Dirty Words and Filthy Pictures: Film and the First Amendment

Sex begins with a kiss, which must be why the 1896 featurette The John C. Rice-May Irwin Kiss — all 47 seconds of it — provoked such a uproar among a puritanical public. Distributed by Thomas Edison’s company, The Kiss (as it is better known) depicted just that and nothing more — a fleeting peck, … Continue reading Dirty Words and Filthy Pictures: Film and the First Amendment