A History of Violence (2005)

1st - The random news: I just finished my second super-short video. The good news is that this one has sound. The bad news is that you are going to hate the sound because it sounds like something you would get from Video Outlaw or worse. Everything was shot in one take. I had another in-camera-editing assignment, but when I post the short on the internet, it will be edited and cleaned up a bunch.

A History of Violence: You either loved this movie or you hated it. That seems to be the general reaction I'm seeing on the net. Cub and I had a blast, a couple of my friends up in Los Angeles thought they had seen this movie done better before. Violence is an issue often addressed by directors today and I'll admit that this movie did not break new ground philosophically, but it did go over the subject matter in a way that at least made me think, even if I had already thought the same things through before.

10/10 on bloody-disgusting.com



Cub, I have to say that at times I found this movie very funny, like in the scene where the guy gets shot in the head and we see he face half blown away, I almost spit my mouthful of Coke on the two or three rows in front of us, I was going into seizures. There were lots of laughs, maybe some as a coping mechanism for the audience members who did not know what to do with such graphic violence, but I think that the scenes which follow the violence change the tone quick and make us remember that there are costs. Violence does not happen in a vacuum. I think that particularly the scene where the son acts out violently at school (met by cheers from the audience) is followed by a sobering scene where we all are almost chastised for enjoying the violence. The Dad says something like "hey, we could get sued for this, it's serious."

Wow honey... I am really impressed at your reflections over the movie and I could not agree with you any more on all the issues you have touched on. Shoot... you pinpointed everything down so nicely that I can't argue or debate with you on any of it. I agree that people laugh at the most gruesome of things simply as a defense mechanism and not that they actually think it is funny. The psychologist in me can tell you that. People tend to laugh at the most inappropriate times simply cause they are uncomfortable and can't sit in their own anxiety (oops getting way too ahead of myself and starting to ramble). Anyway we all tend to do this, it's a part of being human I guess.

Some internet people, perhaps not experts, think David Cronenberg might get nominated for Best Director. Do you think that could happen? I hope so.


I hope Cronenberg does get nominated because this movie was amazing. I give it 10 bears!


One thing about this movie I don't see people talking about, is that it's not very realistic. The town is a fantasy, the action scenes could not really go down that way. I like this because they do away with realism in order to have the extreme variables that can really nail the point home. If the movie were lifelike as it appears in the rather dull preview, I don't think it would be as effective. I guess I just like overkill and shit that is over the top. How about you?

I totally loved it and rave about it to everyone I know!