CLEAN FLICKS AND CLEAN FLIX

BY THE BARON OF DESERET / July 14, 2006
Opinion Piece

Once upon a time, back in February 2004, I started a weblog.

I knew that in addition to general LDS issues, I wanted to focus on movies--and to that end I created a special movie section on the site which, despite not being read by very many people has been a rewarding experience and has generally been updated consistently with two or three new articles every month. At the time, CleanFlix and other such movie cleaning services and technology were in their infancy, and I figured it would only be a matter of weeks before a comprehensive article on them would see the light of day on my new website.

Never happened... The CleanFlix blog article remained on the back-burner for the last two and a half years and has never materialized...mostly because in those two and a half years I've never once used CleanFlix, ClearPlay, or any movie editing service. Surprising, in a sense, because (a) we don't happen to watch R-rated movies, and (b) we live in Utah County where opportunities to rent edited videos are rampant. Seemed like the perfect alignment of stars to make us regular customers....

And yet, everytime I think, 'You know, it might be nice to check out "Lost in Translation" or "Sideways"' and drive by a CleanFlix, I just keep on driving, and have never really developed any serious interest in trying out edited movies. Since CleanFlix and the like have been hot discussion topics lately (see here also) I figured it's probably time I attempt to figure out why I'm not part of the edited movie craze when it seemed inevitable back in 2004.

The key issues from my perspective:

(1) Purism: As a movie purist, I want to see the real movie, not just some arbitrary subset of it. If the movie is supposed to be dark, ugly, and violent--then perhaps it should be seen in its dark, ugly, and violent fullness...or not seen at all. As a commenter in the M* thread remarked, editing movies away from their original intent is a little like buying a copy of Playboy with the pictures cut out just to read the articles. If you care about objectionable content (and I submit you should) it's probably more appropriate to just find some other movie to watch. There's plenty of clean(er) ones out there...

(2) Funding the Enemy: Buying an unedited DVD, and buying an edited DVD from a place that had to buy an unedited DVD first looks exactly the same on the movie studios' income reports. While this fact is a good argument why the studios shouldn't be complaining about edited video places as much as they have, it is also an argument why you might not want to buy edited videos in the first place. Like that pictureless copy of Playboy, you may feel morally superior for finding a way to get some value out of it without wading through the smut, but the purveyors of that smut got just as much of your money with which to line their pockets regardless. You still become one more name on the list of Playboy 'consumers' who keep them running.

If the goal is to encourage the production of better and cleaner entertainment, directly supporting the production of 'bad' forms of entertainment financially, even through a sanitizing middleman, seems to be the exact opposite of what you'd want to do...

(3) The Appearance of Evil: Suppose your bishop is having a casual conversation at a ward activity and says, "Oh, yeah--I read about that in an article in last month's Playboy..." What would your first reaction be? Does that bishop have the luxury of saying to himself: "Of course I only read the 'sanitized' version of Playboy. If everyone else ignorantly jumps to the conclusion that I read the unedited version without first finding out the facts, that's their problem..." But it's not just their problem... Appearances matter.

Many scoff at the idea of "the appearance of evil", and act as if you can take a can of Coors Light, dump it into the sink, fill it with orange juice, and then drink it in public all you like without any harm being done. ("Hey, if people ignorantly assume without finding out the truth, that's their problem...") Lack of credibility or the appearance of unworthiness can have many devastating effects on other people (and yourself), and knowing that people will jump to conclusions without all the evidence, wise people will actively avoid circumstances where they could be misunderstood. The 'truth' doesn't matter much when one or more members have already gone inactive out of disgust for the seeming low standards of their current bishop...

Likewise, if you're on a date and casually start quoting lines from "Sin City" or "Pulp Fiction"--do you have the luxury of assuming your companion won't assume you've just revealed something about your standards in entertainment? Protesting later that you had only seen the clean versions won't matter much if your potential boyfriend/girlfriend has already presumptively crossed you off of the partner suitability list in their head...

(This fact forces some people I know to speak defensively all the time--"I was watching the TV-edited version of "Braveheart" the other day...", "We rented an edited version of "Goodfellas" with all the profanity and violence removed and..." This may help avoid misunderstandings, but at the cost of sounding awkward and/or self-righteous instead.)

Basically, if you're going to maintain standards inwardly, it's frequently beneficial to make sure they are reflected outwardly as well, without attempting to be 'in' the R-rated world but not 'of' the R-rated world amongst people who might not be able to tell the difference...

(4) "Hey, they're just movies...": Both "The Baroness" and I like movies...but they're just a casual, unimportant form of entertainment.

Back in '99 (pre-CleanFlix), when I was at BYU and "The Matrix" came out, it quickly became the hot controversy around campus, with a lot of students who felt they probably shouldn't see it, but couldn't resist, simply because (a) it was supposed to be a 'light' R, and (b) it was the "It" movie of the year, which you just HAD to see if you were anyone. I never did see "The Matrix" (or its 2003 sequels) part because my standards had already been determined, and part because no movie is "must-see". Big name movies come and go every year and no movie--even "The Passion of the Christ" (also unseen by me)--is 'important' and 'life-changing' enough to be worth losing sleep over not seeing. We liked all three "Lord of the Rings" movies, but had we not seen them (as with our friends who don't watch PG-13 movies) it would be no more tragic than going through life not having read "Pride & Prejudice" or not having tasted Rocky Road ice cream. Movies just aren't that important...

This isn't to say CleanFlix and the like shouldn't exist--I think the movie studios' case against them lacks merit especially since (a) they still make the same amount of money and (b) they have little credibility from an 'artistic' standpoint since they edit movies for content on airplanes and TV all the time.

(Tangent: We saw the TV-edited version of an originally R-rated movie last year. After watching it, I glanced at some of the online articles about it, and discovered most of the discussion revolved around the full-frontal nude scene of the lead actress. This nude scene was not in the TV version of course, but more oddly, looking back, "The Baroness" and I couldn't figure out for the life of us where in the movie the scene would have been, as a nude scene from this actress's character had no relationship with anything that happened in the movie. This is significant only to show that oftentimes the R-rated material has no artistic value whatsoever, and is often completely superfluous to the underlying story...)

Due to the technicalities of copyright law, CleanFlix themselves may be in trouble, but ClearPlay seems to be completely legal, so regardless of the outcome of recent court cases there will always be some outlet for those who wish to partake of sanitized films. And yet, for all the reasons above, I don't think we'll be joining them. Edited films seem to present just as many concerns as solutions to the problem of finding clean entertainment, and for the time being it looks like my rendezvous with Scarlett Johansson and Virginia Madsen will just have to wait...

UTAH STORES ARE CLEANING UP BY EDITING SMUT FOR FILMS

BY BRADY SNYDER / Aug 2, 2001
The Deseret Morning News

Stop with the Utah County jokes already.

It seems the taste for sanitized versions of Hollywood films extends well beyond Happy Valley. Stores that rent edited PG-13- and R-rated videos are blooming in Davis County, St. George, Idaho, Arizona and -- perhaps the unlikeliest of places -- Las Vegas.

Editing scenes that include sex, violence and profanity from popular films has become such a promising venture that competition is cropping up. That doesn't surprise Ray Lines, a member of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints who began CleanFlicks Video Co-Op Club late last year.

"There's 120,000 Mormons that live in that community," Lines said of the Las Vegas success. "Not to mention the Christian community. This is not just a Mormon issue."

Since opening in Pleasant Grove, Lines has expanded to Orem and Provo. He also edits videos for franchise-type stores in Tooele, St. George, West Valley City, Las Vegas, Mesa, Ariz.; and Rexburg, Idaho.

And now a competitor has entered the field.

Earlier this month, Braxton Schenk, also a Mormon, opened Layton's Clean Cut Videos, which similarly rents edited videos to its members.

Like Lines, Schenk expects to expand mightily; he's looking into opening stores in Brigham City, North Ogden, Roy, Kaysville, Farmington and Bountiful.

"The neat thing about it is that we've rented to several families that aren't LDS at all. They have very similar beliefs in the way they don't want to watch some of that garbage that's out there," said Schenk, a Washington native. "I've been really impressed by the moral values of this area. Especially from the teenagers. We've had teenagers come in and talk their parents into buying a membership."

Amidst all the success, a backlash, or copyright lawsuit, from Hollywood studios has been absent.

Lines has been featured in a New York Times article and has appeared on NBC's Today Show. Still, despite the widespread publicity, no one has asked him to stop.

University of Utah film historian William Siska says that just because the editing is legal doesn't mean it's ethical.

"If the video stores were really guardians of morality, they would really toe the line as far as what fair business practices are," Siska said.

The stores are profiting off someone else's work, and, if not illegal, it's wrong, Siska said.

Lines and Schenk maintain they are legit since they pay retail price for every video, which, after editing, will be devoid of graphic violence, sex and profanity -- including taking the Lord's name in vain.

The pair maintain Hollywood studios benefit from their businesses since they sell R- and PG-13-rated videos that wouldn't otherwise be purchased.

Still, editing raises concerns about maintaining a filmmaker's artistic vision.

"I guess it depends on what film you're talking about," said Sharon Swenson, who teaches film history and theory at Brigham Young University.

Some films exist only to make money or entertain. Such pictures, Swenson says, would suffer little from editing.

"Now if it's art, then that's another story," she said.

But for now, without lawsuit or much complaint, the clean video stores flourish.

Schenk expects to have edited DVDs in two months, and Lines plans for 10 more Utah stores by the end of next year.