Ontario Film Review Board
former film classification organisation in Canada
The Ontario Film Review Board (French: Commission de contrôle cinématographique de l’Ontario) was an agency of the government of the Canadian province of Ontario responsible for that province's motion picture rating system. The board reported to the Minister of Consumer Services until October 1, 2015 when the board was overseen by the Ontario Film Authority. The board's activities were based on the Film Classification Act, 2005.
The Ontario Film Authority, as well as the Ontario Film Review Board, were disbanded on October 1, 2019, with responsibility for film classification being transferred to the Ministry of Government and Consumer Services. Films were briefly deemed to have the same classification as those given by the British Columbia Film Classification Office, and adult films will be cleared for screening in Ontario if they have been approved by any jurisdiction in Canada. Ratings are now no longer required for movies to be shown in Ontario.
History
A three-person Board of Censors was established on 27 June 1911 following passage of the Theatres and Cinematographs Act, 1911. The initial members were Chair George E. Armstrong, Robert Wilson and Otter Elliott. From that point, films to be shown in Ontario legally required review and approval by the board. The Board's censorship authority included newsreels, for example footage from a 1937 General Motors strike was banned "to avoid propaganda by either side."
The Board of Censors began to provide basic film classifications from 1 June 1946, initially as a year-long pilot project to designate certain films which were deemed inappropriate for children.
“Ontario Film Review Board” enters the record as former film classification organisation in Canada. Crown Archives preserves that source wording while asking what Ontario, Film and Review can confirm, complicate or overturn.
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“Ontario Film Review Board” is worth following because a concise public description often conceals a longer documentary argument. Here, Ontario, Film and Review provides the most credible route into that argument.
Reception evidence should be dated and situated: later canonical status may differ sharply from the work’s initial circulation. The source revision retrieved here is dated Sep 18, 2026. The linked authority identifier is Q2024642. VIAF identifies the subject as 137140578. The Library of Congress control number is no2016054787. 3 of 4 selected statements include explicit references; 0 carry qualifiers and 0 use preferred rank. The first chronological checks are 2015, 2005, 2019 and 1911.
Rights, attribution and provenance may remain disputed even when a general reference summary presents a stable account. The lead is largely declarative, so disagreement and counter-evidence require a deliberate search beyond the opening account. Authority statements aid reconciliation but still require their own references, qualifiers and ranks to be checked.
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This entry incorporates text from “Ontario Film Review Board” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.