To understand violence in film it is first wise to understand the MPAA. Founded in 1922, The Motion Picture Association of America's home page on the World Wide Web explains it like this, "we are the trade association of the American film industry whom have broadened it's mandate over the years to reflect the diversity of an expanding industry." So in short, they say what can be put into a film and what cannot. It was not however until the late sixties that they st

The same is true about rape scenes in films. In 1977 John Badham released his gritty look at the New York disco scene, Saturday Night Fever. The film has a brutal rape scene, and despite the success of the film was still attacked by some womans groups. Again, why deny the truth about rape. It is brutal and it is ugly, the film did it's job.

We know however that war is violent, so what other genres need to include such violent subject matter? I like to look at violence as three separate categories.

We have seen violence in cinema create all types of reactions from people; tough criticism, assassination attempts, and claims of demonic possession. There is something else that these films have in common besides the violence though. They are of course all GREAT films. All of these filmmakers set out to make a film that for the most part tells the truth, whether it be about war, street life, or demonic possession for that matter. The truth sometimes hurts, and as long as there are filmmakers and film to use, there will be things about the films they make that people won't like. People will always have there opinion and they are entitled to that opinion, but like the old wise man once said, "opinions are like assh*&%$, everyone's got one.

Scorsese is a master of showing the realities of street life. Two of his films stand out in the seventies that took the viewer on a seedy side of life that actually exists. Mean Streets is a look at the survival of a few friends who have grown up in the inner-city. Taxi Driver is a look at the life of an out of touch taxi driver with a flair for rigging hidden guns. The ending of this particular film is extremely violent, however the film would of not been what it is without it. Not the same impact. Later in 1980, the President of the United States of America was mortally shot by a man. John Hinckley stated that he had watched Taxi Driver, and wanting to impress the young co-star, Jodi Foster, he decided to kill the president. When the case went to trail the lawyers played the film over and over for the jury. In Mary Pat Kelly's book, Martin Scorsese A Journey, Scorsese states, "Showing the movie in court is unfair. It's like the end of Fahrenheit 451, where the guy is chased,!

2. Realistic Violence- basically anything that can realistically happen to you or I. Rape, murder, mugging, beating, etc.....

American cities were also the subject of many films that portrayed violence, after all where is most of the violence played out. Dirty Harry in 1971 showed the harsh realities of a police officers life in San Fransisco. It also showed that a cop can go bey

Some common words found in the essay are:
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Approximate Pages = 7 (250 words per page double spaced)