Both Sides in Suit Over Film Ratings Scored by Judge

In what may be a Pyrrhic victory for the Motion Picture Assn. of America, a New York State Supreme Court judge Friday threw out a lawsuit brought against the MPAA by distributors of the X-rated film “Tie Me Up! Tie Me Down!”

But in ruling that the case did not belong in his courtroom, Judge Charles E. Ramos issued a 15-page opinion in which he labeled the MPAA’s ratings system as “censorship from within the industry” and urged the organization to revise its ratings system to permit a “professional basis for rating films or to cease the practice altogether.”

New York’s Supreme Court is not the state’s highest tribunal. It is instead a court of general jurisdiction.

Ramos attacked both sides in the case. He accused Miramax Films of seeking publicity by filing the suit and said the distributor and filmmaker were disingenuous in asking him to give the film an R rating when they admitted it should be seen by adults only. But he saved his strongest language for a rating system that he said did not have a viable adults-only rating.