NCJ Number
160253
Date Published
1995
Length
4 pages
Annotation
Producers, directors, actors, critics, and others involved in the entertainment industry are all to blame for the excessive violence in movies; too often these people see movie violence as sophisticated, rather than as disgusting, pointless, and ultimately harmful.
Abstract
Many American movies celebrate violence for the sake of it and for the money it produces. They also promote the sexualization of violence. Movie critics either accept such violence as artistically laudable or inconsequential to a movie's impact. Hollywood's use of extreme violence is now consuming film-making to the exclusion of all other ways of life. There is seldom a portrayal of the violence of poverty that is endemic in the United States. In a country that has the highest rate of gun- related crimes in the world, the highest rate of imprisonment in the world, and the greatest social divisions, it is irresponsible for those who produce media content to aggravate and reinforce these trends. In the wake of the My Lai massacre in 1969, the author of this paper conducted a series of interviews with U.S. soldiers who had murdered civilians. All but one of them referred to war and crime movies as their cultural guide. Since then, Hollywood has become even more flagrant in portraying violence as normative behavior, particularly for young males. Film critics also act irresponsibly as they become part of the selling of violent films. One film critic -- in reviewing "One False Move," a particularly violent film -- described the film as having "undertones of Greek tragedy," and another critic used similar language in saying the film has "the taut inexorability of Greek tragedy."