Member-only story
Gremlins: Vicious Fun for All the Family
A celebration of Joe Dante’s horror comedy, plus how mollycoddling UK censors prevented nine-year-old me seeing this in the cinema
Warning: Contains spoilers.
My desire to see Gremlins during the original run in the UK was thwarted by the British Board of Film Classification. It did not receive the expected PG certificate, and instead was passed at 15 (there was no 12A certificate in use in 1984). For my American cousins, that roughly translates to me expecting a PG, but the film getting an R, as no PG-13 rating existed. The only difference is that whilst underage viewers can get into an R if accompanied, no such provision exists in the UK. A 15 certificate meant no one under fifteen admitted, which was very distressing news to my nine-year-old self.
The BBFC justified their cruelly prohibitive decision with some blithering nonsense about the film potentially being too scary and disturbing for children. Rubbish. Yes, all right, it isn’t for the very young or very sensitive, but as generations of children have subsequently proved, Gremlins had just the right amount of subversive nastiness for young audiences, no matter what mollycoddling adults say. I subsequently saw the film on VHS and loved every minute. Once I had children of my own, I…
