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Blackmail, Murder & Mayhem

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Natural Born Killers

Natural Born Killers

List Price: $19.98
Your Price: $15.98
Product Info Reviews

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Rating: 1 stars
Summary: what a mess
Review: This is a pure headache-inducing mess! Bad acting from everyone involved, a bunch of dumb trippy effects, the overall story is worthless, just totally annoying! This movie is only for rebellious teenagers. For everyone else, it's just 2 hours of your life that you'll never get back.

Rating: 5 stars
Summary: Media is the DEVIL!
Review: People often refer this powerful film, especially the critics who are the media as a grisly mish-mash of pure amateurish style directing. I think that people really did not see the true nature of the film. That is the media controls our thoughts, feelings and behavior. We as the American culture do not scratch the surface of things and only accept things as face value. If we ask questions or refuse to go along with the status quo we are automatically labeled a "Terrorist, Insane, UnAmerican, and deviant". Ask yourself what you believe now and then and you will begin to be truly free. TURN OFF THAT T.V.!

Rating: 5 stars
Summary: THE classice story about violence and the media
Review: Oliver Stone is one of the most skillful of all film directors. His style is to take a topic, and make it an epic event while throwing every technical cinematic trick available for your consumption. He's almost never boring, with the exception of his pro football movie. He's usually irritating, especially when he freely admits that much of his "JFK" is fiction. But he also usually has something relevant to say, and has never done it better than with "Natural Born Killers".

The movie concentrates on how our country makes celebrities out of nasty people, and was prophetic in that is was in production before the whole O.J. Simpson media bash. It "tells the tale", to use a term in the movie, of two young lovers who leave a string of bodies across the country. This is not that out-of-bounds, as Charlie Starkweather and his girlfriend did something like it a somewhat less bloody pace over thirty years ago.

We see that instead of the revulsion that one should feel for these people, the media finds the story profitable, and they become sensations. [Love] sells, so they find themselves on the cover of "People" magazine. In an immortal quote from the movie, "fans" state that "If I were a mass murderer, I'd be Mickey and Malorie". I frankly don't find any of this THAT far from reality, as there are people today who regard Charles Manson as a pop cult figure instead of the pathetic human that he is.

All of this is surrounded by brilliant performances and editing that just blows you away. Woody Harrelson and Juliette Lewis are perfect because they show the capacity for violence, have charisma, and also project that they are actually pretty stupid losers having a ball with their celebrity status. Rodney Dangerfield and Tommy Lee Jones are also priceless as Lewis' father and the warden of the prison.

This is a film to be watched over and over and studied. The Director's Cut is better, as they not only throw in previously cut scenes, but Oliver Stone specifically tells you why they are important.

Rating: 5 stars
Summary: Murder and chaos as well as some startling truths
Review: This 1994 film still packs quite a punch. It's about a mass murdering couple, Mickey and Mallory. They murder people just for fun and are widely excited by it all. The media loves them. It's satire of course, and takes the murders and chaos to extremes, but there's a lot of truth here too.

Woody Harrelson and Juliette Lewis are the young couple and they play their roles well. They are full of energy, romance and enthusiasm for what they do. It is horrible. And yet, they somehow catch the audience up in their glee. Rodney Dangerfield has a small part the young woman's father. He's an extreme of a cruel and hateful molester. His murder seems justified in a way. This is not so for the rest of the victims though who are randomly selected just because they happen to be in the wrong place as the wrong time. There's a turning point, however, when Mickey and Mallory meet up with Russell Means, cast as an old Indian Chief, who has foretold what will happen. There's a cop who's after them, Tom Sizemore, who is more than a little attracted to Mallory. And there's a prime time television host, Robert Downey Junior, who makes the mistake of arranging a live interview with them while they're in prison. Oliver Stone directed. And he got it all right.

I loved this film. It moved fast, held my interest and had some interesting and provocative things to say. The DVD extra features were wonderful too. Interviews with the director, and cast members which added lots of insight as to how the film was made - all in a great big rush in 56 days, eating psychedelic mushrooms, improvising many of the scenes. They explained that some of the film was shot in a real prison with real prison inmates. No wonder the riot that scenes looks so real. I even took the time to watch all the deleted scenes, understanding exactly why they were deleted as the director made comments.

This is not a film for everybody. But as for me, I give it one of my highest recommendations. Especially the DVD version.

Rating: 5 stars
Summary: very stylish piece of art!!!
Review: This movie is an EPIC!!! Misunderstood by many people. But behind the violence and blood, this is a great piece of art!!!
Oliver Stone confronts us with our near future society, when we are on the edge of a lawless society. Two crazy kids who have seen too much TV go berserk and violently kill the people who get in their way. Because of the media-hype and attention they get, they don't wan't to stop; so in a way this movie is a satire on the media.
But all things come to an end, and they're caught by a crazy police inspector Tom Sizemore. The jail is runned by Tommy Lee Jones, and he really plays his best role here.
The movie is shot in color, black&white and on many videoformats, which is very stylish, because Oliver thought it all over in the scenario. This makes it the ultimate MTV-movie. I mean short shots following each other up in a very fast way.
Great soundtrack with 3 Leonard Cohen songs incl. the future. Great choice of music. And a great script, by Quentin Tarantino, with catchy phrases that makes you think. For instance when Woody gives the live interview, he states that he thinks it's normal to kill other people and other living things. Everybody kills but instead of calling it murder they call it "industry". This made me think a lot, and along with the crazy characters and happenings in this movie, I could only say after watching this movie: 't's a crazy world we live in! And why blame Oliver Stone? He just reflects society, and I think the opponents of this movie just can't handle reality.
Don't turn your back on the darkside of life; face it!
The movies are not the blame for violence; violence is here since the dawn of mankind, the movies are here for merely a century. The violence and blood in this movie is just the "paint", you have to see and understand the big picture.
Along with Pulp fiction, Killing Zoe, Reservoir dogs and True Romance this movie belong to the "nouvelle violence" genre, a genre that got much attention in the 90s, but already started in 1986 with Henry:portrait of a serial killer.

Rating: 5 stars
Summary: Reflects our society
Review: This film gets better with age! It reflects more clearly our society`s obsession with violence and the characters (despite what the other reviwer said) of Mickey and Mallory are truly sympatethic -- we feel for them. They may be killers but they`re not hypocrits.
"Natural Born Killers" doesn't offer viewers violence that look like fun (although some scenes are deliberately moking "violent movies" through its satire) and it does not try to glorify violence. A lot of movies do -- and they make a lot of money. "You don't have to be a very sophisticated person to realize this is not a exploatation film. This is an art film."

Rating: 5 stars
Summary: it's satire people
Review: Please after reading the reviews on this movies i thought i was not watching the same movie, this movie is an indictment of our glorification of violence in our society and the media that exploits it for fiancial gain. the performances were top notch by these fine actors and actresses and you could see they were over the top its funny, yet sublime its satire people. perhaps you negative reviewers heard of it when you open your comic and read the "Boondocks" or listen to Parilament-Funkadelic's later albums. stone's intent was to parody the violence we see everyday in the various media(music, art, t.v. etc..) later that year o.j. simpson was on trial and the media expliotation mirroed the movie from the ' media talking heads' to the side show celebrites like kato kalien downey's character is like a modern day bill o'reilly ( who was one of those "journalists") using people for ratings and money for our corprate media and that what this movie represents. we as a society glorify violence of all kinds then we get angry and critcize those who produce it and then our media trivializes it and celebrates it for our enjoyment.

Rating: 2 stars
Summary: Glorifying Anarchy
Review: I didn't care for this movie. I realize that Oliver Stone was trying to make a point about society, but he painted a very pessimistic view where people seemed to revel in being rebellious. There are virtually no sympathetic characters in this movie. If you want to watch utter chaos and nonsense, tape South Park.

Rating: 5 stars
Summary: The Realizim Of Media
Review: I am just another person living life the best as I can in this monotonous world. The first time I saw this film, I didn't understand what the meaning or point behind this feature was! I was puzzled and lost in the movie. It seemed chaotic,like there was no direction of what was going to happen next. It was unlike any other film I had seen. I watched it again right after I finished the first time, left with nothing but confusion. The second view however, was different. It was a movie about a girl,(like most American girls), who was abused by her father,(SEXUALLY)and her mother was denying the situation, she knew everything and yet did nothing. Then along comes Mickey. This was her escape from the nightmarish world she had known and so she took it. Unplanned and unmapped murder happened. They killed her parents in a rage of madness for the evil that had been instilled in her. Then when it was over she told her brother,"your free Kevin"! That in itself is a bold statement,explaining the horror he had witnessed and grown up with. So then they take on a world of drugs, both mental abuse from parents + physical, counter act with their judgement on life. They are lost, but they love each other, and will stop at nothing to continue the crazy world they have created for themselves.
Then without knowing what is going on around them, they have become famous. The media,at this point, steps in and makes stars out of them. They almost praise them for as much killing as they have done. Trying to understand why they do the things they do. Whether it be good or evil. The media, in real life, is like that! Whether it's actors,famous presidents,personal life or singers, or KILLERS, people didn't understand this film or try to go along for the ride, they analized it instead and wound up hating it! And to deny the fact that media makes everything extravagant, it happens, all day, everyday. It's all about money. Whatever it takes, sometimes even death to that person.
I personally think Oliver Stone has a wonderful gift of talent to be portrated on screen. He was smart when picking the actors and actresses in this film. He thought about Woody Harrelson's backround and he knew he would be perfect to play Mickey. He knew without saying or asking that he had a past of abuse and to see that without knowing is a gift. And Juliette Lewis was also perfect, she has a much talented gift for acting then she is given credit for. I have seen her in all her movies. She is not a sex symbol for women, but she has beauty that is unforseen often one to many times.
This film was hated by so many because of it's ugly truth about today's world. It wasn't pretty, it wasn't real, but in a sense of reality it did touch us where it didn't feel good. But that's what made this film one of the best films made today. The directors cut was a totally different image than given, when they cut out certain words, scenes, facial expressions, and choas the film wasn't as good as it should have been. Watch the directors cut in it's entirety, and be more open minded of the point he was trying to portray.

Rating: 1 stars
Summary: Beneath an ugly exterior lies an even uglier truth
Review: As any enlightened four year old already knows, we live in a culture that glorifies, revels in, exploits, promotes and perpetuates darkness. In other words, possessing a pessimistic and cynical vision of the world in general and American Culture in specific is taking the obvious and easy path.

Oliver Stone, with this film (along with the neo-noir "U-Turn" and others)attempts satire but ends up achieving what every artist strives to avoid: becoming that which they despise. By creating this loud, bleak, ultra violent, crude and mono-syllabic film, Stone simply ends up ultimately contributing to the prevailing apocalyptic winds currently blowing our culture into oblivion.

Beneath the ugly exterior of this unpleasent film lies an even uglier truth. Stone completely allows himself (as he does with most of his films)to be coopted by the powers of darkness which he claims to despise.

With "Natural Born Killers", Stone offers the viewer absolutely no hope. He gives us an entire film populated with drooling morons, allowing us no single empathetic character. Obviously Stone wants to draw symbollic parallels between the sex crazed, violent beasts in his narrative and we the viewers. Granted we are all complex characters containing flaws, but we also contain the capacity for human decency and beauty. By giving his characters nothing even remotely admirable, Stone is condemning all of us (and therefore himself- after all, he made the film)into a black hole of despair.

The film does indeed earn one star out of 5 for its admittedly brilliant use of cinema. Stone has always been a canny, if hyperactive, genius at manipulating the film medium. His utter fearlessness borders on the reckless as he deftly shifts film stocks, incorperates animation and gleefully jump cuts. Ironically though, his very mastery of the medium makes him the quintessential American director of the 1990's: overblown, overwrought, obnoxious and wastefull. Like mainstream American media (I laugh at those reviewers who wrongly call Stone "European" in vision as opposed to "American")Stone doesn't understand subtlety. As in all his films, Stone displays a Senecan knack for bludgeoning every point home. He knows absolutely no restraint. And what is more American than being abrupt, loud and rude?

Any viewers though who suffer from chronic migrain need to avoid Stone's canon, especially this film, as it does inspire head splitting agony.

The only reason many praise his films and demonize the all too similar hack Micheal Bay is because many like to call Oliver Stone a brave visionary.

Oliver Stone may be a visual genius, but he caters to the prevailing culture of darkness by simply stating the obvious (whereas Bay assumes his viewers are all idiots). It is not courageous in the least to be cynical and pessimistic. In fact, the opposite is true. As an artist and as a human being, it takes great courage to fight against ignorance and evil and show elements of hope. If Stone has no hope for America or mankind, as "NBK" suggests, then what is the point of making art? A true visionary steps out of Plato's cave and shows us what lays beyond our personal feeble dim visions. We already see the dark cave around us and the even darker and shallow shadows that flicker on the walls in front of us. "Natural Born Killers" as a movie is nothing more than a flashy dark shadow across our landscape.

Instead of purchasing this film, I reccomend the similar themed, but far better films: "Gun Crazy","Bonnie And Clyde", "Badlands" (a quiet, beautiful film that NBK tries to be-but can't because it has no soul)and even Jonathan Demme's great but overlooked black romantic comedy "Something Wild". Each aforementioned film allows characters to posses weaknesses and beauty at the same time while simultaneously scewering and praising American culture.

Stone has managed to successfully achieve that wobbly tightrope with the magnificent films "Nixon" and "Born On The Forth Of July", but he fails here.


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