OTTAWA – The Canadian Broadcast Standards Council (CBSC) on Wednesday released a decision concerning three movies that aired last spring on Bell Media’s Crave streaming service, which were the subject of a viewer complaint regarding the movies’ viewer advisories and pre-9 p.m. broadcast time.
The movies in question were Drive My Car, Dune and Survive, which all aired on Crave in morning or early afternoon timeslots. The viewer who complained to the CBSC questioned whether the sexual content, violence and coarse language in the three movies warranted a post-9 p.m. timeslot, mention in their viewer advisories, and higher ratings, explains a CBSC press release.
The CBSC’s English-language panel examined the complaint under the relevant provisions of the Canadian Association of Broadcasters’ (CAB) Code of Ethics and Violence Code.
The CBSC panel concluded that all three movies should have repeated the classification icon at the beginning of the second hour of their broadcasts as per the requirement of Article 4.0 of the CAB Violence Code.
It also concluded two of the movies should have featured more detailed viewer advisories. In the case of Drive My Car, the panel concluded the movie’s advisory should have mentioned “sexual content” because “mature themes” was not specific enough under Clause 11 of the CAB Code of Ethics.
With regard to Survive, the panel concluded Crave had breached Clause 11 of the CAB Code of Ethics for not mentioning “coarse language” in the advisory for that movie.
While the panel concluded Drive My Car and Dune had been given the appropriate ratings and could be aired by Crave before 9 p.m., it concluded a PG classification for Survive was inappropriate and should have been a 14+ classification as per Article 4.0 of the CAB Violence Code.
Furthermore, given the level of violence and coarse language in Survive, it required a post-9 p.m. timeslot — meaning Crave had breached Clause 10 of the CAB Code of Ethics and Article 3.1 of the CAB Violence Code for broadcasting coarse language and violence intended for adult audiences before 9 p.m., according to the CBSC’s decision.
In response to the viewer complaint, Crave committed to providing more detailed viewer advisories in future broadcasts of the movies in question and to broadcasting the movie Survive only after 9 p.m., the CBSC press release says.
“While this commitment does not change the Panel’s findings with respect to the specific broadcasts reviewed for this decision, the Panel commends Crave for acknowledging its errors. The broadcaster fulfilled its obligations of responsiveness and, subject to the announcement of this decision, nothing further is required on this occasion,” the CBSC’s decision says.
Crave is required to announce the CBSC’s decision regarding its Drive My Car broadcast on Crave 3 on two separate occasions, and to announce the CBSC decisions regarding Dune and Survive on Crave 1 on three separate occasions.
