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[MADem]

315. The point of the Motion Picture Code, though, was that "bad things" did not happen, because the

characters were "good" and the ones that were not would get their comeuppance in the end.

Scarlett and Rhett were MARRIED in that scene--and back then, the Droit de Seigneur http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Droit_du_seigneur rights extended to the prevailing views about marriages--heck, the Hayes Code saw nothing wrong with men "getting a little rough" with women, so long as they didn't leave a mark and the two parties were married. How many scenes passed Hayes muster where some yokel forcefully kisses a woman who doesn't want to be kissed, only, since the guy is SUCH a good kisser, and "The Right Guy" for that unreasonably tempestuous woman, she changes her mind and stops whaling on the clown? That's a standard scene in more films than we can count.

The issue isn't "s-e-x" in those scenes; sex was ALWAYS implied (blowing curtains, panning to the fireplace where the flames LEAP up; panning out the window to angry weather, or down to the sea where the waves crash dramatically...those were cues for "s-e-x" just as surely as flowers were cues for love and affection in silent films.

When the Hayes Code films dealt with "unsavory" topics (not marital sex, but premarital sex or rape, for example), they were only allowed to so do if the "bad guy" got his comeuppance. You could vaguely refer to some poor woman being "interfered with" so long as the "interferer" died a horrible death.

Nothing went on the screen to encourage any sort of turpitude, either. Bedrooms always had either two twin beds, or one foot on the floor. Kisses were timed.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hayes_code

Resolved, That those things which are included in the following list shall not appear in pictures produced by the members of this Association, irrespective of the manner in which they are treated:

Pointed profanity – by either title or lip – this includes the words "God," "Lord," "Jesus," "Christ" (unless they be used reverently in connection with proper religious ceremonies), "hell," "damn," "Gawd," and every other profane and vulgar expression however it may be spelled;
Any licentious or suggestive nudity-in fact or in silhouette; and any lecherous or licentious notice thereof by other characters in the picture;
The illegal traffic in drugs;
Any inference of sex perversion;
White slavery;
Miscegenation (sex relationships between the white and black races);
Sex hygiene and venereal diseases;
Scenes of actual childbirth – in fact or in silhouette;
Children's sex organs;
Ridicule of the clergy;
Willful offense to any nation, race or creed;

And be it further resolved, That special care be exercised in the manner in which the following subjects are treated, to the end that vulgarity and suggestiveness may be eliminated and that good taste may be emphasized:

The use of the flag;
International relations (avoiding picturizing in an unfavorable light another country's religion, history, institutions, prominent people, and citizenry);
Arson;
The use of firearms;
Theft, robbery, safe-cracking, and dynamiting of trains, mines, buildings, etc. (having in mind the effect which a too-detailed description of these may have upon the moron);
Brutality and possible gruesomeness;
Technique of committing murder by whatever method;
Methods of smuggling;
Third-degree methods;
Actual hangings or electrocutions as legal punishment for crime;
Sympathy for criminals;
Attitude toward public characters and institutions;
Sedition;
Apparent cruelty to children and animals;
Branding of people or animals;
The sale of women, or of a woman selling her virtue;
Rape or attempted rape;
First-night scenes;
Man and woman in bed together;
Deliberate seduction of girls;
The institution of marriage;
Surgical operations;
The use of drugs;
Titles or scenes having to do with law enforcement or law-enforcing officers;
Excessive or lustful kissing, particularly when one character or the other is a "heavy."[16]

If you look at a lot of the "pre-Code" films, aka the "Forbidden Hollywood" era, you can actually see things like NIPPLES under dresses or silks, and other licentious and ooh-la-la naughty things, like infidelity and prostitution, displayed with no small degree of vigor. Barbara Stanwyck, the prim and tough matriarch of The Big Valley, got her start as a very "hot" actress in pre-code Hollywood.

It took a "hell" of a lot of convincing to allow the "damn" in "Frankly my dear, I don't give a ....." The censors were originally reticent, and the studio had to lean on them hard to get that through, on the basis that the story would be too diluted otherwise.

Once the sixties hit, the Motion Picture code was on the ropes, and was replaced with the rating system, where everything is "allowed" but the producer may pay a price with the rating the film receives.