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Opinion: movie violence should not be abolished for public safety.</font></center>
Please debate.
Of course it shouldn't. Violence in movies is pure escapist fantasy. Only politically correct worshiping idiots would think movie and in a lot of cases game violence is influencing the worlds crimes. Some of the greatest movies ever made had violence. We can't band-aid everything to give a false sense of a perfect life. There is violence. And one last thing... Violence!
Hitchcock
Clint Eastwood
Steven Spielberg
Directors I would never subject myself to their torture
Ron Howard
M Night S.
Ridley Scott later stuff
Actors I gladly watch anything they do
Humphrey Bogart
Cary Grant
Clark Gable
Johnny Depp
Denzil Washington
Actors I would not sit down and watch
Ben Affleck
Eric Roberts
Actresses I love to watch
Carla Gugino
Julia Roberts
Hilary Swank
Sometimes I feel guilty or uncomfortable watching Bond because obviously there are moments when it does glorify violence.
So I agree in general with this thesis.
But I personally would not want to watch any ultra violent films. I do not even enjoy many horror films. They make me feel sick. I think excessive violence in games is detrimental. Yet I feel that artistic freedom is important. I draw the line, though, at people or animals being hurt or abused during filming. Everything for art, is NOT okay if it crosses a moral line in the making of it.
Well, I could try to make a list, but generally speaking I think they beef up some of the action sequences in the violence department simply for sensation. And of course, there's cases in which the villain acts with such cruelty... For example when Onatopp shoots all of those people in that Severnaya bunker; of course it fits the character and it does further the story which is why I'm willing to excuse it, but it's still extremely unpleasant to watch because I feel like the filmmakers intended for me to enjoy it.
Granted though, for such an action oriented series, Bond films feature fairly little execcive violence. Maybe it's one of the reasons why I like it so much, I really don't know. But because Bond is getting more serious and realistic I feel like the violence portrayed in the movies is following a same trend, while in the past it all felt fairly benine. Perhaps that's an incorrect conclusion of mine, but I'm sure all of you who disagree will tell me so. :p
One example: We could have seen Valenka's arm actually cut off in CR. Other films would have done that. Bond couldn't go that far, and I didn't need to see anything that extreme in a Bond film.
In general, I am quite happy with the way Bond handles violence.
Bond violence is mainly of the cartoon variety with obvious exceptions (Krest, Slate, etc.). Bond is basically an adult cartoon that flirts with reality for an occasional jolt.
Movies like Taxi Driver get all too real with violence, and it's disturbing, but it serves the story.
Movies like Hostel porn up violence, making the violence the story itself and the plot secondary. I actually accidentally saw Hostel with my Brother In Law, and I was revolted. Never again. Yuck.
Violence in movies & TV is bad for people with certain forms of mental illness, but then so are alcohol, forks & motorized vehicles.
The trend began in the 1960's with such films like "Bonnie and Clyde" and "The Wild Bunch".
I am partial to the "leave it to the imagination" line of thought.
Take "Predator" (IMO Arnold's Best film) that was a gore fest and quite graphic but I always felt it was condusive to the narrative. While a film like "Total Recall" just went too far.
Perhaps back in the day, the directors wanted to portray gore but the censors said, "Nyet". In the original theatrical release of "King Kong", there were some scenes that were cut: Kong stepping on a native with lots of blood; bitting men in New York and Skull Island; the scene where he dropped the woman head first from that high building. (Of course these scenes were restored when the film came out on home video back in the eighties. )
I don't like Taxi Driver mostly because of the way in which it portrays violence. Yes, it's inextricably part of the story, but to me it crosses a line. It's a problem I have with more of Scorsese's work, and it's a pity because he's such a gifted filmmaker. Whenever I watch The Age of Innocence for example I can't help wishing he would make more movies that don't have any violence in them.
Still appreciate Taxi Driver for Bernard Herrmann's amazing soundtrack though.
And that line is very subjective. I seriously doubt that, but I believe that anything and everything we watch has to be digested on a less conscious level, and certain things are harder to digest than others.
Violence itself is a very subjective thing. To some, physical combat is violence, to others, passive-aggressive relationship dramas are violence.
I think hinted-at violence can be more interesting than openly shown violence, but I would lie if I said I wasn´t fascinated by those two The Raid films ;-).
Sex on the other hand, even though not today´s topic, I prefer hinted at. I never liked explicit sex scenes. In Bond films for instance I find it much more fun if you only see Bond and some lady starting something that could be a mere kiss but everybody knows it´s more. Can´t say the same about violence ;-).
I knew someone was going to debate that. I don't know if we are allowed to link to external sites (I just read the New Users Guide again and what we can and can't do still seems a bit vague), but if you want I could refer to a few academic articles that I think would make for an interesting read.
People exposed to REAL VIOLENCE use violence.
I came from a home with some domestic violence, then on top of that I was picked on by bullies from grade through Junior High. Instead of going crazy & getting hold of a weapon that would land me in juvie I took martial art classes. I systematically disassembled my bully hierarchy with my skills then shut down the domestic problem with little more than the promise of a knock out and a hard stare. At 15 years old I was triumphant. I continued with martial arts for the next thirty years and never had to draw blood again. And I had watched just about every violent movie ever made. I was naturally a non-violent guy, and Bruce Lee gave me the idea to study martial arts. Violence in movies gave me an idea, but did NOT increase my aggression.
Aggressive people are aggressive because of mental illness or traumatic life situation in which they feel helpless, not because they saw a Rambo movie.
I believe some people are naturally more inclined to be aggressive, yes. And we have different triggers throughout our lives, especially when we are growing up. Different people react differently to the same thing. Some people in abusive homes or environments continue that cycle in the worst way - becoming too violent, abusing others, becoming the worst kind of bullies - but certainly not all, as you are a good example of overcoming that in a good way, chrisisall. Even though you needed to resort to physical skills to defend yourself, difuse situations, and help resolve your serious problems, you did so within limited guidelines from what I can tell.
Concerning movie violence, I can tolerate a fair dose of it but, a point already well made by the likes of @SuzanneStone and @4EverBonded, it doesn't have to be celebrated. Two interesting cases are Henry: Portrait Of A Serial Killer and Cannibal Holocaust. Both films are pretty upsetting, stomach-turning and at times vomit-inducing. Yet I watch them - not often but occasionally.
It's not so much what we see but what's implied that makes me feel pretty uncomfortable watching Henry. Senseless violence to fight boredom, anti-social issues and sexual frustration is what the film talks about, but it also brings nuance and a sense of realism. One cannot help thinking that watching Henry is worth the effort because we can crawl inside the twisted mind of the worst kind of people, yet sadly people who live among us.
Cannibal Holocaust really does deal in explicit images. We witness a naked woman being disfigured around the vaginal area as part of some tribal ritual. We see a turtle decapitated and rumour has it that the budget was too small to afford special effects. Myth or not, the scene plays very realistically and it isn't pleasant to watch a fully grown, harmless, living turtle get sliced up by machete for no reason other than our entertainment (?). Next we have a group of so-called civilised filmmakers burning down a native village so they can collect "unique" footage for their picture.
Because both Henry and Cannibal Holocaust try to convince us that this is reality, their violence stings a lot harder than all the fakery in 'forbidden' cult classics like Ilsa: She-Wolf Of The SS or Eaten Alive. I guess I can handle things better when they're just OTT.
What I find confusing, in a way, is that most ultra-violent films I typically cannot "enjoy" but feel compelled to watch as a challenge of sorts, really do make me contemplate things. Hence, the original I Spit On Your Grave, Uwe Boll's highly exploitative yet nonetheless unsettling Stoic, Rampage and Auschwitz, and some other docu-style shock films, are part of my collection. I don't feel well when watching them, but I walk away with strong ideas about certain things and then I can easily spend many hours thinking about the nature of violence and such. I suppose that's why movie violence isn't necessarily something I cower away from.
Big words for a 14+ year old but it forever changed the family dynamic.
Still, I carry with me to this day the guilt that it took me so long to come to my Mother's aid.
Movie violence's influence is like anything else, a tool for possible change, or an excuse to be an arseh*le.
Violence is part of the Human existence, and to exclude it from 'entertainment' would be to deny its relevance in the real world IMHO.
Movies you considered perfect as a child but are now embarrassed about.</font></center>
* ID4:
For the record, I still like that film but in the second half of the 90s I really thought of it as THE BEST MOVIE EVER MADE!!!! I had bought it on VHS and practically forced people like my mother, my aunt, a former teacher and some other adults to watch that tape. And they all told me it was, um, okay but nothing special and in fact a little chaotic and noisy. I was shocked each time I heard adults complain about certain aspects of ID4. NOW of course, I can see the weaknesses. I blush when I remember how I worshipped that film back in the day. How naive I was. ;-)
* Terminal Velocity:
Oh boy... I'm so embarrassed about this one.
* Hudson Hawk:
Okay, leave me alone. I feel bad enough. ;-)
Okay: Father Goose, with Cary Grant and Leslie Caron
Not embarrassed about the film per se, but if everybody knew how much I wanted to live this movie, that would be a tad embarrassing. For some reason, I thought being stranded on an island with Cary Grant during a war, with me being Leslie Caron of course, was the height of pure fun. (I was like 7 or 8 years old I think). I use to daydream about it. Maybe it was just early hormones kicking in subconsciously. I was pretty enamored of Cary all along, now that I think of it.
What else? Well, offhand, I'll add: Oliver! to that.
Again, the film is very well done (I'm having a hard time coming up with embarrassing films for this list) ... but I turned into a street performer, albeit a little blonde Tomboy singing in a terrible cockney accent, dancing around everywhere (theater, shopping center, my entire neighborhood). It was part of my ongoing love affair with all things British that saturated my childhood (yes, The Beatles were mostly to blame for that).
"Consider yourself at 'ome; Consider yourself one of the family!" ad nauseum ... ;)
I agree that violence in films definetely shouldn't be abolished but this is a pretty stupid thing to say. There have been cases where it's pretty clear that the people involved were influenced by films and no, I'm not a PC worshipping idiot.
The main one that springs to mind is from back in the 90s, when those two ten year old boys kidnapped and killed a two year old boy in Liverpool. One of the boys was constantly watching violent films (he'd seen I spit on your grave apparently) had watched Childs Play 3 just before that. At the end of the film, Chucky (covered in blue paint) gets run over by a train. The boys who had abducted the little kid took him to some train tracks, covered the poor two year old in blue paint and after beatng him to death, left him on the tracks. I don't think I'm a "politically correct worshipping idiot" for thinking that the film influenced them.
Now the boys that did it were obviously very messed up, sick, evil; people probably because of how they were bought up (they both came from dodgy, abusive backgrounds). It's not the films fault, they were evil little psychos, but it did influence the way they killed him.
I'm not saying violence in films should be abolished but it's silly to say that films don't influence the real worlds crimes in some cases. They do.
Anyway, I can't really think of many films I loved as a kid that I'm embarassed about now. I liked Robocop 2 when I first saw it but when I rewatched it as an adult, that was pretty bad (but in my defense, when I first watched it I hadn't seen the first one). I also used to like Over The Top, which was an arm wrestling film with Sylvester Stallone. Actually I'm not embarassed about that. I haven't seen it for ages but when I put it in words like that (a Stallone film about arm wrestling) it sounds awesome.
Nah, I still enjoy that film :)
Good to know, @thelivingroyale! :D I love that film. Charles Dance is perfect in it and I love that faux trailer of Arnold as Hamlet. :P "This time, Hamlet takes out he trash!"
Peter Gabriel singing "In Your Eyes" ... :) Oh that can't count anyway; I was not a child then.
Still working on embarrassing films.
Okay: I adored as a kid (and still enjoy so not overly embarrassed) ALL the Shirley Temple movies! Yes, all of them.
Firsty, it is worth noting that Jon Venables had been physically and sexually abused from a very early age, which is undoubtedly the main cause for him to do the horrible things he did (I think Robert Thompson also had a pretty poor upbringing).
Secondly, your tenuous link to Child's Play 3 has never been proven. To this day, no evidence has ever been provided that Venables had even watched the film prior to the murder. It was a story ran by the tabloids at the time in response to the shock and anger of our society who were looking for a reason as to why two 10 year old children would murder a toddler in such a brutal fashion.
Now, was it an unhappy coincidence? The Matrix is released in '99 and turns out immensely popular. Next, madmen dress like Neo - which is still fairly normal, I mean it's not like the black coat / sunglasses combo is as unique to The Matrix as the white Stormtrooper outfit is to Star Wars - and people blame the Wachowskis.
Can I quote Billy Loomis from Scream? "Now Sid, don't you blame the movies. Movies don't create psychos. Movies make psychos more creative!"