In that, she's absolutely right. But, you know, I just couldn't deal with it.
I hear almost daily a litany of these kinds of stories on the news... We all do.
We hear about children being kidnapped, raped, murdered, abused, etc., and sometimes it just gets to be too much to bear. I get to the point where I feel that if I hear just one more sad story, I'll just lose it.
How does that relate to the remake of WOTWs?
Well, about a month or so ago, I was watching one of the early trailers and, in one scene, a bunch of families basically are wiped out by the cold, ruthless aliens. Men, women, children, instantly incinerated as if they never even existed.
And I immediately thought to myself, "if I see that movie, and they have a lot of scenes like that one, I'm going to feel terrible for a long time to come." Either that, or I'm going to have to shrug it off and treat it like it doesn't mean anything.
But I don't want to just shrug it off and, if you ask me, Steven Spielberg doesn't want me to either.
If I shrug off the violence of the movie, then I have to lessen my sensitivity to human suffering. Yes, the suffering in the movie is all make-believe, but heardening your heart to that which you see in the movie can mean that you harden your heart to REAL human suffering; of which there is much.
Spielberg does not want you to simply shrug off the violence because he WANTS the movie to have an affect. Moviemakers want you to be moved and affected by their work; it's one of the main reasons why they make films in the first place. And in the case of movies like "Saving Private Ryan," and "Schindler's List," you should be moved!
Films like "Schindler's List" and "Saving Private Ryan" remind us how bad and how good humanity can be. From the depravity of the Nazis who tried to eradicate an entire culture, to the goodness and bravery of people like Oscar Schindler (Schindler's List) and Captain John Miller (Saving Private Ryan), who sacrificed everything to do the right thing.
Do you remember in the movie "Schindler's List" the scene where Oscar Schindler is sitting on his horse, having gone for a brisk and enjoyable ride through the countryside, overlooking a town where the Nazis are rounding up Jews? The Nazis were beating them up, shooting them, looting their homes, brutalizing the women.
Article comments
1 - RJ
Oh, this is one movie I am amped for!
I must admit to being a bit infatuated with "end of the world" movies. I absolutely loved Independence Day, for example.
Does this say something bad about me? Or our culture (these movies generally do quite well as the Box Office...?
2 - -E
I don't think that a hardened heart against violence in movies means you will be less concerned about violence in the real world. I love films like Pulp Fiction and Boondock Saints. The unforgiving violence is a source of humor in them. In real life? I've been known to cry just thinking that people have to suffer from [insert whatever people suffer from] or even suffer from it on a regular basis.
What do I think that means? I think it means that parents, teachers, guardians, role models, and every adult has to make sure they teach that very thing- that being ok with death or pain in a movie doesn't mean it is "no biggie" in real life, but quite the opposite. I think these movies provide people with a sort of release where it is ok to see it and not have to react emotionally. It is an escape from reality in that sense. That way, when you go home and turn on the 10 o'clock news you have just that much more in you to be able to handle the world and react accordingly.
3 - Steve S
I love horror, sci-fi, battle epic, military, thriller, espionage, action and hitchcock films! I also love to read Clive Barker and HP Lovecraft and can hold my own against veteran Doom players, armed with only a chainsaw. But I also care still enough about lives that I'm willing to be called a ranting fool for trying to save them.
I guess it's different for everybody. I get caught up and emotional in the sweeping epics and great cinematography and in tragic love stories.
4 - Eric Olsen
very thoughtful David, and the thinking viewer does have to reconcile the often tossed off mass violence of film and TV as "entertainment." I agree entirely that Savign Private Ryan and Schindler were in no way gratuitous and forced you to FEEL the loss.
We picked up the original Star Wars trilogy DVD sert over the weekend, and I was reminded that the destruction of an entire planet by the Death Star was perhaps the most massive act of murder in screen history, yet it carried relatively little emotional weight, which bothered me quite a bit.
5 - DrPat
Should this be in Video? Maybe as a secondary category, at least?
6 - David Flanagan
DrPat: Good point, I've updated the categories to include a few video categories like "horror," "scifi," and "movies."
RJ: I loved ID4 too. I still like the movie. I wasn't a Dad yet when that movie came out, but I think of the scene where the First Lady is dying from internal injuries in a hospital bed and she wants to see her daughter so that she can say goodbye. That was a moving scene in an otherwise shallow action epic.
As scifi goes, ID4 is first rate. Not much there in the way of plot and character development though. With that said, Spielberg is a master at character development, as he has demonstrated over and over again. I thought "Minority Report" was a fascinating movie, not the greatest scifi flick I've ever seen, but one in which we got to know the characters and the motivations of the characters.
War of The Worlds will likely be a powerful movie, and I'm worried that the mass slaughter side of the movie is going to very tough to deal with. It gets too depressing for me sometimes.
Anyway, thanks to everyone for your great comments.
David