so parents get the whole view of what could be in the movie…."
It is a meticulous duty which completely suits his personality. His love of movies and his interest in the film industry make this job a perfect fit for Seidelman. Admittedly, having a job where you get to watch movies all the time is pretty cool, but being an interactive marketing assistant is not without its difficulties.
Take, for example, the parents’ guide for American Pie. "It’s a movie about teenagers experiencing adulthood, and trying to fit that into a parents’ guide without making the parents’ guide itself seem objectionable is kind of a challenge," says Seidelman.
On the flip side, he often encounters situations that are more entertaining than problematic.
"For the movie A Bug’s Life, there was a bee that had a sip of some alcohol and started flying around kind of like a drunk driver. We said, ‘A bee flies drunk.’" This is the kind of thing that would amuse most customers – and Seidelman says they should be amused.
"Most parents would probably laugh at that, but there could be the odd parent who really doesn’t want their kid to see cartoon characters drinking alcohol."
As far as itemizing the questionable material, the scenario is simple. "Basically I go through a movie and I have a sheet with the four categories printed on it: violence/scariness, coarse/objectionable language, sex/nudity and drugs/alcohol," explains Seidelman. "When I see something, I jot it down."
With a great love of film and that kind of research under his belt, Seidelman is an expert when it comes to the evolution of cinema’s limits. He follows court cases that deal with censorship and has borne witness to the most recent wave of shock comedy and violence in movies.
"It seems that movies throughout the years are trying to outdo each other," he says, citing movies like There’s Something About Mary and the American Pie series as examples of comedies that have content that wouldn’t have been included in mainstream films years ago.
"I remember when I was writing the American Pie 2 box about a year ago, it was probably the funniest box I had to write just because there are so many offbeat objectionable situations," he says. "You want to sum it up without sounding too ridiculous, but we want to make sure the content gets across to the customers." In the end, discretion proves to be the better part of valour, and like a true film lover, he covers the basics without spoiling the movie.
While those without children may chuckle over Seidleman’s lists, he seems happy to be doing a double service. "We are in the business of entertaining," he says, "and if our parents’ guide entertains, then that’s a bonus." |
Copyright ©2003 FFWD. All rights reserved.