MovieChat Forums > Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom (1984) Discussion > The PG-13 rating isn't necessary

The PG-13 rating isn't necessary

posted 6 years ago by TheHungryHippo (821)
19 replies | jump to latest

It's quite simple: PG = PARENTAL GUIDANCE SUGGESTED, translation: THERE ARE THINGS IN THIS FILM THAT PARENTS MIGHT NOT WANT THEIR CHILDREN TO WATCH!!! This really isn't hard at all. Temple of Doom fit the criteria of the PG rating as did Jaws and Raiders and ET. The PG-13 rating is redundant and pointless. That and it intended up having some unintended consequences, it was designed to allow a PG film to get away with a little bit more without becoming R but it ended up being used to dumb down R rated films.

[–] Master (1494) 6 years ago

yeah that's awful

[–] TheHungryHippo (821) 6 years ago

We only need 4 ratings (and I'm just naming films that I know of):

- G (It Happened One Night, Planet of the Apes, 2001 A Space Odyssey, Despicable Me, your typical Disney/Pixar film) - This doesn't mean it's 100% clean, it just means there isn't anything too objectionable that should warrant parent supervision
- PG (Jaws, James Bond, Indiana Jones, The Dark Knight, Harry Potter, Lord of the Rings, Home Alone, Star Wars)
- R (The Terminator, Rambo, The Godfather, Goodfellas, Scarface, Pulp Fiction, Taxi Driver, One Flew Over The Cuckoo's Nest)
- X (The Wolf of Wall Street, Boogie Nights, Cannibal Holocaust, A Clockwork Orange, Human Centipede II and III, porn)

[–] [deleted] 5 years ago

What about British ratings? Or those of other countries, for that matter?

[–] [deleted] 5 years ago

whats the difference between R & X ?
we dont have that in the uk , just a "18"

[–] Karl Aksel (1498) 5 years ago

So what makes the PG-13 rating unnecessary? You never say. I think it's fine: PG, ok for children to watch (parents' discretion). PG-13, perhaps not the youngest kids. It was not intended to let a PG rated movie get away with more, because the PG rating is still there. If anything, just the opposite: it now took less for a movie to be given a higher rating. And how do you figure R-rated movies being dumbed down as a consequence? That doesn't make any sense at all. Again, if anything, it would have the exact opposite effect: you could now have movies given a PG-13 rating instead of an R-rating, meaning R-ratings would be given to even harder movies.

[–] MovieChatUser497 (18943) 5 years ago

PG covers what today is classified as PG-13. Parental Guidance Suggested isn't that hard to understand. It means the film has things that small children probably shouldn't be seeing. Parents are just stupid.

As for R-rated films being dumbed down just look at some of the recent Terminator and Robocop films. In today's society PG-13 sells more tickets and these films are being neutered as a result

[–] Starman (412) 5 years ago

All ratings are a form of fear and opression coming out of the sense of lack within us.

All people are different, all children are different with different ancestral traumas.

Interesting, how this is the only Indiana Jones film that tends to be the most relatable to little children, at least in my experience, stories of sacrifices or witches eating little children have been in old literary Soviet fairytales I grew up on as well, children were meant to be scared, not to be sheltered from our natural emotions, however everyone has different traumas, thus then different levels of sensitivity.

[–] TandyMan (11355) 5 years ago

It was the occult imagery, right? Was the problem? I read something about it a long time ago. Anyhow, PG13 definitely destroyed mature cinema. Real damn shame.

[–] MonStar (13552) 5 years ago

For this film, PG-13 tells parents that maybe they don't want their 10-year-old to see the high priest pull a beating heart out of a live man. PG tells them that some other film's somewhat violent content and coarse language might be too much for a 5-year-old.

[–] MovieChatUser497 (18943) 5 years ago

PG means there may be scenes like a guys heart being ripped out that may be too intense for small children (as was printed on the back of the VHS box)

[–] Kowalski (79156) 5 years ago

WITHOUT THE PG-13 MANY FILMS FELL INTO A HOLE.THEY WERENT FAMILY FILMS BUT THEY WERENT STRICTLY ADULTS ONLY FARE EITHER..

[–] BillySlater (4285) 5 years ago

Alot of PG rated films prior to 1984 weren´t "family films" either. I think the PG-13 rating was simply a way to appease stupid people that complained about Temple of Doom. Parental guidance will always come down to the discretion of the parents. So in that respect, it is a redundant rating.

[–] BillySlater (4285) 5 years ago

Anything below the restricted categories are redundant. So in that sense, I agree. Only thing I disagree with is the softening of R rated films. I think that is more a result of studios wanting to make more money than the fault of the classification system.

[–] spurtle467 (1558) 5 years ago

Despite this one's reputation, I always thought Raiders was darker with scarier imagery. It has people getting shot in the head, some guy is impaled by spikes, another is killed with a plane propeller, there are scary close up images of corpses/skeletons, the monkey is poisoned to death, and of course the end scene where people's faces melt and explode. I know this has the "heart scene" and deals with the occult but I think the tone is lessened by all the children and some of the goofy humour with the sidekick characters.