Rating

We have come to the conclusion that our film would be in the 12/12A category. The BBFC guidelines state that to watch a 12/12A film a child must be aged 12 or over or be accompanied by an adult. The reason for this is because our film is based around the death of the main character, and it was implied that he was suffering from depression, and has committed suicide, as a result we think it would be unwise to show this to children under the age of 12 as they might get upset or the film may have an negative effects on them.

A 12/12A film can contain violence but not extreme violence to the point that it would mentally scar the audience. This fits in with our film as throughout, there will be some scenes of violence, but not to that extreme extent. Hazardous Behaviour by characters is acceptable in a 12/12A such as committing suicide, self harming, or taking an overdose. However if these behaviours become inappropriately dangerous them the rating show be heightened to a ‘15’.

The British Board of film classification takes into account a number of factors when desiding what classification to give a film. It looks at; Discrimination, drugs, horror, imitable behaviour. language, nudity,sex, theme, violence, titles and the frequency of sound. The theme of our film is based around a man killing himself and this has a huge influence on the classification we used, as this type of content may make some people feel uneasy or emotional, also some people are more sensitive to this type of material and it may harm them psychologically to watch material that is disturbing or distresing. Violence also plays a part in our film and again this can lead to some audience members feeling uncomfortable . The violence that is potrayed in our film is not that of a 'extreme' violent film but it does contain some mild violence. BBFC states that strong language in not permitted in trailers or advertisments of a category below '15', as a result we had to make sure our project contained no strong language, this was not a problem as we only used non- diagetic sound on the soundtrack and voice over, and in the voice over we used no inappropriate language.

In a typical '12' film the BBFC states that Discrimination of others or discriminatory behaviour must not be allowed in any part of the film overall. Behaviour or language that is clearly discriminatory is unlikely to be suitable, unless it is clearly condemned. In our project we stuck

by this rule as there was no evidence of discrimination during our opening scene and it is unlikey that there would be and form of discrimination throughout the rest of our film. The BBFC also have problems with using drugs and for a '12' film the use of drugs should only be rare and not be portrayed in a way that may mislead the audience of the true effects of the drugs, also there should be no instructions to to audience on how to use the drugs. Our project stuck by this policy as we had no evidnece of any drug use or information on how to obtain or use drugs. Another

criteria is 'Horror', mild horror is permitted in a '12' film however it should not be frequent or continuous. However to some audience members our project could be seen a a horror as it invoves some shocking scenes (when the main character jumps of the building). this is still within the BBFC guidelines and so it is still suitable as a '12' film. Imitable behaviour is tone of the main

criteria that our film contains and it contains dangerous behaviours such as suicide, however during the film there is no evidence of how others could copy the actions of the character and replicate the dangerous behaviour. A further criteria is 'Language' a '12' film can contain moderate language but strong language must be very rare and infrequent, again our project contains no strong language and so it is keeping with this guideline. Nudity and sex in a '12' film is allowed however it must be discreet our project contains no nudity or sex therfore we did not have ant problems with these guidelines. Themes for a '12' film can be mature but they must be suitable for young teenagers, our theme is primarily a psychological drama and films similar to ours are 'Donnie Darko', this film was very succesful with teenagers and contained a mature theme. The last BBFC guidleline is 'Violence', for a '12' film moderate violence is allowed, however blood or injury should not be highlighted, in our film violence is not emphasised its much more about the psychological emotions the characters are faced with.