Rating Board Replies

As administrative director of the Classification and Rating Administration’s Film Rating Board, I write with the support and approval of every member of our board.

The members of the Rating Board were falsely represented by statements made by Bill Kelber as quoted in Sean Mitchell’s article on June 21 regarding the X rating.

At no time during my own Rating Board tenure, which encompassed all of Bill Kelber’s tenure, has any rater voiced the opinion that there should be “a new rating between X and R.” To the contrary, we feel individually and collectively that such a rating would be a disaster for the Rating Board, for the film industry and for the parents for whom we rate. It would invite the very censorship all of us wish to avoid by having us label films as “good adult fare” or “bad adult fare.”

We can only surmise that due to his brief, one-day-a-week tenure here, Bill completely misunderstood some of our wistful comments on those occasions when the real meaning of the X rating (simply: no children admitted) was misinterpreted by the press or by rating applicants. On such occasions it seemed to us another rating symbol to replace the X ( not in addition to the X) might be beneficial.

JOAN GRAVES

Film Rating Board

Motion Picture Assn. of America

Sherman Oaks