Weinstein Co. To Take On MPAA Rating For Bully

The Weinstein Company will take on the Motion Picture Association of America (MPAA) once again after the organization slapped the 2011 Tribeca Film Festival documentary Bully with an R rating. Harvey Weinstein and one of the film’s featured subjects Alex Libby will personally appeal the rating to the MPAA. The R-rating was made due to “language,” restricting minors under 17 from seeing the film unless accompanied by a parent or guardian. The rating would also in effect ban the film from screening in U.S. middle and high schools. Originally titled The Bully Project, the emotional feature captures the stories of several American middle and high school students who faced relentless bullying at school. Filmed over the course of the 2009/2010 school year, Bully exposes pained and often endangered lives of bullied kids. The film’s director Lee Hirsch became a regular on shows such as CNN’s Anderson Cooper 360 following the film’s premiere at Tribeca last year, which happened to coincide with a number of teen suicides allegedly as a result of school bullying. In announcing the appeal via TWC, Hirsch said he made the film for bullies and the bullied to see. “We have to change hearts and minds in order to stop this epidemic, which has scarred countless lives and driven many children to suicide,” he said. The hearing will be held at the MPAA’s Sherman Oaks screening room on February 23rd with Motion Picture Consulting LLC’s Ethan Noble assisting The Weinstein Company. Bully is slated for a March 30th release. TWC is no stranger to MPAA rating hearings. It successfully overturned an initial NC-17 rating in 2010 for Derek Cianfrance’s Blue Valentine starring Ryan Gosling and Michelle Williams.