Hollywood Controversy...was a law broken?

[PurpleXVI]

True enough, Larry, we can only say what our reaction would be in various hypothetical cases. And lemme tell you, if even the SLIGHTEST untoward thing was going on there, I'm all for handing this director guy over to the puritans.

As for needing to show it, well... Shock value, maybe, I don't know. Personally I'd feel pretty damn uncomfortable watching it(Well, I'm guessing, can't say I've seen any rapes on screen before.), but perhaps there is more to the scene than just a hovering camera showing us a vile atrocity.

Mind you, doesn't it strike you as a bit odd that we happily accept seeing violent murder after violent murder on a screen, all the guts and gore hanging out, yet we'd prefer to only see the before-and-after of a rape? Both of them are pretty violent and horrible actions that don't involve any consent.

[Aelia Jusa]

Personally I don't find this all that troubling for Dakota. Of course, it is important that Dakota and her parents were able to make an informed choice about this, and that there are professional people available for Dakota if she was or is at all disturbed by the scene. However, it's not real. She is not actually being raped. That sounds trite, because, duh. But what I mean is, all the elements that make a rape such a devastating experience are not there, assuming of course that it was dealt with by the directors and others properly and professionally, which there is no evidence to suggest that it wasn't. Rape makes a person powerless - this is not the case here, Dakota most likely would have felt comfortable and been encouraged to stop any time she needed to. It's a violent act - again, not the case. The actor playing the rapist would not have been being violent towards her. It's an invasion - she was not naked, she was not actually raped. All that is shown on screen was her hands and face so in terms of filming all sorts of blocking and so on would have been done. Who knows what the two actors were actually doing during the filming of the scene. Her experience acting in this scene would have been nothing at all like it is to be raped.

Probably the most disturbing thing for her would be getting into the character of a young girl that was raped - imagining or being told what sort of emotions she would be feeling and so on. But that would be the case whether she had acted a rape scene or there was merely the suggestion as in Timber's closed door idea.

I also agree regarding Bratz dolls! I have long abhored those things. I would never ever get a child of mine one of them, no matter how much they wanted one. As trite as the expression is, I think they send a really bad message to young girls regarding what they should look like and how they should dress.

[Illumina Drathiran'ar]

We're telling young girls to be slutty, but this Dakota business disturbs people despite everything. There's a visceral, gut reaction. I just want to know where the logic is.

[Larry_OHF]

http://movies.go.com/tipster?id=872043

Latest news is that it tanked at the Sundance Film Festival, for this is an independent film that needed a distributer, and nobody wants to buy it. There are more reasons than the rape scene which is described as quite discreet...the reviews say that the movie itself basically sucks, and falls short of its goal to tell a story.

[Spelca]

From the article:

"When you're shooting a film, it's the images you line up next to each other that create a story," Kampmeier said. "If you have a hand hitting the ground, Dakota screaming 'stop' and you see a zipper unzip -- that creates a rape."

The way I understood that is that the rape scene is shown in bits and pieces... So it was shot like that as well. Like first they filmed her face, and then her hand hitting down, etc.

I don't understand why people don't get upset about other things children do in films as well. Like when they get chased by monsters / murderers, when they have to run around with blood dripping from their faces, when they are acting out scenes of domestic abuse, and so on. Wouldn't they find that disturbing as well? o_O

[Illumina Drathiran'ar]

Originally posted by Spelca: From the article: "When you're shooting a film, it's the images you line up next to each other that create a story," Kampmeier said. "If you have a hand hitting the ground, Dakota screaming 'stop' and you see a zipper unzip -- that creates a rape." The way I understood that is that the rape scene is shown in bits and pieces... So it was shot like that as well. Like first they filmed her face, and then her hand hitting down, etc. I don't understand why people don't get upset about other things children do in films as well. Like when they get chased by monsters / murderers, when they have to run around with blood dripping from their faces, when they are acting out scenes of domestic abuse, and so on. Wouldn't they find that disturbing as well? o_O

Good point. I wonder how Lifetime has managed to escape controversy for this long.

[Khazadman Risen]

But they also leave out the part where the twelve year old in question is doing a strip tease to get tickets to see Elvis. You should read the script, it leaves you wondering about the writer. The description of a pre-teens panties hitting the ground "with defiance" is, ah, kind of sick.

[/)eathKiller]

Personally I don't even think this issue should be debated. With nearly 1/3 of all children being molested nowadays, or something like that, who cares about a child being molested in a movie!? What I'd rather spend our time talking and worrying about is the 1/3 of the population that's actually being molested.

If more people talk about that, perhaps, the less afraid people would be about sharing their disturbed pasts or even children wouldn't be afraid to report such acts to the authorities. It could greatly reduce the number of people harboring long-term mental disorders with orgins in childhood molestation. So Dakota Fanning did something racy in a movie. Big deal. Do you even keep track of Japanese Cinema? I've seen more little girl rape scenes than most people can stomach for a lifetime. It's disgusting, but every director out there now wants to include them to be more "racy".

Violence, sex, and youth, are just going to keep multiplying exponentially in front of the Camera lens and people are only going to grow more disturbed. What really bothers me, however, is that some people are comparing this to Brokeback Mountain and actually saying that Brokeback was in some way worse because Dakota is at least being raped by a man...

As for the director/writer... I think he's got a serious Lolita complex. Don't be surprised if he is discovered to be a part of some child porn ring or something in the future.

[Dreamer128]

Originally posted by /)eathKiller: As for the director/writer... I think he's got a serious Lolita complex. Don't be surprised if he is discovered to be a part of some child porn ring or something in the future.

I think the writer/director is a woman..

[Cerek]

Originally posted by /)eathKiller: Personally I don't even think this issue should be debated. With nearly 1/3 of all children being molested nowadays, or something like that, who cares about a child being molested in a movie!? What I'd rather spend our time talking and worrying about is the 1/3 of the population that's actually being molested.

Your figure of 1/3 of children being molested sound very high to me, but your main point is still valid. Children being molested in real life is much more disturbing than the act being portrayed in a film. However, such scenes in films only serve to feed the lustful fantasies of pedophiles and may encourage others to "experiment" with pedophilia. That is reason enough to debate this issue.

Originally posted by /)eathKiller: If more people talk about that, perhaps, the less afraid people would be about sharing their disturbed pasts or even children wouldn't be afraid to report such acts to the authorities. It could greatly reduce the number of people harboring long-term mental disorders with orgins in childhood molestation. So Dakota Fanning did something racy in a movie. Big deal. Do you even keep track of Japanese Cinema? I've seen more little girl rape scenes than most people can stomach for a lifetime. It's disgusting, but every director out there now wants to include them to be more "racy".

Movies, TV and other media have a huge influence on our social values and morals. The more we see different things promoted in the media, the more "acceptable" these things become. The fact that Japanese Cinema has so many little girl rape scenes is, indeed, disgusting and very disturbing. By your own statement, it has led to other director's feeling as if they have to include such scenes in their own movies. The trend feeds upon itself and the more the general public is exposed to such acts, the more "desensitized" they become to the true horror of the act being portrayed. That is why Dakota Fanning doing something racy in a movie is a big deal.

Originally posted by /)eathKiller: Violence, sex, and youth, are just going to keep multiplying exponentially in front of the Camera lens and people are only going to grow more disturbed. What really bothers me, however, is that some people are comparing this to Brokeback Mountain and actually saying that Brokeback was in some way worse because Dakota is at least being raped by a man...

If enough outrage is raised over violence, sex and youth in front of the camera, then the trend will decrease rather than increase. The fact that this film bombed at the Cannes Festival provides a small degree of hope for the trend to decrease. Than again, it may have just bombed because the film was directed and produced so poorly rather than an abhorrance to the content. THAT is a truly disturbing thought.

As for the director/writer... I think he's got a serious Lolita complex. Don't be surprised if he is discovered to be a part of some child porn ring or something in the future.

I agree with the apparant Lolita complex. I thought the same thing when I read the article. Whether the writer was a man or woman is immaterial. He/she definitely seems to have an unnatural attraction to sex acts involving young women. I also agree it is entirely possible she was the victim of such acts herself.