The BBFC is a British non-profit organization established in 1912 to provide age classifications for films and videos shown in UK cinemas and sold on DVDs/videos. They assign ratings of U, PG, 12A, 12, 15, and 18 based on the level of violence, language, sexual content and other factors. The document discusses the criteria for each rating in detail. For their new film project, the document's author determines that a 15 rating is most suitable due to scenes of strong violence, the depiction of a deteriorating psychological state, and frequent strong language.

1. BBFC
THE BRITISH BOARD OF FILM CLASSIFICATION

2. What is the BBFC
The BBFC is a British based non-profit organisation
that gives age classifications for film and video
products. They were set up in 1912 by the film
industry in the hope that it would bring uniformity to
the classifications of films nationally.

3. The classifications and why they would
be applied to a film.
The U stands for universal and is
suitable for children ages 4+. Films in
this category are extremely mild in
respect to bad language, sexual
content, violence etc. These films are
all about promoting positive messages
to young children.
PG stands for parental guidance and should
be made suitable for children 8+. Like the U
classification these films must not promote illegal
or anti-social behaviours like bullying, drugs etc.
Light sexual innuendos are allowed if used with
comedy or are unlikely to be understood by a
younger audience.
12A means that the movie can be seen
by anyone 12 or more years old
unaccompanied. The ‘A’ stands for
‘advisory’ and ‘accompanied’. Children
under 12 years of age can see the film if
they are accompanied by an adult. These
movies will be made with a young teen
audience in mind and so there can be
lightly more risky contents.
12 is exactly the same to 12A in what age restriction
it has, what films are allowed to have this certificate
and how much violence, profanity, sex etc. it can
contain. The difference is that the 12 certificate is
just for videos, DVD’s and Blu-rays, whereas 12A is
for films at the cinema only.

4. The classifications and why they would
be applied to a film. (continued)
The 15 certificate means that If you are under the age of 15 you cannot watch this product at the cinema,
purchase it on DVD or video and that it isn’t suitable for children under the age of 15. A 15 certificate movie
is likely to be much stronger than movies with the 12/12A rating. This is because they may contain: strong
violence, frequent strong language (eg 'f***'), portrayals of sexual activity, strong verbal references to sex,
sexual nudity, brief scenes of sexual violence or verbal references to sexual violence, discriminatory
language or behaviour and drug taking (however drug taking cannot be encouraged).
If a film has this certificate it means that no one under the age of 18 can view it. These films are for
adults and are never suitable for children. very strong violence. Films like this can contain things like:
frequent strong language (eg 'f***') and/or very strong language (eg ‘c***’), strong portrayals of
sexual activity, scenes of sexual violence, strong horror, strong blood and gore, real sex (in some
circumstances) and discriminatory language and behaviour.
(There is also a R18 certificate for films, however this is a rating that would never be suitable for the film we are making
and so I didn’t think it necessary to include it in this powerpoint.)

5. The rating that we have chosen for our
film
We have decided that the 15 age rating is the most suitable for the type of film that we wish to
create an opening for. This is firstly because there we intend for the movie to contain various scenes
of strong violence which wouldn’t be suitable for a 12 certificate. Much of this violence will not likely
be shown on screen however the bodies of the victims and their injuries will most likely need to be
shown to help show the development of the investigation done by the authorities as the storyline
progresses. The second reason is that although the horror genre, the thriller sub genre that we are
pursuing, is allowed in a 12/12A rated film, the guidelines for this rating state that disturbing
psychological threat sequences cannot be frequent or sustained. This statement means that this
rating isn’t suitable for our film as half our film will be a documentation of how the murderer’s
psychological state is deteriorating from the social norm to completely insane. Thirdly this film
belongs with this certificate as there will be frequent, uncensored strong language throughout the
film, most likely originating from the authorities out of frustration or the victims through fear.
However there will be no very strong language that would make it more attributed to the 18
certificate. Despite these three reasons I did thoroughly consider whether or not this film could have
the 12/12A restriction due to its lack of any sexual references or drug use, however I decided that the
reasons stated above mean that the movie belongs in this certificate.

6. Source of information
The information that I used to create this PowerPoint was compiled from the website
‘www.bbfc.co.uk’ and so is credible and reliable, however I only used this site as a source of
reference, nothing was copied in identical wording.