Culture clips
(Taken from Plugged in Website)
July 23, 2012
A screening of The Dark Knight Rises turned to tragedy in Aurora, Colo., when at 12:30 a.m., on July 20, a heavily armed gunman wearing a bulletproof vest and gas mask opened fire on a theater crowded with midnight moviegoers, killing 12 and injuring 58 others. Reports indicate that the alleged shooter, 24-year-old James Holmes, had dyed his hair red and said that he "was the Joker," the name of Batman's most famous adversary. A poster of the comic book and cinematic villain was found in his apartment after a multitude of booby-traps linked to self-made bombs and/or grenades were disarmed by police. Reports Pierre Thomas, senior justice correspondent for ABC News, "I was struck by one source today who said that this 'was really like a mad scientist, really like a villain in a movie.'"
Still, police say they have not yet uncovered a motive for the shooting. The suspect earned a bachelor's degree from the University of California at Riverside. He had been pursuing his Ph.D. in neuroscience at the University of Colorado Medical School campus in Aurora, but had recently dropped out. He legally bought the four guns he used in the assault, along with 6,000 rounds of ammunition, over the last few months.
"I would not presume to know anything about the victims of the shooting but that they were there last night to watch a movie," said Christopher Nolan, director of The Dark Knight Rises, in a statement. "I believe movies are one of the great American art forms and the shared experience of watching a story unfold on screen is an important and joyful pastime. The movie theater is my home, and the idea that someone would violate that innocent and hopeful place in such an unbearably savage way is devastating to me. Nothing any of us can say could ever adequately express our feelings for the innocent victims of this appalling crime, but our thoughts are with them and their families."
Warner Bros., the studio that released The Dark Knight Rises, responded to the shootings by canceling world premieres of the film in Paris, Tokyo and Mexico City. It has edited gunplay out of its television commercials. And it (along with several other major studios) elected to not report official box office estimates over the weekend, though final figures will be released on Monday as usual. Of the studio's reaction, Hollywood.com box office analyst Paul Dergarabedian said, "In my 20 years of covering the box office, I've never seen anything like this before." [msnbc.com, 7/21/12; washingtonpost.com, 7/21/12; abcnews.com, 7/22/12; nydailynews.com, 7/21-22/12]
"This is not to place the blame for anything that happened in Aurora on this movie, though I knew, minutes after I'd heard the news, that there were pundits, legislators, radio hosts and concerned parents who were going to do so. … We are at this writing some distance away from assessing what the suspect's motives were. And yet, there was darkness shrouding Dark Knight Rises even before the shooting. Marshall Fine, my old friend and colleague from the New York Film Critics Circle, was besieged over the past week by death threats for his less-than-glowing review of the movie. There are other film reviewer friends who have likewise been verbally harassed, in varying degrees of ugliness, over critiques of Batman movies that weren't nearly as, well, critical as Fine's. I'm not anxious to find direct psychological connections between fandom run amok and cold-blooded murder. Nor do I feel an urgent need to prosecute popular culture for capital crimes, though I'm also not naïve enough to believe that people's feelings can't be adversely affected by what they see and hear. There's a lot I simply don't know for sure, about the shootings, about the suspect, about the victims for that matter. I do know this: That culture, popular or otherwise, can do many things to make us feel connected. It can at its most euphoric or engaged detach us from misery, loneliness and pain. But ultimately it cannot free or save us from these ills. The movie I saw today permitted me to forget for almost three hours what happened to people who saw it two time zones away. It couldn't—and didn't—keep me from caring about them. And from worrying about the rest of us."
—movie critic Gene Seymour [cnn.com, 7/20/12]
No one made any direct reference to the Aurora shooting during Fox's 2012 Teen Choice Awards, held July 22 in Universal City, Calif. But the tragedy wasn't far from the minds of many. "It is just really horrible that we can't even feel comfortable going to the movie theater, and that extra police have to be at movie theaters now," said co-host Demi Lovato on the red carpet before the show. "It is just really sad that our world has come to that." But the show must go on, and it did, with three surfboard-shaped statuettes going to The Twilight Saga: Breaking Dawn - Part 1, bringing the total Twilight franchise Teen Choice Award haul to 41. The Hunger Games snagged seven awards this year. And two R-rated movies that most teens are too young to see by themselves--Colombiana and 21 Jump Street—were also winners. In the television categories, ABC Family's Pretty Little Liars and CW's The Vampire Diaries each took home five awards. In music, Justin Bieber and Taylor Swift earned four awards apiece and were named the year's top male and female artist, respectively. [foxnews.com, eonline.com, 7/23/12]
Despite the increasing popularity of DVR machines, users are not fast-forwarding through the ads as readily as they once did. About 46.7% of commercials were skipped by DVR users during the 2011-12 television season, compared to 52.8% in 2007-08. Why? Researchers suggest that some viewers may be purposefully watching commercials that sponsor their favorite shows as a way to show their appreciation. Or they may simply be too lazy or preoccupied to even hit the fast-forward button. Still others suspect that advertisers are just getting sneakier—tying products more explicitly to the content of the show. For instance, take Hershey's spots on TNT's The Closer: A commercial might feature star Kyra Sedgwick, in character, snacking on a candy bar in her office—almost as if it was a continuation of the show. The camera then cuts to a couple apparently watching The Closer, who discuss Sedgwick's consumption of said candy bar. [slate.com, 7/19/12]
There's a boycott rising up against popular fast-food franchise Chick-fil-A for its opposing stance on gay marriage. Celebs enlisted so far include Miley Cyrus, Deepak Chopra, Lindsay Lohan and the Kardashian sisters. Actor Ed Helms, best known for his role on the NBC sitcom The Office, announced on Twitter that he's joining the protest, writing, "Chick-fil-A doesn't like gay people? So lame. Hate to think what they do to the gay chickens! Lost a loyal fan." Boston mayor Thomas Menino has vowed to block the chain from opening a restaurant in his city. And on July 20, The Jim Henson Company, producers of The Muppets, announced that it had severed promotional ties with Chick-fil-A. According to a statement posted on the company's Facebook page, "The Jim Henson Company has celebrated and embraced diversity and inclusiveness for over fifty years and we have notified Chick-Fil-A that we do not wish to partner with them on any future endeavors. Lisa Henson, our CEO is personally a strong supporter of gay marriage and has directed us to donate the payment we received from Chick-Fil-A [for a current promotion] to GLAAD."
Chick-fil-A president Dan Cathy has not backed off his stance on marriage, saying, "We are very much supportive of the family—the biblical definition of a family unit. We are a family-owned business, a family-led business, and we are married to our first wives. We give God thanks for that. … We know that it might not be popular with everyone, but thank the Lord, we live in a country where we can share our values and operate on biblical principles." [abcnews.com, 7/19/12; huffingtonpost.com, 7/23/12; facebook.com/hensoncompany/notes, 7/20/12]