Couldn't do it.
This is entertainment?
We think it's a good story? Children watching men and women carve eachother, driven to the edge of humanity for the sake of survival?
You think that's fiction?
Fools.
Children see their parents murdered every day.
It's not glory.
It's not legend.
It's horrid.
It's sad.
Children.
When will it end?
I don't think I can watch violent movies any more.
The knowledge is too much.
There is nothing for which I would wage war.
War is not righteous.
War is carnage.
War is animal.
I had the same experience with American History X. And Saving Private Ryan.
Saving Private Ryan had as much to do with me becoming a pacifist as anything.
That child in Gangs of New York watched hundreds of men kill eachother. Watched his father be killed and then had nothing left.
Maybe he brings peace in the end because he sees the futility.
I'll never know.
I watched Gangs of New York when I was a junior in high school and it was the first time that a movie made me physically ill. I felt awful. I used to be able to say "it's a movie" and "that's not real". I think that movie was the turning point for me and gore. Now I feel sick if someone talks about blood. I'm with ya.
ReplyDeleteThank you for your sensitivity. I spend my days listening to stories of human torture and trauma. Sometimes I feel like I am in shock, and other times I am astounded at the resiliency and creativity that seeps from these victims. Their post-traumatic growth puts me in awe.
ReplyDeleteStill, I don't understand how this can happen (right now, in real life) and be permitted by governments and coorporations and life in general...
Thanks for the information that this critically-acclaimed movie is one I should never watch. I am always glad to hear from others who can't handle violent movies (I find that they're often pacifists, but I don't know which comes first). I don't understand the attitude that being able to watch gory movies is a point of pride. I do not think my aversion to depictions of violence is a weakness.
ReplyDeleteI felt that way about the movie Natural Born Killers. I still feel that way, just thinking about it. I choose not to watch movies like that anymore as well.
ReplyDeleteWow...what a blog post. I read it like 4 times!! It was that good. I see that you are friends with Jennifer Horn. That is how I found your blog. Anyhow, I am her children's daycare provider! Glad I found your blog...I will get some good reads out of it!
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