Director Francis Lawrence says that Constantine got screwed by being given an R-rating by the MPAA, despite adhering to the PG-13 guidelines. The movie was the first appearance of the DC comics character on screen and caused controversy due to Reeves being cast in the role. Despite not being blond or British, Reeves did a good job with his version of the character, and the movie has been re-evaluated in recent years after struggling at the box office.
Given the popularity of the movie now, Lawrence has recently spoken to Reeves about a sequel, but with JJ Abrams working on a new movie featuring the character, that seems unlikely now. Part of the reason Constantine didn't make a lot of money at the box office was the limited audience it had due to the R-rating. Despite showing very little visceral violence and not much bad language, the movie was given an R-rating, and it suffered as a result.
Lawrence, speaking as part of the "Constantine: 15th Anniversary Reunion" panel during San Diego Comic-con@Home, says that he believes Constantine was "screwed over" by being given an R-rating. The director says that the original intention was to make an R-rated movie, but the studio made them go PG-13 in order to get a bigger budget. In a cruel twist of fate, the MPAA ended up giving the movie an R-rating anyway, thanks to the movie's dark tone. Lawrence says if he'd known, he would have gone full R-rated in the first place and doubled down on the violence and language to match the tone of the original comic. You can read his full quote below.
"Originally when we all stared on this we thought it was going to be a rated R film. Warner then dictated that it had to be PG-13 because of what it cost. We got the list of guidelines of what you can do and you can't do in a PG-13 movie and we followed those rules to a tee. I mean, the amount of times you can say f**k, the kinds of nudity, the blood, the violence, all of those things. And we screened it for the MPAA and I remember hearing that they got about five minutes in and put their notepads down and said that we got a hard R for 'tone.' This is not something that's on the list. I think it was an overwhelming sense of dread was what I heard that they had from the opening scene onward. They didn't think there was anything that we could do about it. Basically what we had was a PG-13 movie that got an R-rating, which just killed me because if we were gonna get an R-rating I would have made an R-rated movie. We could have really gone for it in terms of intensity and violence and language and all those kinds of things. We got a bit screwed on that front. We did try to fight but we obviously didn't win that battle."
Lawrence, who went on to direct three films in the Hunger Games franchise, still seems upset when he recounts the story. Producer Akiva Goldsman added that he believes the subject matter of the movie meant it would always get an R-rating. He says there's a genre of "religious horror" that gets an R easier and that you have to understand the ratings are based on subjectivity rather than the specific guidelines handed out. Goldman ends by joking that if filmmakers want to ensure they get an R-rating, they should include demons in their movie.
It's an interesting observation as viewed by current standards, Constantine doesn't come off as an R-rated movie. As Lawrence says, it's a PG-13 movie that got an R-rating, and it would be a fun exercise to imagine what the movie would have looked like had the filmmakers set out to make an R-rated movie. Whether it would have performed better at the box office is debatable, as the market for a movie like Constantine wasn't particularly big back in 2005.
With JJ Abrams making a new Constantine movie, it's unlikely that the character will get the adult, R-rated treatment he deserves. Abrams traditionally makes PG-13 fare, though he might treat this movie differently, given its source material. With no details about the new movie forthcoming yet, let alone any indication of what the movie's tone will be, it's useless to speculate. But it is disappointing to think fans missed out on a proper R-rated movie back in 2005 because of miscommunication around how the rating system really works.
Source: Comic-Con International