Film filters are a needed step

If possession is nine-tenths of the law, who owns "Manhattan," "Chicago" and "Paris, Texas"? That is the crux of the brouhaha brewing among filmmakers, consumers and Congress. Movie filters, devices that don't alter content, have already gained the backing of Congress and the president. On Wednesday, President Bush signed a bill giving legal protection to film filter firms like ClearPlay in Utah.

It's the splicers and dicers who are taking the heat for mutilating the work of others.

The dilemma sets up like this. When you buy the DVD, it's yours. Bend, fold and mutilate it. You can fry it up for breakfast. The rub comes if you make money off any changes you make to its content. That's messing with someone else's "intellectual property."

CleanFlicks, CleanFilms and other cinema sanitizers say they have a right to tinker with the possessions of consumers. Movie directors, actors, producers and writers say that twisting the content and selling it is a form of vandalism.

In short, the plot is thicker than a Clancy thriller.

From where we sit, the "property" argument is the only one that holds any water. When moviemakers cry foul because their "artistic creation" has been mutilated, the notion doesn't hold. Television constantly takes theatrical films and edits out strong language and nude scenes to make the films palatable to families. Airlines do the same. Film industry "artistic integrity" tends to go south quickly when big money is concerned.

It's the intellectual property argument that is the sticking point. Still, however the issue is eventually resolved, one thing has become clear. Hollywood has lined up on the unsavory side of the debate. In the name of monetary gain, Tinseltown has been forced to defend some incredibly distressing movie scenes depicting sadism, masochism, abuse, gore, racism, rape, incest and drug abuse. The industry's position might be more sympathetic if it were defending, say, the fact Judy Garland's slippers in "The Wizard of Oz" must be "red" (never mind they were silver in the book), but when Hollywood, to line its pockets, bans parents from editing out the male rape scene from "Deliverance," they are no longer working on the side of the angels.

Fortunately, members of Congress do not have to answer to the directors guild. They must answer to all those mothers and fathers in the heart of the country. Hollywood currently is putting the heat on CleanFlicks and other movie editing companies. If mainstream citizens put a little heat on Congress, Hollywood's clout may turn out to have less substance than tinsel.