A clause buried in the Children's Safety Act of 2005, currently awaiting consideration by the Senate Judiciary Committee, is likely to wreck havoc on filmmakers and state based film commissions and could have more far reaching effects, reports Brooks Boliek. The clause, which is intended to curb child pornography, essentially, under certain interpretations, makes simulated sex scenes equivalent to actual sex scenes in the eyes of the law. This could mean that any film with a sex scene is considered pornography.

A clause buried in the Children's Safety Act of 2005, currently awaiting consideration by the Senate Judiciary Committee, is likely to wreck havoc on filmmakers and state based film commissions and could have more far reaching effects, reports Brooks Boliek. The clause, which is intended to curb child pornography, essentially, under certain interpretations, makes simulated sex scenes equivalent to actual sex scenes in the eyes of the law. This could mean that any film with a sex scene is considered pornography.

Being considered porn has a variety impacts on a film, most of them minor inconveniences really, but this could effect everything from where films are shot to what films get theatrical release. That in turn effects what films get made to begin with.

I don’t want to be chicken little here, the intent of the Act is not to curb free speech or legitimate free enterprise, and I imagine the wording of the proposed law will simply be clarified and the scope limited. However, the Act has already passed the House and should it be passed into law as is, I for one would not be comfortable counting on the courts to exercise common sense when interpreting and enforcing the law. So I'm red flagging this one.