Daily life and news is filled with tragedy, sorrow and haunting headlines. It seems like every day there are mass shootings, new fatality records broken or natural disasters ruining hundreds of lives. It’s great when celebrities use their star power for good and fundraising to help aid or bring awareness to events like these. However, that’s the only involvement celebrities should have with these horrific events.
The film industry has taken it upon themselves to profit from the disasters and heartbreak many people have endured. This trend started many years ago with films about the Holocaust, genocides in other countries and serial killers. For Louisianians, the industry recently produced the movie “Deep Water Horizon” about the 2010 oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico. Locals already watched that event unfold and the sad aftermath of it. I don’t want to go pay to relive that story with handsome actors as the selling point because I already coped with it and have moved on. The glamorized reminders of these events is not welcomed and slightly insensitive.
Not just one, but two movies have been made about the Boston Marathon bombing. It’s wonderful when movies highlight the real life heroes that sprang into action during those hard times, but I don’t need Mark Wahlberg in “Patriots Day” or Jake Gyllenhaal in “Stronger” to emphasize the hardships so many people went through because of the terrorism that took place.
People like to go to the movies and see something fun and chipper, or an original drama with enticing acting and unique storylines. We already know what happened, how many lives were lost and how many of us are in the healing process. There’s no sense in opening old wounds for entertainment. It’s insensitive to the people who were affected firsthand, who lost loved ones or lost everything in the natural disasters.
If charities or something else was created from these movie adaptations, then at least they’d have a worthwhile purpose. However, the movies are too late to do any good and are just an excuse for actors and actresses to feel like they were involved in bringing light to a terrible tragedy.
Save your money and don’t support movies that glamorize and exploit devastating past events. Don’t support the insensitivity to human lives that have been lost or wondrous nature that’s been destroyed. Hollywood needs to come up with something new or original if they want to gain support from a broader audience. Encouraging survivors to relive their trauma is alienating to an audience, and really, it’s sick and cruel.
Jordan Miller is a 21-year-old elementary education junior from New Orleans, Louisiana.