Director Defends Graphic 'Killer Inside Me' Violence

One of the summer movies I'm looking forward to the most is The Killer Inside Me. Some of that's personal; I went to high school in Tulsa, where much of the film is shot, and which has one of the finest collections of standing art deco architecture in the country, featured throughout the movie. It's also where I found the book when I was a kid, by the great pulp novelist Jim Thompson. Beyond that, though, I really admire director Michael Winterbottom. I don't love his films as a general rule, but I certainly think he makes them differently than most people, and he refuses to fit inside a little box about what contemporary film should be. This one contains, from what we've heard, almost unspeakable violence. I believe part of the reaction to the movie is because it's violence against women, the same way we'd cringe if we saw children or dogs being beaten in films. When it's a fairer fight, people tend to care less about the bloodshed. In an interview with The Guardian, Winterbottom defended his film. Rachel cooke, who spoke to the director, lays out the case against the movie's violence, detailing the now-infamous slugging of Jessica Alba by Casey Affleck. Cooke calls it, "a sickeningly protracted scene in which, so far as I can recall, facial bones crunch repeatedly to the sound of classical music and Lou's girlish, high-pitched voice ('Hold on, sweetheart,' he murmurs soothingly, as he hits her. 'It's almost over.')" It's a more evenhanded interview than Cooke's own commentary about the film; she clearly has problems with it. But after making her point, it becomes more of a feature interview on her subject than an axe-grinding. As for Winterbottom's exploration of this kind of brutality, he says:

"The impact of the violence, it seemed to me, was about someone destroying anyone close to him. It feels like he doesn't deserve happiness, or whatever. The brutality of the killings is because they love him; that's what makes him want to destroy them. Because he hates himself. But then, obviously, when you edit it, you have a choice of how long to leave it, and how long not to leave it [ie when to cut the scene short]. I wanted to show that if you choose to kill someone by punching them, it's a long, slow, difficult process. Also, I want you to have the space to think about what's going on. Why is he doing this when he loves her? It's the pointlessness of it. That's the key thing: how pointless it is."

The Killer Inside Me hits theaters and VOD on June 18th.

Comments

[D]

You went to high school in Tulsa? Please don't tell me you were a Jenks' Trojan.

REDSKINS RULE!

[Get The Big Picture]

Ha! No...Broken Arrow.

[D]

Good, I'm not sure I could handle finding out that one of favorite blogs of the last couple years had been fed to me by a no good Trojan.

[Jeremy H]

I was just in Tulsa last week for the Conan O'Brien tour & was thoroughly impressed by the city. We were there for Conan, but there was also May Fest (w/ a bunch of other little "fests" tied to that) and the city's innaugural WNBA game. The city was popping that night. Had alot of fun. BTW Conan was AMAZING! One of the most enteraining events I've ever been to. That's all, I guess. Not much to do w/ the movie itself, but the movie does sound pretty cool.

[Get The Big Picture]

Where did he play? The Brady?