watch it: “Forbidden Images”

The filmmaker says:

All of the clips used in this film came from a reel of 35mm nitrate found in an old theater somewhere in Pennsylvania.

The projectionist clipped these scenes to meet local moral standards of the time.
Will our current forms of censorship look just as ridiculous to future generations?

I found this via Echidne of the Snakes, and I’ll let her explain one reason why this is so interesting:

The way the video is discussed [at YouTube], both in the blurb and in most of the comments is interesting. Very few notice that every single of these images is about women's bodies and none make the point that nothing having to do with just men seems to have been cut. But most interestingly of all, the overall theme is one where women's bodies are conflated with "daring sexuality," and the blurb urges people to think about what one might censor today, given that such innocent scenes were censored in the past.

In one sense, of course, absolutely nothing has changed. Sex is still all about women's bodies and people either want them covered up and hidden or freely available for public consumption.

I couldn’t have said it better myself.

(PS: You should be reading Echidne of the Snakes all the time if you’re interested in feminist matters.)