MovieChat Forums > Badlands (1974) Discussion > Good movie but extremely inaccurate and ...

Good movie but extremely inaccurate and romanticized


The two were completely brutal and careless in real life. And Starkweather was practically mentally retarded lol.. although I think we can all see how that wouldn't make a good movie.

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Terence Malick never confirmed or denied when the movie came out it whether it was based on the Charles Starkweather case but obviously it was and by doing it that way, you had alot of wiggle room to tweak the storyline. Sissy Spacek was told by Malick not to pattern herself after Carol Ann Fugate but to draw inspiration for her character by her own Texas childhood which she did.

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Very loose portrayal of Charlie and his girls exploits not a documentary . Made for entertainment . Plus it was Nebraska not Montana too . Fictional account .

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Well think about Psycho. We sort of feel bad for Norman Bates but does anybody feel bad for Ed Gein?

Art, imagination and entertainment takes us there.
In a way its how we deal with it.

. Ephemeron.

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I'd feel bad for Ed Gein. The guy clearly had some pretty severe mental disabilities and was a product of a life's worth of abuse. His mother ruthlessly crushed any sense of independence out of him, never let him grow on his own, so when she died he was in his forties, confused, lost, and helpless. Not saying he was an innocent, but he's a pretty grotesque example of what happens when one is never allowed to gain any real independence from an insanely overbearing parent. Norman Bates is more likeable because they left out all the nasty stuff that his real life counterpart did to the bodies. A film made in 1960 could never show a guy prancing around in a skin suit and making furniture from spare body parts. Hollywood has a bit of self censorship where they tend to sanitize things, on screen murders being quick and easy for example. Contrast Hollywood nasty, with real life nasty like say "3 guys 1 hammer." It takes a while for a victim to die.

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That's like saying Boogie Nights is an extremely inaccurate and romanticized depiction of the life of John Holmes.

Badlands isn't meant to be about the Starkweather case. It's loosely inspired by it.

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