Images and Movie Violence
The school shootings in Newtown have prompted U.S. movie premieres to either be cancelled (Django) or scaled down (Jack Reacher) in honor of the victim’s families because the films contain heavy violence. Jack Reacher, for example, opens with a sniper scene in which several people are gunned down. Broadcasts of television shows have also been postponed (Family Guy, The Cleveland Show, American Dad). Our society is faced with an interesting debate, and these quick responses are a road into a deeper inquiry.
On the one hand, by postponing the celebration of the release of a violent movie, which is what a premiere is, people in the entertainment industry are acknowledging that entertainment violence is at best insensitive in the light of real-life violence, and at worst might be undue. On the other hand, Quentin Tarantino, director of Django, defends violence in movies. At a NY press junket recently he said “I just think you know there’s violence in the world, tragedies happen, blame the playmakers.” 1
Perhaps stepping beneath the surface of these opposing views that each have value can yield interesting insights – beneath the question of whether violence is ok or not is really a question of whether the images we see are powerful or not.
The language of our body/brain is image. All of the sensory input of our experiencing registers in our brain as an image. These images are holistic “packets” of information that contain smells, emotions, tactile feelings and so on. Think about how your mouth waters when you imagine a fresh lemon being cut into, or how seeing a piece of antique furniture either gives you the chills or warms you with nostalgia because it reminds you of your grandmother’s. Advertisers know this, and capitalize on it – my neighborhood is awash with billboards of fizzing cans of coke being poured into chilled glasses with dewy moisture sliding down the sides, for example. The instant I see one of them I can smell the liquid, feel the chill of the glass and the spray of the fizz, and taste that super sweet childhood memory of a drink. And it makes me want one.
In addition to speaking the language of image, our brain contains mirror neurons that fire the same centers of our brain that we see of the person we are interacting with – if we are with a friend who is crying, our brain fires crying and we feel that emotion; if we are with a friend who is laughing, our brain fires up those neurons to help us laugh with them. If we see someone who is afraid, we feel fear. Often referred to as the empathy neurons, these neurons also fire when we watch a person experiencing an emotion on a movie or television screen. Hence why we cry at an AT&T commercial.
So, with images being our blueprint – showing us where to go and how to feel, informing us about our environments and what we are taking away from these experiences – the debate about what we choose to see in movies becomes less about whether violence is moral or not, and more about whether we acknowledge the power of image or not. And in the discussion of whether or not to legislate against violence, I move more toward each individual asking themselves what images they want to be the influencing ‘wallpaper’ of their lives.
To be sure, we are bombarded with many kinds of images daily, and we have cognitive input that helps us filter and categorize them. Equally, there is a role for movies where a wrong is righted, justice is served, the victim overcomes their own block to become hero. These stories have prevailed throughout time and are a cathartic lesson. It is how these stories are treated – which choices are made with the images shown – that is perhaps something to consider.
It’s a worthy debate of these very inflamed and agitated times. There isn’t an easy answer. I leave this blog with a case study from Dr. Jeanne Achterberg’s revelatory book Imagery in Healing: Shamanism and Modern Medicine: A man hospitalized from heart failure was presumed asleep/barely conscious when the doctor and team made their rounds. The doctor, reading the chart, saw that the man had no chance to live, and would die very soon. What he said to the residents and nurses was only that the man has a galloping heart, and then everyone left the room. Months later the doctor was shocked to see the man, full of vital energy and health, in his office for an appointment. The man beamed and said he had to come and personally thank the doctor because he knew, after hearing the doctor say he had a galloping heart, that he was strong like a horse and would recover. To the doctor the image of a galloping heart was one that was severely ill; to the man it was an image of a life-filled, snorting mustang.
Images move us. How do we want to be moved?
