Perceptions of sexual violence in films – Audience and BBFC

Few decisions a film regulator takes are as delicate as those on sexual violence. Classifiers must balance freedom of expression and an adult’s right to choose what to watch against the risk that a scene might harm viewers or, through them, society. In the United Kingdom this task belongs to the British Board of Film Classification, and two films show how it has handled the question: Sam Peckinpah’s Straw Dogs and Gaspar Noé’s Irreversible.

How the BBFC judges a scene

The BBFC classifies films mainly to protect children and vulnerable viewers. For video works, including DVDs, the Video Recordings Act 1984 requires it to consider any harm that may be caused by the way a work deals with sex, violence, horror, drugs or crime, and scenes of sexual violence often combine several of these at once. The Board also has to respect the rights protected by the Human Rights Act 1998, including freedom of expression.

The Board does not judge a scene in isolation. Its guidelines ask about the context in which the scene is presented, the expectations of the audience, the genre, the way the violence is shown, the apparent intention of the filmmaker and the overall tone and impact of the work. A scene that eroticises or endorses sexual violence is treated very differently from one that shows it as an act of harm. To make these judgements, the Board relies on public consultation and on research into how real audiences respond.

Straw Dogs: a long refusal

Straw Dogs was passed uncut for cinemas in 1971. Its notoriety rests on one scene, in which Amy, the central female character, is raped by two local men, one of them her former boyfriend. The problem was not only the length of the scene, but the suggestion that Amy eventually derives some pleasure from the first assault.

When the film was submitted for video release in 1999, the BBFC asked for cuts to the rape scene, because it feared the film might offer some viewers a justification for the “male myth of rape”: that a woman who says no secretly means yes. The distributor refused, and the film was denied a certificate. The version examined then was an American print that had already been cut.

In 2002 another distributor submitted the original uncut version. The restored footage made the second rape unambiguously brutal, and that context changed the meaning of the first: it was now clear that Amy did not welcome the assault. The Board consulted clinical psychologists who work with sex offenders, and concluded that the film had no significant potential to cause harm. Straw Dogs was classified 18 uncut for video.

Audience research also showed something the earlier decisions had underestimated. For many viewers the core of the film is not the rape but the transformation of Amy’s husband, David, from a timid man into an avenger. The film is split into two parts that produce two different responses: vulnerability in the first half, and a disturbing identification with violence in the second.

Irreversible: passed uncut

Irreversible, released in 2002, contains a single rape scene lasting around nine minutes, filmed without a cut. The BBFC had the film assessed by a consultant psychologist and passed it uncut: despite the challenging content, it did not breach the Board’s guidelines.

The BBFC’s audience research found that viewers’ responses centred on two features: the unbroken length of the scene, and the fact that the victim was played by an international star, Monica Bellucci. Many viewers, including many men, described an intense empathy with the victim, as if they were victims themselves; others saw themselves as powerless witnesses. Either way, the scene was experienced as an assault on the viewer, not as an erotic spectacle. That reading, together with the film’s narrative structure, supported the decision to leave it uncut.

What the comparison shows

The two cases point in the same direction. The BBFC’s judgement depends less on how much violence a film shows than on how the film frames it: whether the scene is placed in a context that makes its harm clear, or whether it invites the audience to enjoy it. And over time, as research into audience response grew, the Board’s decisions came closer to the way real viewers read these films.

For producers, the lesson goes beyond the United Kingdom. Every country has its own rules on classification and age ratings, and the same film can receive different treatment in different territories. In Italy, for example, state film censorship was abolished in 2021 and replaced by a classification system in which distributors classify their own films, subject to review. A distribution plan for a film with difficult content should take each territory’s rules into account early on.

This article is adapted from Claudia Roggero, “How audience’s perception of sexual violence in films can influence BBFC’s valuation”, Entertainment Law Review, vol. 22, issue 2 (2011). It describes the UK framework at the time of publication; the BBFC’s guidelines have since been updated.

FAQ

Why was Straw Dogs refused a video certificate in the UK?

In 1999 the BBFC asked for cuts to the rape scene, fearing it could reinforce the myth that women enjoy rape. The distributor refused the cuts, so the film was refused a certificate. In 2002 the uncut original version was classified 18.

Why was Irreversible passed uncut?

The BBFC found that the rape scene, though long and disturbing, did not breach its guidelines: it presents the assault as harmful rather than erotic, and audience research showed viewers experienced it with strong empathy for the victim.

What does the BBFC consider when classifying sexual violence?

The context of the scene, the audience’s expectations, the genre, the way the violence is presented, the filmmaker’s apparent intention and the overall tone and impact of the work, together with the risk of harm under the Video Recordings Act 1984.

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