BBFC

The BBFC is an independent, non-governmental body which has been responsible for classifying cinema films since it was set up in 1912 and videos/DVDs since the Videos Recording Act was passed in 1984. It is a non-profit organisation, and its fees are adjusted only to cover its cost. In order to preserve its independence, the BBFC never receives subsidies from either the film or the government. Its income, instead, is solely from the fees it charges for its services, calculate by measuring the running time of films or DVDs submitted for classification. It consults the Department of Culture, Media and Sport before making any changes to its fees.

Films are rated in teams of two. With each work, the Examiners log details of what they watch, including - General context (plot), characters, an outline of individual scenes; timings of key moments, including camera angles, types of shots, on- and off-screen moments; and bad language, sex and drug references and so on.

When classifying a film, there are quite a few issues faced, meaning they have to consider whether the material is in conflict with the law, harmful to the viewer, unacceptable to appear to a wider audience, acceptably portraying the dominant issue, or problematic within its tone.

The Dark Knight was awarded a 12A rating by the BBFC, which resulted in much press coverage and complaints from members of the public, because they thought the violence was too strong to be contained in that category. I feel that it should have been awarded a 15 rating, due to the high levels of violence in it, however, I don't think that it is as much as an issue as everyone says, and personally, not something I would be outraged about. Especially, since there are worse cases of misrated films. Some would argue that the violence in the film was just below the guideline of a 15, therefore that is why they rated the film a 12a. At the same time, people of that age have seen much worse things that people don't complain about and sometimes at this age, they need to exposed more to violence in order to understand why it happens. If not, then they may not understands signs of aggression or violence, or see these things as wrong. Plus, the dark knight is a superhero film and therefore is not reality and people of this age should be able to or learn to understand this.

The guidelines for a 15 rated films, indicate that they may feature strong violence, frequent strong language, 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, this depends on the severity and extent of these features.