Review: Software cleans adult DVDs

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By Lincoln Spector

(IDG) -- Parents have a handful of options for shielding their children's Internet surfing, by restricting access to sites through various programs. But until now, the options have been much fewer when it comes to adult movies.

My 6-year-old daughter wants to watch my Austin Powers: International Man of Mystery DVD. I tell her she has to wait a few years. But new software can play the DVD on my PC without -- as Austin himself would say -- the naughty bits. Soon, that software may move from the home office to the living room.

One DVD-bowdlerizing program, ClearPlay, is available for download from the ClearPlay site, with a free trial offer. Two more, Movie Mask from Trilogy Studios and an as-yet unnamed product from Eyedecide, are expected to be available by spring. When one of these programs plays a DVD, it mutes potentially objectionable words and skips over shots that might offend.

The process doesn't work with every movie. These programs need specific instructions on what to cut for a particular DVD. ClearPlay currently comes with instructions for about 200 movies; all three companies hope to add about 25 titles per month. The emphasis is on recent, big Hollywood products -- the movies that line the walls at Blockbuster.

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They don't work for every DVD player, either. ClearPlay currently works only on Windows PCs with DVD-ROM drives. Initially, Eyedecide and Movie Mask will be limited to Windows PCs as well. This is a problem, because families don't usually gather around the PC to watch movies. Not surprisingly, all three companies are trying to get their technology into set-top boxes and game consoles.

Hands-on cleanup

You can try ClearPlay on your PC free of charge for 30 days. But be careful: You must enter a credit card number to obtain the free version. If you don't cancel your subscription with the 30 days, you'll get billed.

ClearPlay puts its own interface over your existing DVD playback software. Your DVD player still runs in the background, controlled by ClearPlay, but you don't see its interface. You can manually launch your own program and get around ClearPlay completely when you don't need the cleaned-up version.

I examined the first Austin Powers movie through ClearPlay. Among the suddenly missing footage was much of the restroom fight's scatological humor and almost all of the hot tub scene with Number Two's Italian confidential secretary, Alotta Fagina. In fact, you never even hear her name in the ClearPlay version of the flick. The cuts are often clumsy and obvious.

The upcoming Movie Mask will not only cut footage but will also hide offensive visuals behind added graphics. For instance, if you watch Titanic through Movie Mask DVD Player, Kate Winslet will pose for her picture wearing a corset.

Another forthcoming Trilogy Studios program, Movie Mask Director, lets you add such masks to any DVD. You could, for instance, give an old-fashioned swashbuckler a sci-fi feel by turning the swords into light sabers. Trilogy Studios hopes that Movie Mask Director will attract the college market, which isn't particularly interested in covering up nude scenes.

Parental choice

Filmmakers will probably not be happy with these programs. They have no legal recourse, however. Since the software merely alters already-purchased copies, it doesn't break copyright law, say the vendors (who've checked it out).

The fact is that filmmakers could easily make DVD-bowdlerizing software obsolete. Studios already make clean versions of movies for airlines and TV networks, and existing technology in every DVD player would allow them to put both versions on one disc. They currently don't do so.

Is an optional clean version, on the DVD or via software, a good idea? Perhaps so, says Mick LaSalle, movie critic for the San Francisco Chronicle and the author of Complicated Women: Sex and Power in Pre-Code Hollywood.

"This sounds like a way to give the people what they want without infringing on the freedom of the studios to make art in their own way," LaSalle says.

Personally, I'm a cinema purist. If a movie in its original form isn't appropriate for kids, my solution is not to show it to them. My daughter will have to wait.