Mike's Musings: Unfilmable?
I recently rewatched "Hollow Man" a week or so ago, and it got me thinking...is there anything that, under no circumstances, should be included in a movie?
I've seen a lot of movies that have disturbing material in them. Rape ("Boys Don't Cry"), domestic violence ("Once Were Warriors"), torture ("The Passion of the Christ"), explicit sex ("Lust, Caution). You name it, I've probably seen it. The stuff I've listed is disturbing, and often times that's the goal. You don't watch a movie like "Once Were Warriors" when you're in the mood for light entertainment, and woe betide anyone who thinks that the movie is a lighthearted action/adventure movie (I did for a time, but that was only because Lee Tamahori's career turned to action movies later in his career).
And yet, when I watched "Hollow Man," I felt unclean. The two scenes that made me feel this way were a rape scene and particularly brutal act of animal cruelty. I won't say that they were unnecessary; they served the purpose of showing that Sebastian Cane was becoming violently insane. But Paul Verhoeven created an exploitation flick when he directed "Hollow Man," and that's not the place for this kind of thing.
For the record, I have nothing against either rape or animal cruelty in film...even in fiction. I think that "Once Were Warriors" is a near masterpiece and "Brotherhood of the Wolf," which is my favorite movie, has a scene where hundreds of wolves are slaughtered. But in both films these scenes added something to the story in which no other act could. The rape scene in "Once Were Warriors" serves a purpose, and the wolf hunt makes perfect sense in "Brotherhood of the Wolf." While not pleasant to watch, it's understandable why Lee Tamahori and Chrisoph Gans included them in their films and I hold no ill will towards either of them.
"Hollow Man" is different because of the context in which the scenes were presented. First of all, having a lead character go descend into violent madness is a very general plot development, and the ways to show this while raising the nape hairs are endless. In using rape and animal cruelty, does "Hollow Man" accomplish something positive (in a twisted way) that nothing else could? I don't think so. That's what makes these scenes create ill-will. "Hollow Man" could have done a number of different things to achieve the same result, and using a graphic rape and the killing of a dog to do this is really a cheap shot. That, and the fact that Verhoeven exploits both makes it a double whammy, but never mind.
That's the big question. If you're going to show something that is going to repulse a lot of viewers, you better make sure that there's no other way to do so without turning off your audience.
I've seen a lot of movies that have disturbing material in them. Rape ("Boys Don't Cry"), domestic violence ("Once Were Warriors"), torture ("The Passion of the Christ"), explicit sex ("Lust, Caution). You name it, I've probably seen it. The stuff I've listed is disturbing, and often times that's the goal. You don't watch a movie like "Once Were Warriors" when you're in the mood for light entertainment, and woe betide anyone who thinks that the movie is a lighthearted action/adventure movie (I did for a time, but that was only because Lee Tamahori's career turned to action movies later in his career).
And yet, when I watched "Hollow Man," I felt unclean. The two scenes that made me feel this way were a rape scene and particularly brutal act of animal cruelty. I won't say that they were unnecessary; they served the purpose of showing that Sebastian Cane was becoming violently insane. But Paul Verhoeven created an exploitation flick when he directed "Hollow Man," and that's not the place for this kind of thing.
For the record, I have nothing against either rape or animal cruelty in film...even in fiction. I think that "Once Were Warriors" is a near masterpiece and "Brotherhood of the Wolf," which is my favorite movie, has a scene where hundreds of wolves are slaughtered. But in both films these scenes added something to the story in which no other act could. The rape scene in "Once Were Warriors" serves a purpose, and the wolf hunt makes perfect sense in "Brotherhood of the Wolf." While not pleasant to watch, it's understandable why Lee Tamahori and Chrisoph Gans included them in their films and I hold no ill will towards either of them.
"Hollow Man" is different because of the context in which the scenes were presented. First of all, having a lead character go descend into violent madness is a very general plot development, and the ways to show this while raising the nape hairs are endless. In using rape and animal cruelty, does "Hollow Man" accomplish something positive (in a twisted way) that nothing else could? I don't think so. That's what makes these scenes create ill-will. "Hollow Man" could have done a number of different things to achieve the same result, and using a graphic rape and the killing of a dog to do this is really a cheap shot. That, and the fact that Verhoeven exploits both makes it a double whammy, but never mind.
That's the big question. If you're going to show something that is going to repulse a lot of viewers, you better make sure that there's no other way to do so without turning off your audience.
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