----------------------------Original message----------------------------
"True Romance" was an awful movie. I see a deep and significant difference
between it and "Reservoir Dogs." -- or another similar film, David Lynch's
"Wild at Heart." In "Dogs," the violence serves no purpose and solves no
problem. TR, on the other hand, glorifies and wallows in typical, reeking,
"righteous" violence. Like Slater's manly execution of the drug dealer Gary
Oldman (at the urging of Elvis no less! -- what an abomination!). And oh how
we thrill to Patricia Arquette's killing of the hit man. And Christopher
Walken's lingering sadism over Dennis Hopper. Typical violence as
titillation, e.g. part of the problem, pornography. Not to mention the
couple's happily-ever-after ending made possible by a suitcase full of
cocaine. Sick, macho, amoral, pro-violence mythology.
 
Very different is "Wild at Heart." Sailor and Lula try to escape their
violent pasts with only a few dollars in their jeans. No manly vengeance
first, no drug money. Pure love and innocence on a wing and a prayer.
Sailor's one relapse -- the armed robbery -- results in sickening, pointless
violence and a five-year setback of their dreams. As soon as he becomes
tempted in Big Tuna by the sadistic, emotionally-crippled Bobby Peru, the
innocence and hope of their road trip starts to leak away. In the end, pure
love, hope, innocence and untarnished forgiveness win out (and elevated by an
untarnished memory of Elvis, evoked through Sailor's singing of "Love Me
Tender.")
 
For me, a significant failing of "Forrest Newt" is the reliance on FG's
lucking into a huge fortune. I guess the writers couldn't figure out any
convincing way for the good-hearted half-wit to take care of his aging mother
and AIDS-victim girlfriend without scoring an unholy pile of cash. Too bad
for all the real good-hearted half-wits out there, slaving away at their
sub-poverty minimum wage jobs. Watching their real aging mothers and
AIDS-victim friends disappearingx. What a pathetic film.
 
Thanks for listening.