 |
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
 |
Posted: |
Sep 14, 2010 - 12:44 AM
|
|
|
|
By: |
DeputyRiley
(Member)
|
About the violence - it just seemed trendy to me. Like porn. In the days of classic filmmakers like Peckinpah and De Palma, Carpenter etc, such acts were seen as horrific and painful and were terrible things that happened to people we identified with, and those who used them had consequences. The type of film popular now (Death Proof, Inlglourious Basterds, Hostel, Saw) uses cheap violence and sadism as the point in itself, we laugh and invite those values inside and then movies change their normal values. On another level we're attracted because it's in us too. Or not. Just typing.
Interesting, Michael Ware. I have really wanted to post something here about my recent feelings towards what I classify as "vile violence" (vs. "dignified violence")...I really have thought about it a lot and I simply cannot come up with a sound explanation of my reaction to violence and gore lately, but I have this strange urge to share my thoughts here. So please, do not expect much from what I'm about to say, but I really want to get a few points off my chest...I'm really not making any kind of statement because I'm contradicting myself and can't really figure out what my point is...
Anyway, I have identified what I call "vile violence" that is really unpleasant to watch on film, examples being Piranha 3D, The Departed, and now Watchmen to name a few. Something about that violence, perhaps as Michael Ware said "trendy" and I'd add sensationalistic, it's not silly or fun "dignified violence" such as the respectful yet over-the-top stuff in say Braveheart or Saving Private Ryan. This is completely and utterly a matter of opinion, but I just wanted to share...something about the violence in Piranha 3d, The Departed, Watchmen...it just kind of offends me, I feel it's totally tasteless and the Eli Roth-mentality of a director kid in a candy store saying "Hey look I'm directing a movie check out the neat gore I've added which adds absolutely nothing to the movie" (which could easily be said for films such as Friday the 13th or Saw but those movies really work for me) and ultimately is nothing more than an unpleasant and annoying distraction.
The problem with me saying this is, I love the Saw movies. Not for the gore, as I've stated many times before, in fact the gore in the Saw films are my least favorite aspect, but it never takes anything away from the movie. This is where I'm being hypocritical because I can see great similarity between the use of gore in Saw and Watchmen, it's sadistic and sick, but one heavily detracts from one movie and the other I'm able to just dismiss without being affected. And I don't know why.
I also love the Friday the 13th movies, all of them, and I love the violence in them, they are a crucial part of the fabric of those movies, and when I hear how the MPAA forced F13 directors to trim their violence down to soft R it really bugs me. I can say though, that if the Friday the 13th films didn't entertain me to such a strong degree, I would probably be irritated by and find fault in their use of violence. Yet those movies are so much fun for me, and the violence just kind of follows suit, even though on some tiny level I recognize that it's vacuous violence that really could be construed as pointless to some, and I respect that, but I grew up with those movies, was scared by them as a kid, and now as an adult recognize and revel in their 100% embrace of what they are, without making any apology because the F13 films know their target audience and know what niche they're filling. Apologies, as that last point was worded poorly and probably made no sense. I really defend the violence in the Friday the 13th films and most slasher films (Texas Chainsaw, Nightmare on Elm Street, Halloween).
Even though I think the original Halloween is a masterpiece and admirably features no gore, I also absolutely love Carpenter's Halloween II and like how that film took the gore approach, I think it made for a great Halloween film and a nice contrast to the already admittedly terrifying bloodless original film. Ironically, even though I dislike "trendy" gore, I do think that Carpenter's (or technically Rosenthal's) Halloween II was totally being trendy, injecting copious amounts of violence to compete in the Friday the 13th market. Then you have Zombie's ludicrously trashy and unwatchable Halloween remakes, where the violence is really no worse than the violence in the original Halloween II except that Zombie makes it joyless, loathsome, and vile. But then...I really liked his use of violence in House of 1000 Corpses and Devil's Rejects where I thought the disturbing quality of the shocking gore helped intensify the films' terrifying scariness (to me).
Roger Ebert has said some interesting things regarding violence in slasher films, and he's extremely opposed to and offended by it (check out his reviews of Friday the 13th Part 2 and Halloween II on his website for example) -- I really respect Ebert's opinions but I completely disagree with his reaction to those two early 80's slasher films, he takes it way too seriously (which I'm sure I do in other cases) and misses the point that the violence in those films, especially at that time, was part of the fun of being young and going to the movies and being shocked and scared, but in a fun way. However, although I don't agree with his reaction to the violence in F13 Part 2 and Halloween II I can easily apply his opinion and reasoning of being unpleasantly turned off by the violence to other horror/non-horror movies, so it seemingly boils down to specific reaction to specific violence in specific films, and how said violence works with (or for, or against) the story, genre, or intention.
I'm fully aware of my rampant contradictions, I'm just really ambivalent about violence in horror movies, a genre that I adore, but also about violence in mainstream big pics like Saving Private Ryan and The Departed. I hated the gore in The Departed -- I felt like it was really a pretentious effect Scorsese was going for, the stark reality of violence in realistic situations and so forth, but it was so over-the-top when, in this specific case, I didn't feel like it needed to be, and it was just plain unpleasantly distracting in the worst possible way. It made me feel bad somehow, as did the violence in Watchmen. When Rorschach meat-cleavers the murderer in the skull in silhouette, I was just like, "Really? Do you need to be that flamboyant and shock tactic?" The character had what was coming to him and the act helped explain Rorschach's mentality, but I thought it was really tasteless and gratuitously vile. I really don't know what to say, I know it doesn't make any sense...
Added to which, I hate the Hostel films. The distinction between the Hostel films and the Saw films is I believe the Saw movies are much more ambitious and complex plot-wise, and the gore is making a point, wherein the Hostel movies contain no ambition except to be as gross and disturbing as possible.
It's late and I'd love to get into it more, but I've already written a lot and I just wanted to mention these thoughts in no particular cohesive order. Would love to hear anyone's thoughts on this. Thanks fo' yo' time! 
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
 |
Posted: |
Sep 14, 2010 - 7:05 AM
|
|
|
|
By: |
mastadge
(Member)
|
Roger Ebert has said some interesting things regarding violence in slasher films, and he's extremely opposed to and offended by it
I love Ebert. I frequently disagree with him, but I think he's a smart and funny guy. That said, he seems only to object to violence when it isn't cartoonish enough. His hatred of Fight Club (Ebert: **) seemed to boil down to the movie featuring a character who is permanently disfigured from being beaten in the face. He objects that Kick-Ass (Ebert: *) is "morally reprehensible" in the way it depicts a child dishing out violence to and taking a beating from criminals, but seems to find the children cutting each other with swords and murdering civilians in Percy Jackson (Ebert: ***) okay and doesn't seem to have any objection to the attempted forced rape at gunpoint in Hot Tub Time Machine (Ebert: ***) either. He seems to use disgust as a guide to morality -- as long as the morally reprehensible action is bloodless or in the context of a gag (haha the black guy has a giant penis so this near-rape is funny!), it's okay, but let it get graphic and suddenly it's wrong wrong WRONG!
I want to have a conversation with him and point out that personal disgust is not a guide to morality, but rather in this context an indication of one's own personal limits for exposure to gore.
For me, Deputy, although my mileage for violence is clearly different from yours, I get what you're saying, although I'd use different terms -- I generally believe there's no such thing as "dignified violence", for one thing. Fictional violence doesn't faze me at all. In life, I'm an extremely gentle soul and have never hit anyone in anger and rarely even raise my voice in argument. I'm all about human rights, animal rights, nonviolent resolutions to problems whenever possible, and so forth. While cruelty bothers me, though, gore does not. When people are injured, I just deal with it. The sight of blood or fat or organs or bones or anything else that's usually under the skin suddenly being outside the skin doesn't sicken me. And gore doesn't bother me in movies either. What bothers me in movies is not how realistic or sensationalized or stylized the violence is, but whether the level of violence fits the film. I don't have any problem with the cartoony violence of Piranha, even if it is bloody. Part of my loathing for Percy Jackson is it's a kid's film in which the hero murders (albeit bloodlessly) a civilian, and there's no problem with that. It's the morality behind the violence, not the violence itself, that bothers me. I don't have a problem with armies clashing, but I do have a problem if a movie goes the route of "realistic" violence, but does not also show the effects that real violence has upon the people who commit it or survive it. I don't have a problem with sensationalized violence per se, but I do have a problem with sensationalized violence when it involves our heroes sensationally but unnecessarily killing people, and then we're still expected to see them as heroes. To me, it's not about the presentation or the extremity of the violence, but how the violence fits in the context of the film.
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
| |
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
