Quartile rating: 7/10 · 1 rating
Kirby Dick's provocative documentary investigates the secretive and inconsistent process by which the Motion Picture Association of America (MPAA) rates films, revealing the organization's underhanded efforts to control culture. Dick questions whether certain studios get preferential treatment and exposes the discrepancies in how the MPAA views sex and violence.
Kirby Dick's documentary earns standout Novelty marks for its ingeniously self-referential conceit — hiring a private investigator to unmask the anonymous MPAA raters while simultaneously submitting the film itself to the ratings board and documenting the result. It's a genuinely one-of-a-kind structural move that mirrors its own subject. The investigative journalism content is compelling and the exposure of MPAA hypocrisy (sex vs. violence double standards, indie vs. studio disparities, the NC-17 stigma) is well-argued, earning a solid Plot score. Acting is not really applicable beyond talking-head interviews, which are engaging but unremarkable. Cinematography is functional documentary work — nothing visually distinctive. The ending, while satisfying in its meta-commentary when the MPAA rates the film NC-17, doesn't deliver a dramatic resolution since the systemic problems it exposes remain largely unchanged, landing it at average.