film certificate

Certificate of Film

what does the certificate mean?

The certificate for a film basically means an age requirement to watch and buy the film. It also gives an indication to the audience of what the film may include to check it is suitable for the audience members. For example, if a child who is 12 years old, wants to buy a film that is certificated 15, the film seller wouldn't be allowed to sell the child the film without a parent present who gives consent. Also a parent would be able to check to see if the film is suitable for their child to watch by looking at the age certificate.

What certificate 15 involves

Many horror films are rated 15. This is because many horror films involve scary, gory and gruesome scenes that may frighten or upset viewers, especially if they are younger than 15. Other certificates were considered. 12a would extend the audience size, but may result in a few audience members having a negative reaction to the film, and we could be accused of choosing an unsuitable age certificate. This certificate was also eliminated as in our film, we hope to use disturbing scenes, that may involve violence and also scenes that would scare the audience. Another age certificate that we considered was 18. This would ensure that the majority of the audience would be content with the scenes included in our film. However, it limits and reduces the number of audience members who is able to watch it.

Films of this age certificate may include:

·         strong violence

·         frequent strong language

·         portrayals of sexual activity

·         strong verbal references to sex

·         sexual nudity

·         brief scenes of sexual violence or verbal references to sexual violence

·         discriminatory language or behaviour

·         drug taking

Why this certificate for our film

We plan to include frightening scenes and disturbing effects in our film. Some of the things we intend to use, members of the audience who are under the age of 15 may find upsetting and disturbing. If we choose to extend the distressing and unsettling, the film certificate that we have chosen will not restrict anything we would like to include. This could be, for example, more violence and gore, in our scenes and this also means it would be suitable still for the target audience, which is 15 up to about the age of 24.