I love GOING PLACES. It's a demented masterpiece for the ages. I was shocked, however, to see it only garnered an R rating back in '74 and not an X. I think if it were rereleased theatrically today, it would be an instant NC-17. Thoughts?
shareWell I watched it on a free-to-air French TV channel just two days ago and you'll be even more shocked to know that it only carried a -12 restriction... and it was shown in the peak time 8.50pm slot! By the way, I timed the duration at just over 112 minutes, which probably corresponds to the 117 minute length quoted on IMDB when converted from PAL to NTSC (using the calculation of x25/24).
I find Miou-Miou's character so funny. It's that catatonic expression on her face that does it - reminds me a bit of this emoticon:
That's insane! But...it's also France, so perhaps not so much. : )
shareOh God- that's the quickest response I've ever received on IMDB. Couldn't have been more than three minutes! I was a little surprised myself by the classification, as my impression is that France, like most of Europe, has become a lot more risk averse and culturally conservative over the last 40 years since the film was made, at least as far as television output goes. I'm not actually in France- I pick up their reception from Britain. I only ever saw this film shown once on British TV and that was probably in the late 1970's. I very much doubt it would ever be shown free-to-air in Britain again. Probably the British TV execs are just too worried about offending minority cultures, whereas French society maybe hasn't quite reached that same point yet, although it's definitely heading there.
Here's the link to the broadcast which I watched on Thursday evening:
http://www.programme-tv.net/cinema/2297909-les-valseuses/