Age Certificate - Miss B

Age Certificate

The British Board of Film Classification (BBFC) is an independent body which was originally established by the film industry in 1912. Local Authorities were made responsible for what was shown in cinemas and from early on accepted the decisions of the BBFC. There are obvious benefits to both Local Authorities and the film industry in having a central but independent body bring consistency to the classification process and accept responsibility for decisions.

Local Authorities remain legally responsible for what is shown in cinemas under the Licensing Act 2003 and can still overrule the decisions of the BBFC. This does not happen very often.

Examples where it has happened include the film Spider-man which some Local Authorities rated ‘PG’ or ‘PG12’ instead of the ‘12’ awarded by the BBFC. Westminster Council banned Crash and Camden Council gave ‘18’ certificates to The Texas Chain Saw Massacre and The Story Of O before the films were submitted to the BBFC for classification. Both were subsequently classified ‘18’ uncut.

In 1985 the BBFC became the statutory authority for classifying videos/DVDs under the Video Recordings Act 1984.

The first ‘12A’ was introduced in Spiderman, it was a argument against the BBFC amongst the parents and careers. The argument was that Spiderman was there child’s childhood super hero, and the children in this case should be allowed to watch Spiderman.  Which originally the BBFC gave a rating as ‘12’. So the BBFC introduced `12A’ which basically means that a child is allowed to go in the film if they’re supervised with an adult.

The BBFC tend to give thrillers a 15 because it usually includes strong language, and scenes of violence, which are only suitable for mature adults which is classified as 15+

In my personal opinion I will give a thriller film a classification of 15+ as well, because it may contain strong use of language which only young teenagers are the smallest possible age can visualise (15+).

 

As an overall I have learnt that a thriller films age certificate is one of the main and key things of creating g a film, it clarifies what age should be eligible to watch a film according to what sorts of scenes it has in place. So in our thriller case it taught us what age group will be most appropriate to watch our thriller.