Trend Toward Laxity?

A widening breach between the 25-year-old Hollywood Production Code, which has recently relaxed its taboo list, and the Roman Catholic Legion of Decency, still the nation's most powerful box-office pressure group, is gradually becoming more obvious. Items:

P:James Francis Cardinal McIntyre, Archbishop of Los Angeles, dispatched a "special statement" to the pastors of 267 churches in his archdiocese, instructing that "caution be issued to all your people, but particularly to the young" about "an obvious trend toward laxity in some of the motion picture productions--and in the advertising of them as well."

P:Howard Hughes's Son of Sinbad, approved by the Hollywood Production Code but condemned by the Legion of Decency (even after re-editing) as "a serious affront to Christian and traditional standards of morality and decency," is already booked for several hundred theaters. Like Hughes's controversial French Line, it seems headed for a dual treatment: boycotting in heavily Catholic areas, nationwide sexsational advertising to convince the public that Sinbad is really a euphemism for Singood.

P:In Manhattan, the Rev. Thomas F.

Little, executive secretary of the Legion of Decency, charged that producers "as a matter of deliberate policy have been contracting for a considerable amount of literary material which is gravely offensive to the moral law . . . with the apparent acquiescence of the Production Code Authority to the appearance of such material in released pictures." Father Little said that the Legion was having difficulty finding pictures to approve. He pointed out that in the last six months the Legion has rated some 78 pictures in objectionable categories.

P: In Hollywood, Eric Johnston, president of the Motion Picture Association of America, replied that while the movie industry welcomes criticism, it feels it is "doing a fine job" and does not contemplate making "concessions to anybody on anything." Johnston admitted that some recent films have portrayed excessive violence, but "there will be a different trend in films released this fall and winter . . .

The goal is to make pictures reasonably accepted by reasonable people."

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