Note: This review was originally posted to my Epinions account.
How do I write a review of a movie when I can’t even mention the title? I
recall having a similar situation on a few occasions, such as with
Princess Mononoke, where I couldn’t mention a character’s name due to a
similarity to a banned word. Here, the word in question is the title and
we’re talking about the king of all bad words.
Growing up, I
simply didn’t use it. There was some great taboo, as if by saying it, I
was committing some great crime. Now that I’m a little more accustomed
to saying it, I’d love to be able to say it in this review. Not only is
it the title, but it’s such a great word. (The irony is that the full
word is listed in the database, but I can’t use it in the actual
review.)
I rented F**k from NetFlix after seeing This Film is Not Yet Rated. (I have yet to review it, but I plan to soon.) Both focus
on society’s standards. This Film is Not Yet Rated deals with motion
pictures and language/imagery in general. Fuck deals with one particular
word and a single-finger gesture that’s generally associated with it,
albeit only briefly.
The movie goes into a lot of different
areas, such as the origin of the word and the various usages. For
instance, George Carlin and his Seven Words You Can Never Say on
Television came up. That led to Lenny Bruce, Howard Stern and the FCC’s
censorship of the word. Does the word fall under freedom of speech?
No one’s really sure where the word came from, but many people in the
movie point out that pretty much all of the acronym theories are wrong.
It probably comes from some word from before English even existed and
probably always had to do with sexual intercourse.
The movie
also touches on how fuck is seen as low class and vulgar. It’s
definitely not appropriate for TV and radio. As Billy Connolly said,
everyone knows what fuck off means, and it means more than just ‘get
lost’. There is a strong emotional impact to the word. I suppose if we
remove the meaning from the word, somehow, then some other word will
take it’s place. We do need that outlet.
There are interviews
with Ron Jeremy, Pat Boone, Ice-T and Drew Carey among others. Each
person had something to say about the word. As you can imagine, the word
was used a lot in the movie. (Some people used it more than others, but
I’d imagine that the total count is through the roof.)
The
only problem I had with the wide range of areas covered was that the
movie didn’t cover any one area that well. The movie was only 93 minutes
and could have gone in to a little more depth. Then again, I really
don’t know what to expect. It was still a well-made movie.
I
wouldn’t recommend buying it. The movie has very little replay value
except maybe to watch with friends. I’d recommend renting it, instead. I
might even recommend the movie to my mother if I can just bring myself
to say the title in front of her.
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