Wouldn't a gun massacre feel more realistic given there is one each year in the US? Why did they chose to show arrows as the weapon of choice? Also, its more unrealistic killing many people by a bow and arrows as by the time you take aim and draw each arrow, someone can get close to you.
Was the director afraid of the NRA and the gun lobby?
The choice of weapon makes much more sense in the book as does everything to be fair. There is a great deal of detail about how Kevin set the scene for the massacre before the victims even walked in to the gymnasium - where he was hidden, potential places where the victims could take shelter were blocked etc. If this piss poor arty adaptation in any way piqued your interest yet left you feeling there should have been more please read the book. It has stayed with me in the years since I read it, I've passed it on to family and friends but the film left me cold and extremely disappointed because I knew what it could have been.
shareI really wish they would have stuck with the crossbow instead of whatever he used (I don't know, it looked like a long bow) because crossbows are way more high powered from a distance and work a little closer to guns in terms of aim/trajectory. I probably would have just held my backpack in front of my face because you'd have to riddle me with arrows using a long bow for it to be fatal.
shareKevin wanted to set himself apart from the gunmen, if I remember correctly.
shareWhich begs a simpler question, why arrows? I mean who in their right mind would support and encourage a profoundly troubled kid's passion for archery.
He killed sixteen Czechoslovakians. Guy was an interior decorator.
His dad encouraged it. He never thought anything was off with kevin and dismissed Eva's talk. He thought she had something against his perfect, angel child. Kevin had him fooled into thinking he was what he wanted him to be, all the while he hated and resented his dad.
shareIt's made a lot more clear in the book, but the reason she didn't say anything against it was because he was interested in so few other things. From the moment he was born she always had trouble getting him to show enthusiasm for anything at all. She supported his passion for archery because he really had no other passions to speak of.
shareThe author was the one who made it a massacre by bow and arrows, and trust me, it was not because she cared what the NRA thought. The author herself is a liberal feminist. The book makes it more clear that he chose bow and arrows for these reasons:
1. To distinguish himself from other school shooters and ensure himself lasting notoriety as the "crossbow killer" (in the book, the massacre is said to have taken place at the end of the 1990s just two weeks before the CHS massacre. During the 1990s there had already been several high-profile school shootings. Using a crossbow was a way to ensure his stunt didn't get lost and forgotten in the shuffle).
2. It was available. Kevin actually had an independent studies archery course at the school, so no one was suspicious when he showed up with a crossbow and a bag full of arrows.
3. In the book, Eva is revealed to be a liberal gun control advocate. The choice of weapon was in part to ensure that neither she nor anyone like her could blame the act on America's "gun culture", nor that it would feature prominently in the gun control debate. It was part of his steps to ensure that his massacre ended up "meaning nothing".
And it is true that it is considerably more difficult to kill someone with a crossbow (in the book it was a crossbow) than with a modern firearm. Kevin knew that and that's why in the book, he brought over a hundred arrows to shoot all ten of his targets multiple times until they stopped showing any signs of life. And he also fired from a balcony in the gym after having cleared out anything in the gym that his targets could have hid behind so that he basically had free reign to shoot them anywhere in the gym no matter where they were, ass opposed to chasing them around the gym floor like the movie implied. And he locked all the gym doors not just to keep his victims from escaping but to prevent first responders from being able to enter thus ensuring that any victims that managed to survive the five or more arrows he shot into them would bleed to death before they could get a SWAT team to breach the doors.
"One each year"?
Sadly, school shootings in the U.S. happen much more frequently than that. At least once a month.
I think the one a year is more relatable to mass school shootings, although there are gun related incidents as you stated quite rightly at least once a month.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_school_shootings_in_the_United_States
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So that people would pay attention to the story not the gun. And still, even though there was no gun, you're still paying attention to the gun. Also, its more unrealistic that people would be killed in a high school than on the streets of a Democrat controlled major American city.
Was the director afraid of the liberal elites and the media?
____________________________
Death is the road to awe.
Was the director afraid of the liberal elites and the media?
Why I wrote that is clear.
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Death is the road to awe.
I don't follow. Please elaborate.
Let's be bad guys.
Sigh. Very well....
OP writes:
Wouldn't a gun massacre feel more realistic given there is one each year in the US? Why did they chose to show arrows as the weapon of choice?
Was the director afraid of the NRA and the gun lobby?
Was the director afraid of the liberal elites and the media?
Also, its more unrealistic killing many people by a bow and arrows as by the time you take aim and draw each arrow, someone can get close to you.
In the book he used a crossbow
share