Horror Movies Essay, Research Paper

?Natural Born Killers,? ? Psycho,? ? Friday the 13th ,? and ?The Legend of Sleepy Hollow? are all horror films. In these films there is always some crazy person or monster-like character that goes around and slaughters innocent people. And usually, but not all the time the killer is killed at the end of the movie. The media publishes or broadcasts stories that say that horror films influence people to imitate these wrongful acts of violence. I believe that these movies do not influence people to imitate these murderous crimes onto innocent people. Horror films are a way for people to exercise their violent emotions with out hurting anyone.

The media publishes ,in my mind stupid , stories about horror films that say that some whacked out kid has just killed someone because of a horror film he or she saw. I think that the kid blaming the movie is just a reason to get out of jail time. The parents of these kids should not be showing there 8 years old children horror films in the first place. That is why there is a ratings system. And all horror movies are rated R, which means no one under the age of 17 should watch the movie with out adult supervision.

A movie that comes to my mind for a movie supposedly influencing people is the Oliver Stone movie ?Natural Born Killers.? In it Woody Harrelson and Juliette Lewis play a couple that go on a violent crime spree. They kill dozens of people. A lawsuit was filled against Oliver Stone for making this movie. In 1995, Patsy Byers, was working at a Louisiana convenience store when it was robbed. Byers was shot and left a quadriplegic. She later died of cancer. Her relatives say the couple that robbed the store was incited by watching ?Natural Born Killers.? The lawsuit accuses the film’s director Oliver Stone and the producer, Time Warner Entertainment. It says they intentionally incited copycat crimes (Crabb). I believe this lawsuit is stupid. It is sad that someone was shot and later on died. But everyone knows the horror movie is a just a movie. The couple that shot Patsy Byers had a choice whether they were going to rob the convenience store or not . The horror movie did not force them to go rob. They had freewill.

Horror films provide people with an outlet for their violent feelings they have inside. When someone people watch horror films they imagine doing harm

to their evil boss at work. But they just imagine this, they know if they acted on these emotions they will end up in jail or even worse, the death penalty. Even when I watch a horror film I imagine killing the bad guy in the movie, because of the awful crimes the bad guy commits in the movie. But I know killing people is wrong. The movie does not influence me to act on these anticivilization feelings that I have. The horror movies are a fantasy for some people to let out violent emotions.

I believe that if society did not have horror films to watch , then some people would actually go out and kill people because they do not have an outlet for the emotions they have. All throughout history society has had a form of horror films. This other form was public executions. Furthermore, people before the horror film time needed some way to practice their anticivilization emotions.

I do not believe that horror films influence people to commit murders. I believe that people just use horror movies influencing them as a way to get out of

prison or a reason to make up another frivolous lawsuit. Horror movies are for entertainment purposes only.

Crabb, Michael. ?Oliver Stone being sued for Natural Born Killers.? CBC Infoculture

10 Mar. 1999. 10 Dec. 1999. <http://www.infoculture.cbc.ca/archieves/filmtv/

filmtv_03091999_killers.html>.

Natural Born Killers . Dir. Oliver Stone. Perf. Woody Harrelson, Julliette Lewis.

Time Warner Entertainment, 1994.