Blue Movies and Laws

Factual Questions
1

Question…why are porno films called “blue movies?” A friend of mine reckons that the earliest such films had a blue tint to them due to poor developing procedures (like, in someone’s bathtub). Or does the strange name have something to do with the even stranger “blue laws,” which indicated what folks were NOT to do on Sundays? And why the heck were the laws “blue?”

Color Me Confused,
Patty

2

For what it’s worth “Blue Laws” first applied to the theocratic New Haven colony (they printed the stuff on blue paper). Something off-color can still be referred to as blue.
Film gets a tint to it because the tint was added.

3

This page has some theories about “blue” used in this way. One of the more interesting is below

Now my own WAG: it may be related to a slang expression for an erect penis, a blue-veiner

4

Thanks for the input! The webpage is especially useful!

Patty

5

I can’t resist- ever notice that a smoke-filled room has a blue haze around the ceiling? Old-time porn films were frequently called “smokers”.

Just another WAG

Cartooniverse