“Speaking on behalf of the cast and crew of ‘The Dark Knight Rises’, I would like to express our profound sorrow at the senseless tragedy that has befallen the entire Aurora community.
I would not presume to know anything about the victims of the shooting but that they were there last night to watch a movie. 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 theatre 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.”
– Christoper Nolan, director of The Dark Knight Rises, speaks out on last night’s shootings.
Oh, and just in case you still had a little tiny piece of hope for humanity left over from today, we’re now hearing the news that this is the largest mass shooting in U.S. history.
A few more updates: tonight’s Paris premiere of the movie has been cancelled, but, as of now, next week’s premiere’s are still going on as planned. The National Association of Theater Owners has announced that there will be added security for showings of the movie, and that any sort of costume will not be allowed. Also, just to repeat that one point: this is the largest mass shooting in U.S. history. It took place in a movie theater. At a showing of a Batman movie. What is even happening to this country?
your country is a country where you can basically buy guns in the supermarket. maybe it’s time to change that.
may the victims rest in peace.
Maybe you should shut the fuck up about our country, as you obviously don’t know what you’re talking about. I doubt millions of people are doing everything they can, legally and illegally, to live in your country, like they do here.
So they don’t sell guns in the supermarket?
Chuck bb, truth hurts. If the US didn’t have such a lax gun policy this shit wouldn’t happen. Compare shootings in the US vs shootings in Europe.
Mireee, I’ve followed your comments over the years here on Evil Beet. You are an educated woman. So let’s talk facts: 77 dead last year in Norway, 69 shot by, guess what, a European named Anders Behring Breivik. Ring a bell? I can guarantee you Norway has strict gun laws. Didn’t help there, did it?
Let’s talk Serbia / Macedonia / Croatia? All part of Europe, right? How many TENS OF THOUSANDS massacred in the 1990’s, both Muslim and Orthodox Christian, because you have an unarmed population in those countries? When rulers are afraid of their own people. the first thing they do is disarm them.
Lots of guns in Switzerland and France – very lax gun laws, comparable to ours. I don’t see you advocating they give up their guns.
Mexico does not allow civilians to own guns, PERIOD. No exceptions. Look what a utopia that country is. The violence there is unbelievably high. And the cartels there get the vast majority of their weapons (fully automatic, by the way) from European and Asian smugglers, not US gun stores.
The GREAT thing about our country is that the right to self-defense is absolute. We are not afraid of guns – there are over 300 MILLION of them floating around in our country.
Truth hurts, doesn’t it?
It wasn’t about you.. It was about a well educated, but deranged human who had violent imaginings, felt he was nothing, wanting to be somebody he carried this plan out.. by the things he knew, wanted to be..
Although there are some Walmarts that sell guns in the US, this type of violence happens all over the world. Anyone who goes on a rampage like this, killing innocent people, could be classified as mentally deranged (even if they do it for political or religious reasons). This isn’t just an American problem. We do have strict gun laws in this country…maybe they should be stricter or maybe they just need to be better enforced. This guy bought his guns and ammo legally, by the way. What I find curious is that anyone who makes ultra-violent movies would be shocked to find “life imitating art”. And I wonder why some people had their small children at this type of movie.
Exactly!
It also looks like movie theaters are going to end up resembling airports in pat down security and metal detection. I agree with Christopher Nolan, it is a terrible attack on our innocence as people who come together in theaters to share in the stories that often make us a better people, in that we share something emotional together. It’s a community experience.
I think everyone should go back and watch Micheal Moore’s Bowling for Columbine. He addresses all the issues of how easy it is to get a gun in the States. He was offered a free gun just to open a bank account….
And yet maybe, it’s not so much about getting guns as verifying the psychological profile and state about someone wanting a gun permit. Background checks.
I know there are no easy solutions in a society in which if you really want something (drugs, weapons) there always seems to be a way to find it.
And I don’t judge anyone wanting these items, as long as they don’t intend to hurt other people as a result….
Just to address you DeeCee: A lot of ultra violent movies can in some ways be cathartic, so that we can experience the Spaghetti Western release of revenge, and thereby not feel we have to experience it ourselves out there in the world.
But people like Whatshisface (I will not dignify him by remembering his name) because they are deranged, totally miss the point… they seem to take it as license to be evil themselves; they are too fucked up to realize that it’s art offering a catharsis; they act like children hyped up on sugar.
And people like that will always exist. And no shutting down of super hero movies, or movies that depict violence (some I take issue with, and always will), will ever stop the psycho who locks himself in his basement, drinks like a fish, enters a fantasy world, and plans mass murders.
Perhaps these people are like Darwin’s casualties… as depicted in A 1000 Ways to Die. They don’t get something essential about a society that’s evolving much too fast in some ways…
Like the girl who gets run over in a parking lot because she’s so busy texting, she doesn’t’ even “get” the cars that can kill her if she’s that self-absorbed.
Use of violence as catharsis goes back to Ancient Greece. It’s legit.