Wondering if anyone remembers any of the headlines about copying things from movies,
Andrew B, you may have to help out on this one....
I recall a scene in tv ads for "The Program" where the football players were lying prone on a yellow highway line at nighttime as some kind of hazing stunt. Apparently, some kid thought this would be a good idea to try and got splattered all over a highway in the real world. Not too surprisingly, the scene was pulled from theaters.
Anyone else remember headlines like this, where someone couldn't make that separation of film and reality?
I remember that!
"Jackass" the TV show has inspired legions of idiotic teens to "be cool" and attempt their own stunts despite the warning preceding the show.
I recall the stunt where the kid got hit by the car his friend was driving and ended up in the hospital for weeks.
Also, remember how Beavis & Butthead supposedly inspired kids to burn down their trailers & houses?
They cut all scenes of Beavis holding a lighter and saying, "Fire Fire Fire!"
Morons....all of them!
Post Edited (08-13-03 22:07)
How many of these people were in drug induced states and how many who copy movie stunts are just plain stupid.
Watching James Bond movies forced me to build a huge doomsday laser in my basement. Watch the skies.
Brother R
I read a lot of stories of THE EXORCIST freaking people out, but that movie just seemed to cause mass hysteria back then. In that case I think it just triggered something in certain people who were already mentally ill.
Remember that War of the Worlds radio broadcast drove the nation into national emergency. Farmers were standing waiting for the aliens with their shotguns ready. Amazing how cool radio used to be...
I'm one more Albert Pyun movie away from doing something brash. What that is, I don't quite know. But it won't be pretty.
But seriously, movies are one of the major scapegoats (besides video games and music) of violence amongst teenagers and in the media. I mean, who could forget that the Matrix was questioned because of those two dopes who shot up Columbine? After all, they were wearing trenchcoats, and the Matrix is the first movie where the characters wore trenchcoats. Sure.
I'm not gonna get into this argument, because to me, it holds no weight or validity. But yeah, I remember the whole hoopla surrounding the Program and Beavis and Butthead. More movies have been under scrutiny, but I can't remember which off of the top of my head.
Nick
THE ROCKY HORROR PICTURE SHOW made me want to wear womens' clothing.
Just kidding.
REALLY . . . I'm just kidding . . .
There were more than a few people who shot themselves attempting to duplicate the Russian Roulette scene in THE DEER HUNTER.
just read this in an article at this site: http://www.nald.ca/province/que/litcent/media2/media3.htm
"In his summation, the Judge stated that it was the violence in the film, "Child's Play III" which may have played a role in the Bulger murder, although Buckingham pointed out that there are no similarities between the events of the murder and events in the film. This, nevertheless, led to calls for censorship in Britain, and in 1994, legislation was passed to counteract "video nasties" there.
Buckingham used the term "moral panic" to describe what actually went on around this event and referred once again to a tendency to blame the media for undesirable social developments. This tendency is not new and dates back to when Plato wrote about the young poets of the time, specifically Homer. What is disturbing about this kind of response is that it is based in the belief that there is one explanation for an undesirable situation."
there was also a bit of hoopla about a couple who did a series of crimes a few years back, maybe killed some ppl, and they blamed it on a movie when they faced court. can't remember the name of it though.
NATURAL BORN KILLERS might be the one you're talking about. A couple killed a clerk in Louisiana and mentioned they had been "inspired" by the film.
The crazy part is, the girl was my state's Attorney General's daughter!
THE ROCKY HORROR PICTURE SHOW made me want to wear womens' clothing.
Just kidding.
So what is your excuse, then? :)
The big incident that jumped to my mind was supposedly inspired by "The BasketBall Diaries." I even found a news article:
http://www.onlineathens.com/1997/120597/1205.a3prayershooting.html
I have caught stories like this over the years. It seems like a few types of movies make the worst come out in some people:
Racing Movies
Vampire Movies
Crime Movies (where the bad guys are the central characters)
Doing some quick checking via google, I ran across these two tidbits:
March 1987 - Tim Erickson and two other Minnesota teenagers, admitted members of a "vampire cult" inspired by the movie The Lost Boys, murder a 30-yr old drifter and drink his blood. Erickson is sentenced to life in prison.
http://www.rense.com/ufo6/HUMSAC.htm
In 1995, two teenagers, Sarah Edmondson and Benjamin Darras, watched Oliver Stone's "Natural Born Killers," did some acid, then went out and shot two people. Patsy Byers was paralyzed and William Savage was killed.
http://www.statenews.com/editionssummer99/080599/ms_col.html
I can also say that my group of friends was inspired by "Highlander" when we were young. Yup, we took wiffle ball bats (often wrapped with electrical tape and even string wrapped hilts) and would chase each other around, whacking away. Not good to get caught at the Dairy Queen without your sword when another immortal dropped in for a waffle cone.
I find that any one who attempts to renact the things they see in movies, and are injured or killed by them probably shouldn't be allowed to reproduce any ways.
Yeah, Sarah Edmonson was the daughter of the OK State Attorney General.
I got a couple.
Thelma and Louise
When Louise (Sarandon) and Thelma (Davis) drove their car off the cliff at the end of the film, alot of people started committing suicide this way. As this method of suicide hadn't been used to a great extent before, people started thinking it was due to the film.
Lair of the White Worm
I have heard a number of couples re-enact the scenes in the film, between Lady Sylvia Marsh (Donohoe) and the boy scout (Pitt), from the time she picks him up hitchhking till the time she drowns him in the bath by stepping on his head with her boot. Hopefully, the last is just an re-enactment, or that is the first and last time the couple does that scene.