Editing Hays Code (section)

===Pre-Code Hollywood===
{{Main|Pre-Code Hollywood}}
[[File:The Kiss (1896).webm|thumb|left|''[[The Kiss (1896 film)|The Kiss]]'' (1896), starring [[May Irwin]], from the [[Edison Studios]], drew general outrage from moviegoers, civic leaders, and religious leaders, as shocking, [[obscenity|obscene]], and immoral.]]
[[File:Great train robbery still.jpg|thumb|A famous shot from the 1903 film ''[[The Great Train Robbery (1903 film)|The Great Train Robbery]]''. Scenes where criminals aimed guns at the camera were considered inappropriate by the New York state censor board in the 1920s, and usually removed.<ref>Prince. pg. 24</ref>]]

On February 19, 1930, ''[[Variety (magazine)|Variety]]'' published the entire content of the Code, and predicted that state film censorship boards would soon become obsolete;<ref name="B4445">Black (1996), pp. 44–45.</ref> however, the men obliged to enforce the code—Jason Joy (head of the committee until 1932) and his successor, James Wingate—were generally unenthusiastic and/or ineffective.<ref name="DH8" /><ref name="B5051">Black (1996), pp. 50–51.</ref> ''[[The Blue Angel]]'', the first film the office reviewed, which was passed by Joy with no revisions, was considered indecent by a California censor.<ref name="B5051" /> Although there were several instances where Joy negotiated cuts from films and there were definite—albeit loose—constraints, a significant amount of lurid material made it to the screen.<ref>Jacobs (1997), p. 27.</ref> Joy had to review 500 films a year with a small staff and little power.<ref name="B5051" /> He was more willing to work with the studios, and his creative writing skills led to his hiring at Fox. On the other hand, Wingate struggled to keep up with the flood of scripts coming in, to the point where [[Warner Bros.]]' head of production [[Darryl Zanuck]] wrote him a letter imploring him to pick up the pace.<ref>Vieira (1999), p. 117.</ref> In 1930, the Hays office did not have the authority to order studios to remove material from a film, and instead worked by reasoning and sometimes pleading with them.<ref name="Bl52">Black (1996), p. 52.</ref> Complicating matters, the appeals process ultimately put the responsibility for making the final decision in the hands of the studios.<ref name="DH8" />

[[File:Frankenstein's monster (Boris Karloff).jpg|thumb|left|upright|Actor [[Boris Karloff]] as Doctor Frankenstein's creation in the 1931 film ''[[Frankenstein (1931 film)|Frankenstein]]''. By the time the film's sequel, ''[[Bride of Frankenstein]]'', arrived in 1935, enforcement of the Code was in full effect, and the doctor's overt God complex was forbidden.<ref>Gardner (1988), pg. 66.</ref> In the first picture, however, when the creature was born, his mad scientist creator was free to proclaim [[Frankenstein (1931 film)#Pre-Code era scenes and censorship history|"Now I know what it feels like to be God!"]]<ref>Teresi, Dick. [https://www.nytimes.com/1998/09/13/books/are-you-mad-doctor.html?pagewanted=2 "Are You Mad, Doctor?"], ''The New York Times'', September 13, 1988; accessed November 24, 2010.</ref>]]
[[File:DeMille - Sign of the Cross - Sacrifice in the Colosseum.png|thumb|From [[Cecil B. DeMille]]'s ''[[The Sign of the Cross (1932 film)|The Sign of the Cross]]'' (1932)]]
One factor in ignoring the code was the fact that some found such censorship prudish, owing to the libertine social attitudes of the 1920s and early 1930s. This was a period in which the [[Victorian era]] was sometimes ridiculed as being naïve and backward.<ref>LaSalle (2000), p. 20.</ref> When the Code was announced, the liberal periodical ''[[The Nation]]'' attacked it,<ref name="B4445" /> stating that if crime were never to be presented in a sympathetic light, then taken literally that would mean that "law" and "justice" would become one and the same; therefore, events such as the [[Boston Tea Party]] could not be portrayed. If clergy must always be presented in a positive way, then hypocrisy could not be dealt with either.<ref name="B4445" />'' [[The Outlook (New York)|The Outlook]]'' agreed and, unlike ''Variety'', predicted from the beginning that the Code would be difficult to enforce.<ref name="B4445" /> The [[Great Depression in the United States|Great Depression]] of the 1930s led many studios to seek income by any way possible. Since films containing racy and violent content resulted in high ticket sales, it seemed reasonable to continue producing such films.<ref>LaSalle (2000), p. 77.</ref> Soon, the flouting of the code became an open secret. In 1931, ''[[The Hollywood Reporter]]'' mocked the code and quoted an anonymous screenwriter saying that "the Hays moral code is not even a joke any more; it's just a memory"; two years later ''Variety'' followed suit.<ref name="DH8" />