Analysis film .

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Violence is salvational in the American epic tradition; at least it was in Fenimore Cooper and

Jack London and Hemingway, the law of survival, the natural law, now perverted by the PC-PG

access of “family entertainment” safely preaching to us that violence is incorrect. Is it? Or it is

the way of a world where, under every peaceful blade of grass, tiny yet feral bugs devour other

bugs in cycles of destruction and creation?

Eddie Vedder writes, in his song “Footsteps,” “In the days of old suicide was enough … just to

end their own suffering. Now there’s a need to see another suffer … as innocent as they once

were … helpless as they are now. We have created a monster … a herd of monsters.”

No legislation in Washington, no TV or movie censor boards are going to prevent the merging

virtual realities of media from expanding. It is inevitable that with games, viewing glasses,

interactive buttonry, more and more “news” and what’s-happening-every-nanosecond shows that

the depiction of violence will become more and more realistic. As television and some movies

banalize their violence (no squibs, no blood, no shock to the act of dying), the news shows will

win the ratings war with carpet coverage of murder. As there is now C-Span and the Court

Channel, and Execution Channel is inevitable for gassings, lethal injections, “night before” and

“last meal” dramatics. Crimes will be exactly reproduced with new film science.

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I do believe there is love at the end. And I do believe that, in one of our characters’ words, “love

beats the demon.” Without giving away our ending, I find it ironic that it is Mickey and Mallory

who are the ones to escape the Great Yawn. But you make up your own mind.

“In a dark time, the eye begins to see.” – Theodore Roethke