This Film Is Not Yet Rated

Film Threat Eric Campos

It's vital that everyone who cares about film see this documentary.

Seattle Post-Intelligencer William Arnold

Funny, muckraking documentary.

New York Daily News Jack Mathews

Fascinating, amusing and ultimately disturbing.

Rolling Stone Peter Travers

Kirby Dick's indispensable guerrilla attack on the film-ratings system gives Hollywood a swift, smart and hilarious kick in its institutional, hypocritical ass.

The Onion (A.V. Club) Scott Tobias

It thoroughly eviscerates the MPAA and makes a solid case that the culture has paid the price for its censorious practices. His (Dick's) attacks are the equivalent of shooting ducks in a barrel, but these ducks had it coming.

Entertainment Weekly Owen Gleiberman

Has a bright, dishy spirit.

Portland Oregonian Shawn Levy

A revealing, compelling, scabrous and funny look into a system characterized by through-the-looking-glass logic and Kremlin-style secrecy.

Washington Post Philip Kennicott

Remarkably entertaining.

Los Angeles Times Carina Chocano

An impassioned piece of activist filmmaking that's as persuasive and entertaining as it is disturbing.

Slate Dana Stevens

The movie is both clever and ruthless at exposing the ratings board's inconsistencies and hypocrisy.

The New York Times Dana Stevens

Feisty, intellectually engaging.

Wall Street Journal Joanne Kaufman

In the ultimate test, Kirby submits this very documentary to the tender mercies of the MPAA. It gets slapped with an NC-17 for graphic content. He appeals. He loses -- ten votes to zip.

Salon.com Andrew O'Hehir

Intriguing and often hilarious.

Variety Todd McCarthy

Never really addresses why aspects of the ratings don't work, proposes concrete improvements or compares the system to those in other countries. Still, picture's bracing, hilarious and out-there elements make it a landmark.

Austin Chronicle Marjorie Baumgarten

Yet, like it or not, the MPAA ratings is a system in which we all participate – which makes this film important to see if anything is ever going to change.

Philadelphia Inquirer Carrie Rickey

Hugely entertaining catalog of MPAA follies.

The Globe and Mail (Toronto) Jennie Punter

Gets under your skin as another thought-provoking wake-up call about the power of studios and the corporations that back them.

TV Guide Maitland McDonagh

Ultimately, Dick subordinates scholarship to passion, which may be exactly what it takes to convince mainstream moviegoers that they should care about a system that shortchanges THEM when they go to the movies.

New York Post Lou Lumenick

While This Film Is Not Yet Rated does not suggest an alternative to the ratings board, it does expose this Tinseltown sham to some well-deserved public ridicule.

Boston Globe Wesley Morris

The filmmaker doesn't exactly let anyone off the hook.

San Francisco Chronicle Ruthe Stein

Extremely amusing.

ReelViews James Berardinelli

Despite being a little rough around the edges (as is often the case with the work of maverick documentarians), This Film Is Not Yet Rated is more than just an angry diatribe against the MPAA.

USA Today Claudia Puig

There is no question that the organization is a riveting subject for a film.

Village Voice J. Hoberman

Any investigation into Hollywood inevitably mutates into a noir.

LA Weekly Ella Taylor

Unlike the object of its scathing attention, Kirby Dick's documentary about the Motion Picture Association of America's ratings board is merry and bright and loads of fun.

The Hollywood Reporter Kirk Honeycutt

Dick's strongest points are that these raters receive no training and are given no standards by which to judge movies. Experts in child psychology or media or social studies are not consulted. Nor are they allowed on the board. The days of counting F-words or pelvic thrusts need to end, and in the film's quieter moments, Dick makes this case compellingly.

The New Yorker Anthony Lane

As the movie shows, the whole furtive business of ratings is indeed ridiculous and should be overhauled.

Dallas Observer Rob Nelson

This Film Is Not Yet Rated has a refreshingly snotty sense of humor.

Baltimore Sun Chris Kaltenbach

This Film Is Not Yet Rated performs a great service, though not especially well.

Chicago Tribune Michael Phillips

100 percent right about our corrupt and hypocritical industry-controlled movie ratings system. Being right, however, doesn't automatically make for a strong documentary. I enjoyed a lot of it. Yet fully half of what's on screen is beside its own point.

Premiere Jared Shimizu

Raises some probing questions about the secrecy of ratings decisions in a way that entertains and educates audiences with or without agendas to protect film integrity.

Empire David Parkinson

Packed with amusing graphics, animated sequences and damning testimonies, this is a landmark denunciation of Hollywood infantilisation and protectionism.

Chicago Reader Jonathan Rosenbaum

The main activity charted in the documentary is a kind of adolescent mischief, as Dick and a private investigator seek to uncover and expose the anonymous MPAA employees.