How many F**ks Do You Give?

Profanity seems to be increasingly more acceptable in the media as time goes on. The question is, does this help or hurt the final product? South Park released an episode in its fifth season that literally had a "shit-couter" that went up every time the uncensored word 'shit' was used. In total, there were 162 spoken shits, and 38 written shits, making an even 200 occurrences throughout the half hour time slot. This became one of the top ten South Park episodes that changed the world, according to a 2006 exclusive documentary. This pushed the boundaries of uncensored profanity in television, and set a new standard for producers in comedy. Now, in movies, 'shit' is a common word in any movie from PG-13 and up. 'Fuck,' however, is the more controversial word. According to a chart I found on Wikipedia, there is one movie that uses the word 824 times in its 93 minutes. This, however is a documentary about the word itself, so I don't think it should count. Second on the list, though, is a movie called Gutterballs, that uses it 625 times. Now, this is not a widely popular movie, however, if you continue down the list, you'll find some very well-known, and in some cases, award-winning movies.

For example:
Casino (398)
Goodfellas (300)
Jarhead (278)
Reservoir Dogs (269)
Pulp Fiction (265)
The Big Lebowski (260)
Boondock Saints (239)
The Departed (237)
American History X (214)
Scarface (207)
8 Mile (200)
and even Good Will Hunting (154)

The rest can be seen here: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_films_that_most_frequently_use_the_word_%22fuck%22

As you can see, these are some very famous and successful movies that gave a lot of fucks (mostly gangster movies). But, in contrast to this, I skipped over quite a few movies that were far less successful, and that you've probably never even heard of. So, the moral of the story is that if you're going to fuck a movie, make sure you fuck it well. Back to my question - how many fucks do you give?

Movies and goals.

This summer I stayed at Ithaca working for campus center and event services.  I was very busy and worked over time for five weeks.  This left little time to watch movies and television.  This semester I want to start watching more television and movies again, but at the same time I want to broaden my horizon.  Looking at Mubi amazed me by the size of its collections with classics that I really need to see like Chinatown.  Also coming into the school year I bought American History X and The Boondock Saints 1 and 2.  I really love all three of the movies.  What I love about American History X is how it switches between using color and black and white.  I think it is a really brilliant way to tell the story.  My goals for the class are to create the best projects I can.  I am hoping to be able to write some scripts for some of the projects and see where they end up.  I am very excited for the class and I can't wait for the projects to get underway.