Star Wars: Episode I reclassified from U to PG for 'scary scenes'
It was released a long, long time ago, but Star Wars Episode I has been reclassified in Britain from a U to a PG for its scary lightsaber fighting.
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Future screenings of the Phantom Menace will now come with parental guidance after the BBFC upgraded their original classification from when the film was released in 1999.
The British Board of Film Classification has not made the change for the offensiveness of the much-maligned Jar Jar Binks character, and nor does George Lucas’s prequel origin story now carry a nap warning for the slow paced middle act.
Episode I, was instead found to contain “moderate violence” because of spaceships shooting at each other and the climactic lightsabre battle between Qui-Gon Jinn (Liam Neeson), Obi-Wan Kenobi (Ewan McGregor) and the villainous Darth Maul (voiced by Peter Serafinowicz).
That duel, spoiler alert, ends with Maul being cut in half by Obi-Wan and then falling down a shaft. Before the reclassification, Episode I was the only instalment in the prequel trilogy to have been certified as a U, with the similarly poorly received Attack of the Clones (2002) being a PG in the UK, and the Revenge of the Sith (2005) being a 12A.
The original trilogy were all certified as a U and the sequel films, released in the 2010s, were all rated as 12A.
The BBFC has not changed the classification of any of the other Star Wars films but its latest review comes as part of its 2024 annual report. This saw some titles upgraded by two ratings as standards have changed, with a reference to suicide in A Star Is Born (1937) seeing the film moved up from a U to a 12.
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The Crow (1995) and Fight Club (1999) were both moved down from 18 to 15, with inspectors taking a different view on violence and drug use now to what was seen in the 90s.
Natasha Kaplinsky, president of the BBFC, said its 2024 review saw the highest number of changed classifications in its 112 year history.
She said: “We classified more cinema features than ever before, and we have made significant progress towards extending the coverage of trusted BBFC age ratings on streaming services through new deals with Prime Video and Netflix.”