As you know, lots of Hollywood movies are loaded with violence and bloodshed. But some of these movies get a lot more heat and controversy than others. I’m sure you all remember the kind of controversy that surrounded Todd Phillips’s DC film Joker. The film dealt with mental health, and it didn’t shy away from showing brutal beatings, murder, and more.
Well, American Psycho director Marry Harron recently shared her thoughts on Joker and said she thinks that Keanu Reeves’s John Wick films are much more disturbing. She thinks the controversy surrounding it was “ludicrous,” and she doesn’t understand why films like John Wick don’t get the same kind of treatment. She explained to Vulture.
“It was so ludicrous. I was so familiar with that conversation. Both Joker and American Psycho were caught up in a national conversation about whether they romanticized violence. While Joker’s critics claimed it gave a sympathetic origin story to a toxic man (New York’s critic David Edelstein called it “an anthem for incels”), American Psycho was criticized specifically for its violence against women. Notable feminists including Kate Millett and the National Organization for Women protested the story when it was released as a book. because that conversation has happened around me, because it happened around American Psycho, and it’s always the same conversation. These attacks always focus on some kind of art movie. They never focus on the extreme violence in mainstream entertainment. I love John Wick, but it’s far more violent and has far more mayhem than Joker or American Psycho. Actually, both of them have a small amount of violence. It’s just that that violence is disturbing.”
She brings up an interesting point. Why is it that the violent art films are surrounded by more controversy than the big tentpole movies? I don’t think the controversy hurts those arthouse films, though. In fact, it fuels the curiosity in people and plays a hand in getting them to see it. Hell, the recent film The Hunt made sure to include the film’s controversy in the marketing!
It’s interesting to see how different people have different opinions on the controversy surrounding violent movies. What do you think about all this?