THE IRISH Film Censor's Office (Ifco) became the Irish Film Classification Office yesterday, when Minister for Justice, Equality and Law Reform Dermot Ahern made the name change official.
"The role of the film censor has evolved to reflect changed times," Mr Ahern said as he addressed film distributors and the media in the Ifco screening room at Harcourt Terrace in Dublin.
"In a mature society," he added, "I think most of us believe that adults should be free . . . subject to the law, to decide for themselves what they may see, and that the primary role for Ifco should be what we call age-related classification."
He noted Dr Kevin Rockett's definitive book, Irish Film Censorship: A Cultural Journey from Silent Cinema to Internet Pornography, had described the history of censorship in Ireland as a journey that mirrored the social and cultural history of the State since independence.
The Minister welcomed the office's new remit as an open and transparent modern agency. "I am happy that it now explains the rationale for its decisions," he said, "that its website provides information and helpful consumer advice for parents, that it commissions ongoing research, that it engages regularly with the public - and parents in particular - and with schools, teachers, children, psychologists and other professional experts."
The name change marks the end of an era during much of which Ireland operated one of the world's most draconian film censorship systems. The first film censor, James Montgomery, appointed in 1923, famously stated he knew nothing about movies, but he knew the Ten Commandments and he took them as his code.
In his first full year as film censor, he banned 124 movies and cut 166. On the subject of the 1935 British film Father O'Flynn, Mr Montgomery commented: "Reel one might be called 'stage Irish', but the girl dancing on the village green shows more leg than I've seen on any village green in Ireland. Better amputate them."
John Kelleher, who was appointed film censor in 2003 and will now be known as the director of film classification, noted that in the 63 years since the film censor's office occupied the Harcourt Terrace building, over 50,000 films had been submitted, of which 2,000 were banned and 11,000 cut. As an example, he showed the "Here's looking at you, kid" scene between Humphrey Bogart and Ingrid Bergman in Casablanca.
Mr Montgomery had banned that film in 1942 because it could have infringed on Ireland's neutrality during the war. His successor, Richard Hayes, passed Casablanca, but with various cuts because the woman played by Bergman thought she was a widow when she became involved with the Bogart character, but her husband was still alive.
Mr Kelleher noted that over the first 40 years of the censor's office, no distinction was made between films for adults and children, even though Britain, for example, had an X certificate for films for adults.
He went on to show a clip from another American classic, The Graduate, in which the Mrs Robinson character, played by Anne Bancroft, begins to seduce the younger man, played by Dustin Hoffman. The film was banned in 1968. However, a film appeals board, established four years earlier, passed the film with an 18 certificate - albeit with 11 cuts, including the crucial seduction scene.
Among the many other notable films that were cut or banned by the Irish film censors were Gone with the Wind, Brief Encounter, Psycho, Midnight Cowboy, and The Wild Bunch.