Distributors Fox Searchlight were well aware of the potential ratings hassle when they picked up the film at Toronto; director McQueen (it’s weird that he didn’t modify his name, or go by Steven or something, right?) has final cut, and made it clear he wasn’t touching a frame of Shame.

So now the film has the scarlet letter/numbers of NC-17, which was intended, when created in 1990, to designate the kind of “for adults, but not porn” movies that its predecessor, the X, originally labeled — pictures like Last Tango in Paris and Midnight Cowboy. But the refusals of theatre chains to carry them, video stores to stock them, and newspapers and television to advertise them resulted in a rating that bore little difference, in terms of revenue or stigma, from the X. Occasionally, a film has come along (Requiem for a Dream, The Dreamers, Bad Education) that looked to challenge the conventional wisdom and ride its positive reviews into some genuine commercial viability for the rating, but those successes have been minor, few, and far between. Time will tell if Shame manages to buck the trend; meanwhile, you can check out the film’s trailer in the most recent edition of our weekly “Trailer Park” feature.

1912 – The British Board of Film Classification (BBFC) is founded. They have two certificates: U for universal, meaning suitable for children, and A for adult, meaning children must be accompanied by an adult.

1922 – The Motion Picture Producers and Distributors of America (MPPDA) is founded, with former US Postmaster General Will H. Hays in charge.

1930 – The MPPDA creates the Motion Picture Production Code (aka the Hays Code), which forbid films from lowering moral standards of viewers or ridiculing law, among other things.

1932 – The BBFC adds the H certificate (for horror) to the U and A certificates. Only Britons 16 and older could be admitted to a film with an H certificate.

1951 - The BBFC replaces the H with an X.

1968 – The MPPDA is replaced by The Motion Picture Association of America (MPAA) and begins to assign ratings, including Britain’s X rating for films unsuitable for minors. 1968′s Greetings, directed by Brian De Palma and starring Robert De Niro, becomes the first American film to receive an X rating, despite being non-pornographic (it was later re-rated R).

1969 - Midnight Cowboy receives an X rating from the MPAA. It goes on to win Oscars for Best Picture, Best Director and Best Adapted Screenplay, becoming the first X-rated film to win an Academy Award.

1971 – The MPAA gives Stanley Kubrick’s A Clockwork Orange an X rating.

1972 – Fritz the Cat becomes the first animated film to receive an X rating from the MPAA.

Early 1970s - The MPAA’s X rating also referred to non-trademarked films, meaning that any filmmaker could give a film an X rating without even submitting to the MPAA. Thus, beginning in the 1970s, many pornographic films carried an X rating, later evolving into the use of multiple X’s (i.e. XX, XXX) to indicate just how unsuitable for minors the film was. Again, these were not MPAA-sanctioned ratings — the MPAA only gave single X ratings.

1990 - The MPAA replaces the X rating with NC-17, thus separating non-trademarked works from those rated as unsuitable for minors (only the MPAA can give an NC-17 rating). The acronym stands for “No Children Under 17 Admitted.” Henry & June, released October 5, 1990, becomes the first movie to receive the new rating. Some papers refuse to run ads for the film, or future NC-17 titles.

1995 - Showgirls is released by United Artists with an NC-17 rating. Despite the rating, the film is distributed in 1,388 cinemas upon release, however its financial failure does much to steer producers clear of the NC-17 rating. (That said, with a $20 million box office, it is the top-grossing NC-17 film all of time. Food for thought.) Many films, upon receiving an NC-17 rating, have gone back and edited out contentious material until the MPAA downgrades the rating to R. Both American Pie and Grindhouse were originally rated NC-17 and later edited down to R.

Late 1990s – The MPAA changes the wording of the NC-17 rating from “No Children Under 17 Admitted” to “No One 17 And Under Admitted.”

2008- Kevin Smith’s Zack and Miri Make a Porno becomes the first film to win an R rating after appealing the MPAA’s NC-17 designation.

Awesome. We actually think this is yet another good sign about the quality of the flick, as some of our favorite comedies were deemed NC-17 before they were edited down for a R-rating.

Like what? Why we’re glad you asked! The 40-Year-Old Virgin (“pervasive sexual content, language and some drug use”), American Pie (“strong sexuality, crude sexual dialogue, language and drinking, all involving teens”), Clerks (“extensive use of extremely explicit sex-related dialogue”), Pink Flamingos (“a wide range of perversions in explicit detail”), Showgirls (“nudity and erotic sexuality throughout, and for some graphic language and sexual violence”), and the universally underloved Zack and Miri Make a Porno (“strong crude sexual content including dialogue, graphic nudity and pervasive language”).

Also, while it’s not a comedy, remember the rating drama we told you about with Slumdog Millionaire? And just look how well that all turned out for Danny Boyle…