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Why was The Matrix rated R?
- Thread starter Cow Mengde
- Start date
OP
OP
Oh right, this was the other thing, since everything was virtual, I always assumed the people they were killing weren't real people. Now that I think about it, maybe those are real people that they're killing? I really just saw it more like a video game.
Nope, that was PG.
Since they are killings the dudes in The Matrix aren't they killing them in their pods too? Those are just guards with a job with families in the matrix right? Pretty messed up when you think of it.
Yeah that's the way it works, but like they say in the movie, every person is potentially an agent so it's not like they can just knock people out, they'll just wake up as an agent.
Yes, it is. The justification is that they're essentially dead already and could turn into agents at any moment, but yes - any operation generally results in the loss of human life which the films very much gloss over.
no
Temple of Doom was the reason PG-13 was created, but it was PG.
Yeah, I watched it recently and was surprised how mild it was compared to more recent movies. There is a lot of killing that might push it toward the upper end of PG-13, but it doesn't go near as far as other R-rated films do. It's practically a kid's movie compared to anything from Paul Verhoeven from just a few years prior.
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My first R rated movie was the Uncut version of Robocop labelled as R rated. My presception might be a bit skewered.
I've always wondered if it could have snuck into PG-13 without this one.
I only noticed this while watching the 4K version for the first time, but you can see Switch's nipples through her shirt
If it was released today, it would need only minor changes at most to easily secure a PG-13 rating. The American rating system is completely fucked right now, with PG-13 currently allowing scores of violence but very limited nudity and no more than a single f-word, the PG rating becoming the defacto kids rating, and G being rendered basically non-existent.
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I think it was the lobby scene. Nothing else was much beyond the typical PG-13 action stuff of the time.
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Oh shit, I completely forgot about this! I saw this movie and was shocked by the scene simply because of the rating. This was around the same time as The Matrix too.
I once thought it was because it was just too much for the underage mind to process.
Something like that.
...but yeah probably all those people getting shot.
Something like that.
...but yeah probably all those people getting shot.
Films rated R in the US are almost invariably rated MA15+/M15+ here, depending on whether it's a "hard R" or the rating stemmed from some sort of weird technicality (e.g. the John Wick movies are MA15+ while The Matrix is M15+ across the board).
The US really needs its own MA15+ equivalent. Studios would no longer need to um and ah over aiming for an R rating versus losing out on most of the teenage audience.
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It's really hard to justify nudity for plot reasons. I mean, you can maybe explain why you needed to show someone getting killed on screen but it's harder to explain why the audience had to see someone's junk. "Well, we feel his dick really moves the plot forward."
It was a pretty morally ambigous movie.
They were massacring people in that lobby who had no idea what was going on, basically innocent people just standing in the way of their objective without realizing it.
They were massacring people in that lobby who had no idea what was going on, basically innocent people just standing in the way of their objective without realizing it.
I'm surprised it is considered borderline for some
Beyond what was already posted, how about the scene of the baby being nourished with liquefied dead people. Or the tracking parasite getting vacuumed out of Neo. There is some very disturbing material in the Matrix
Beyond what was already posted, how about the scene of the baby being nourished with liquefied dead people. Or the tracking parasite getting vacuumed out of Neo. There is some very disturbing material in the Matrix
and also had nothing to do with Trenchcoats but I digress
About 0:40
That scene with is mouth getting "glued" was scary as fuck the first time i saw it.
I think the one f-word thing for PG-13 has been increased to two. Several movies have gotten away with two in the past 5 or so years.
Edit- actually some movies have even more than two according to this post: https://m.imdb.com/list/ls075350723/
Edit 2- okay context is important too. good article here: https://www.polygon.com/2015/10/22/9592366/The-martian-rating-fuck
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It was a 15 in the UK at release. I can remember me and my friends having to crack out the fake ID's to go see it.
As noted earlier, the bottom line reason is the MPAA is weird and inconsistent.
But overall it's got a fetish-y tone that probably set off their alarms.
I thought it was a weird rating back when it came out, though.
But overall it's got a fetish-y tone that probably set off their alarms.
I thought it was a weird rating back when it came out, though.