800 Words on the Aurora Shootings

It's been a couple weeks since the Aurora shootings, and I think it's okay now to add my two cents. I don't want to talk about the tragedy itself in any detail, because I'm not qualified in any way for that. Instead, I want to try to sort out some thoughts and ponder the question that's been on my mind since I heard about what happened in Aurora - what does it mean?

Looking at the response to the tragedy, very little it seems. Security was briefly beefed up at theaters, but I don't think that's going to last. There was some discussion of gun control policies and mental health access, but most of the pieces I saw were cynical op/eds, predicting that nothing would actually change. There were also a few thoughtful ones about the terrible nature of the media coverage, and I generally agree with the theory that mass shootings are all about attention seeking, and no good can come of the media furor around the gunman involved. I got a look at a few minutes of the local news coverage of the shootings, where a hyperbolic reporter made reference to the fact that they were going to follow the story for days, weeks, and perhaps months and years to come. I stopped watching after that.

What about the impact on the movies themselves? Well, it was interesting to see how Hollywood responded. The "Gangster Squad" trailer was pulled, and the film itself delayed to January so that a potentially offending scene could be excised. Warner Brothers cancelled premieres and press, donated money, and did everything in their power to show their sensitivity to the victims, short of pulling "The Dark Knight Rises" from theaters. Box office tallies of the opening weekend of were not officially reported, a symbolic gesture since most of the usual bean counters got the estimates out to us anyway. The assumption is that the shooting played a part in the opening weekend grosses of "The Dark Knight Rises" falling below initial estimates, but nobody can say for sure. It's still a monster hit around the world, so any financial impact was limited.

The shooting in Aurora was a terrible tragedy, and in the immediate aftermath there were specters of all kinds of horrible fears, about movie theaters suddenly being less safe, about these highly anticipated blockbuster film premieres being a magnet for attention-seeking maniacs, about our whole film culture suddenly somehow being complicit. But after a few weeks and with the benefit of some distance, the more it feels like this was just another random act of violence perpetrated by a highly disturbed individual. It could have happened in a post office, a school, or any other public place where a crowd of people had gathered. I don't want to suggest that these mass killings are not deeply shocking and awful every times that they happen, and perhaps indicators of some deeper systemic problems, but they happen for reasons that are usually extremely personal and limited to the particular perpetrator involved.

So the shooting, in spite of the shooter's apparent obsession with Batman, has nothing to do with the movies. It reflects absolutely nothing about the Batman franchise, or superhero films, or onscreen violence or anything else you want to try and tie it to. The urge to do do, however, is a strong one. We want to find an easy explanation and we want the shooting to mean something. And it's too easy to speculate and draw conclusions that there really are no bases for. As much as we want them, there aren't ever going to be simple answers in cases like this. I've seen a couple of people try to blame the content, and predictably there's some yahoo trying to sue Warners for releasing the film, but it can't possibly stick. The shooter hadn't even seen the film, remember.

And related to that, it's very tempting to want to use the tragedy as a bludgeon for the moral or political issue of your choice. I caught myself wanting to tell off someone online for being enthusiastic about the Bobcat Goldthwait comedy "God Bless America" because it contains a scene where there's a shooting in a movie theater that's played for laughs. After Aurora, how could you champion a movie like that? But of course, that movie came out months ago and has nothing to do with Aurora. In light of recent events it was insensitive and unfunny, maybe, but that didn't somehow make the movie bad. "God Bless America" was rotten all by itself.

I'm glad that "Gangster Squad" was moved, because it is in very poor taste to evoke the shooting so close in time, even if the scheduling of the film was a coincidence. I think the film's fortunes have probably been irreparably damaged though. And I was relieved that "The Dark Knight Rises" had very little content in it that could be connected with what happened that would give any conspiracy theorists more ammunition.

It feels small and petty to feel protective of the films in this situation, but I am a media junkie after all, and the media is what I obsess over. I really enjoy Nolan's Batman films, and no matter how they're regarded in the future, it's sad that they're always going to be associated with this tragedy.
---