Do not blame the movie.
Do not blame director Christopher Nolan or Christian Bale stars.
But maybe it's good to have a discussion about the culture of entertainment are proficient in selling the power fantasy of violence to people who feel helpless.
Initially, little is known about the gunman Aurora, Colo., that killed 12 in the middle of the night showing of we know his age (24), and his name (James Holmes) "The Dark Knight Rises."; Fact the latter is not relevant, the the former may be less so. The audience that has become the most breathless in anticipation of the third and final movie in the series "Dark Knight" - the audience for whom it's not only movies but top pop their lives - were young. But motive is not known, although unconfirmed reports at the time of the press that Holmes told police he did he could be a fan who lost contact with reality "Joker.". He could be political. Or maybe he's just released "The Dark Knight Rises" as well as potential stage. In which all Americans (or all of the Americans who mattered to him) at midnight on Thursday? On this film. Where a place for him to finally be seen, good to hear, to make an impact? Elsewhere.
The gunman was planning an attack for the first local public screening of the film, and it's almost certain he did not see himself. Let's be clear about this: James Holmes is not the poster child for anything but the pain in his head. However difficult, at this point, to completely separate the actions of a madman single all-encompassing mania gave birth to the series in a surprising number of people. For millions, "The Dark Knight Rises" is just a movie (and, critics, which is very good). For vocal contingent in the suburbs, it's much more - a film that should be perfect for the world to make sense at all.
Earlier this week, the popular movie review aggregation site Rotten Tomatoes suspended user comments for "The Dark Knight Rises" for fans who directs several death threats and threats of rape at the critics who dared to give this film less than perfect score. Reviewers like the Christy Lemire Associated Press and movie blogger Marshall Arts promised physical extinction because they dared not like movies that they post a threat does not even look.
There's something really terrible happened here: titled fanboy mentality, enabled by the anonymity of screen names, moving and thinking as a mass and reacts to any deviation from praise to outrage round a spoiled child. Of course there are many level-headed response to the board Rotten Tomatoes and elsewhere, of course not all the fanboys (and girls) are stupid immature. But enough of them to dominate the discourse, and assuming they are frightening to contemplate: If someone does not like this movie, he deserved to die. Oh, wait, are you kidding? They're just words, pixels on the screen? How does that set you free? If you are a real human being threatened with violence while hiding behind a wall DrkKnghtFan, what consequences does it have for the intended victim, the community, for your soul?
More pressingly, it needs to be asked, why fantasy fantasy in general and in particular means so much to so many people? Why attack a few negative reviews for the film as an attack on their own identity? When the second film in the trilogy Nolan "Batman", "The Dark Knight," came out in 2008, it was awesome to see so many members of the generation that does not have a cultural focal point of finding them in this respect, the way previous generations have rallied around The Beatles or "Nevermind" or "Titanic." Even more so: I remember (and write about at the time) a young man I met who equate the impact of "Dark Knight" for the Kennedy assassination and the Challenger disaster as an event that young people come together and give them as they determine.
Really? A movie? (. And I say this as someone who has devoted a lifetime to see, write, and think about the movie) That's a sign of several things, one of which is that Nolan is very skilled at making films that matter - a move to larger sizes beautiful and asking big questions about where the world will be knocking while we fool with explosive action and drama and superhero in pain. His films do not explain the world we confusing, but they reflect that confusion with the skills catharsis, a way that feels right if you do not know how to find the words to yourself. They are hardly political, but they reflect the powerlessness we feel about politics and society - about our lives - that resonates with power. Not surprisingly, then, the mass-fan online seems to be more ruthless protector of superhero films Nolan of "The Avengers" or "The Amazing Spider-Man" (although they can be ugly about them, too). And what a coincidence that the gunman appeared in the movie Aurora is not a summer blockbuster that different? Maybe he wants to mean as much to us as "The Dark Knight" meant to him.
Or maybe not. He's probably just another crazy person, with no ax to grind about this or any film. But I would not be surprised to learn that he was responding, in psychosis, for the tortured fantasies of power that this film - and many of popular culture aimed at young people in particular - into a fantasy That trade is now everywhere. It is possible for us, of any age or sex, to avoid the reality of the day in America by keeping our eyes fixed on our screens. They are on our walls at home and in restaurants, in our living rooms and bedrooms, we toted in a backpack, fitting neatly into our hands. Screens we sell a lot of things: video games both benign and ultra-violent, empty "news" about celebrities, Facebook posts from our most intimate friends 2864, trailers for the latest Hollywood blockbuster in which man flying through the air and blow up everything that is bad in their lives. The display shows that we care, each and every one of us. Turning off the screen to face the world is saying, in many cases, no, you really do not.
That's hard, especially if you are still figuring out who you are and a superhero, beautifully conflict (or supervillain) reflects your self-image. Our culture's entertainment dreams of power is a drug that makes us kidnapped in a cloud of promise: that we can win and winning is everything and that we will be seen and heard for who we are if we are thin enough or strong enough or have a cool toy or the biggest guns. Fantasy lie, because people know we are making a desperate fantasy to be lied to and are willing to pay for it. And often, when we're selling the fantasy that is so well made, which seem to push so deep into our very real sense of the disaster is imminent, and that seems so self-conscious about the fantasy itself, certain people respond to it as if it were truth. "The Dark Knight" movie-like fantasy, and if they matter to you as something more than a very well crafted and provocative entertainment, you really need to interrogate ourselves (and maybe your friends) as to why.
A final thought: The idea is quite a bit mask is important in this regard. Superhero movies dominate the box office that we are all about the mild-mannered secret identity and power that comes with wearing a face mask. We live every day through digital mask: a screen name, online personas, Twitter feeds, Facebook posts, and so on, any attempt to show the world the face we want, not the face we fear we have. Gunmen wearing masks in Aurora, also, to protect themselves from tear gas, or to avoid being seen, or to play with a sad fantasy in his head that he personified Doom is not an angry 24-year.
In reality - real reality, perhaps you've forgotten? - No one wearing a mask. Someday people will have to face it
Source : http://www.boston.com/ae/movies/2012/07/20/fantasy-masks-and-james-holmes-the-dark-knight-rises-killer/7xPjZWzV6WBWrXGb6Cz0dJ/story-1.html
