One of the first movies ever made was of a person slicing an eyeball open. The trend to shock and ‘gross out’ is not a new one. The obvious and much stated Gladiators of rome and the bloody games being a prime example where snuff was mainstream. At least now we are in fantasy land and only pretending.

The real crime here is the quality of the movies, they in general are bad. Not because of the violence or depravity but because of the poor screenplay, bad plots, bad acting and far too much deus ex machina. In short except these as entertainment pieces and judge them on the standards for entertaining.

As to influencing what people think the newspapers and media empires are far more scary than a horror film. Just think how many have died due to political spin, vietnam, falklands, afghanistan, iraq and you can see the spin machine hurtling to demonise Iran. Thats really scary, give me a sicko movie any day.

I’m a firm believer in what you dwell on, you give power to - what goes in is what comes out. Now, no one is denying the existence of personal responsibility - you do what you choose to do. But what you watch DOES influence how you think about things.

I’m not saying that just because we’ve seen someone die in a horrible way, we’re going to go out and commit some atrocity. But perhaps it makes us more suspicious of other people, more expectant of evil in the world and more preoccupied with that evil. Less capable of seeing goodness, less sensitive to the needs of others, less sensitive to the pain of others. Perhaps it contributes to the destruction of humanity if not on an individual basis, then the spiritual fabric, collective subconscious.

We are reckless with our own spirits.

Saw simply came about because someone watched Se7en and thought “What if we made a movie that showed the horrific stuff that Se7en implied and left to imagination” and progressed from there, a new “benchmark” was set (whether we needed it or not) and the boundaries have been continually pushed ever since. This is not unique to horror movies, things like jovial Candid Camera evolved in to the meaner stunts of Jackass.

From these films I get Escapism, (or an urge to rip out my eyeballs as the film is crap). I am at an age where I can watch these movies in the fantasy context in which they were created, and see them as works of fiction which entertained me at some level. I believe that saying that people who commit crimes because of movies, or are “conveniently” link to movies by the media is a tad very unfair. If someone had the imbalance to cause harm to someone else, they would have found some way to act it out, I believe that what ever atrocity they witnessed in a movie was merely the flavouring for whatever nasty dish was simmering underneath their personality.

I have an extensive DVD collection from which my nephews like to come in and borrow from. I screen everything they want to borrow, they don’t get 15’s or above and even then I have refused them 12s. Certificates are there for a reason, but it is very common in our society to ignore them. Take the child that set himself on fire after seeing the Stunt on Jackass, movie was an 18, child was way way way below that age, so how did he see it? Someone either bought, recorded or rented it for him. Maybe a 21 certificate should be introduced due to the more extreme movies that are being made these days and greater awareness taught on why the certificates exist in the first place.

When I go to any of these movies, I know what I will be seeing, I am under no illusion. I am repulsed, sickened and disturbed by what happens in the movie, but that reminds me of how human I am. I have a sense of right and wrong, they day I stop flinching at this stuff is the day I will start worrying.

In terms of the unhappy ending… well that seems to be more than just these types of movies, TV shows, books, comics and dare I say life doesn’t always have happy endings. But in balance, look at all the happy ever after movies we have. But to say that this is unique to new movies is a bit untrue. How many times did Dracula return from the Grave, how many films finished with some image of the bad guy surviving?

In saying that, I don’t like these movies because of a few things 1) I am sick of remakes, especially movies that have existed in my lifetime. 2) Style over Content 3) Instantly forgettable apart from the shocking scene 4) People keep going to see them, so studios will keep making them.