Why Movie and TV Filtering?

Parents often feel frustrated while searching for family–friendly movies and television shows they can watch with their kids. The movie and television ratings system, although helpful, does not always alleviate parental concern. Many parents feel they can’t trust PG, PG–13 or TV–14 rating due to varying levels of violence, coarse language and sexual situations.

Until recently, several movie editing companies like CleanFlicks, Family Flix and Clean Films professionally edited DVD movies for a fee. However, a 2006 District of Colorado court ruling made this practice illegal. Current movie filtering is legal because the technology does not physically alter or make copies of a DVD or VHS video.

Television filtering is also legal; the technology uses the closed–captioned signal encoded in most television programs to detect and mute offensive dialog. Other television blocking technology consists of blocking television channels or specific programming.

Movie filtering technology edits offensive dialog such as curse words and sexually charged language and scenes that include excessive violence and sexual situations.

In this site, you’ll find articles related to Movie Filtering as well as comprehensive reviews and a side–by–side comparison to help you make an informed decision on which Movie Filtering product is right for you. At TopTenREVIEWS — We do the research so you don’t have to.™

What to Look for in Movie and TV Filtering Products

Movie and TV filtering products vary in the features they offer and the content they filter. The most popular products are DVD players that can filter dialog and scenes from movies based on specific preferences. These players use filtering software that works with the original DVD. The movie filters are either pre–loaded onto the DVD player or downloaded to a separate USB device and then loaded onto the player.

Some movie filtering technology only filters out dialog. These products also differ in the secondary devices they work with. Some only work with DVDs, while others work with DVDs, VCRs and television. These movie and television filtering products use the closed–captioning signal coded on DVDs, VHS videos and television programming to detect objectionable language based on specific filter settings.

• Features Set – Important features for movie and TV filtering technology include the ability to remove dialog such as curse words and sexually charged language and scenes such as extreme violence and sexual situations. Some products filter offensive dialog as well as scenes while others only filter dialog. Most television filtering technology filters out dialog or blocks television programs entirely.

  Settings for both dialog and scenes usually include a ratings scale from high to low. A high setting allows more curse words, violence and sexual content and a low setting allows little to none. Parental control settings usually include tolerant, moderate or strict and most filtering devices have a password option for parents.

• Ease of Use – The television screen should display the menu options accessed through a remote control included with your filtering device. If a device does not come with a remote control, the front display panel should provide all the access you need.

  DVD players connected to a television with an HDMI connection use progressive scan mode. Filtering devices that use closed–captioning to filter dialog will not work effectively in progressive scan mode. The dialog will still be muted, but the closed–captioned replacement text will not display. To remedy this situation, consult the device’s user’s manual for instructions to turn off progressive scan.

• Ease of Installation/Setup – Filtering devices should include a connection cable such as a coaxial cable, S–video or component video as well as a user’s manual/Setup Guide. Setting up the device to your television with these tools should only take a few minutes.
• Filter Accuracy – Pre–filtered content from products that use filtering software should be at or close to 100%. Products that use the closed–captioning system are usually 95% due to human error and technical problems within the system.
• Help/Support – Companies that manufacture movie and TV filtering products should have informative product pages with a list of features. If the company offers several different filtering products, they should provide product comparisons. Some websites will also provide PDF copies of their User Manuals.

  Answers to customer service or technical support questions should be provided by a large FAQs section. If you can’t find answers to your questions, you should be able to contact the company by telephone or email. Emails should be returned with helpful answers within 24–48 hours.