Natural Born Killers 2 Essay, Research Paper
Natural Born Killers is a story by Quentin Tarantino who sold the screenplay to a friend who latter sold it to Oliver Stone. Stone and his fellow screenwriters rewrote the original script. This doing horrified Tarantino, so with a private meeting they both met and resolved the conflict to the two scripts. In there finial edit they wrote the characters to fit certain movie stars. Natural Born Killers stars Woody Harrelson and Juliette Lewis, with Robert Downey Jr., Tommy Lee Jones, Tom Sizemore, and Rodney Dangerfield.
Woody Harrelson stars as Mickey Knox, a self-proclaimed Natural Born Killer. His girlfriend is Mallory, played by Juliette Lewis. Over the period of the film, Mickey and Mallory get married and go on a killing spree, starting with Mallory’s parents (played by Rodney Dangerfield and Edie McClurg). The film revolves around these two “mass murderers” as they go through many changes and many killings. We don’t see them all, but we get the idea that they have killed many people. However, the second part of the movie collides with the first segment as soon as the media shows up. The media is represented in one main figure, and some other smaller parts. The main representation is Wayne Gale (Robert Downey Jr.), a talk show host who is obsessed with serial killers, especially Mickey and Mallory. This talk show host along with other forms of the media has made Mickey and Mallory stars. It shows that serial killers can become as famous as movie stars and sports stars. In fact, this film is about so many things that it’ s hard to explain in a review.
The Motion Picture Association edited 32 minutes during its review prior to the release of the censored version, they were latter edited back in on the directors cut version of Natural Born Killers. The movie starts out with various different shots in a diner out in the desert, where the film transfers from black and white to color shots. There are also many parts of the film that is edited from 35 mm, 16 mm, 8 mm shots, to video tape to super red tape
As the introduction of the film roles it shows background scenes of different symbolism of who they are and different chaos they have created to their victims. In the second scene there is a small episode of, “I Love Mallory” with the background of a live audience. This is where Mickey and Mallory meet and fall in love. Mallory falls in love with Mickey upon first sight, Mallory’s dad who is the father from hell played by Rodney Dangerfield who has been raping Mallory since she was about twelve has Mickey arrested and put to jail. After Mickey was released from being incarcerated he goes and reclaims Mallory from the father from hell by killing her family as she watched very happily.
Tom Sizemore and Tommy Lee Jones play a couple of cops. Jack Scagnetti (Tom Sizemore) a cop after Mickey, Jack is upsest with Mickey and Mallory. Jack also has demons inside of him that want to kill. Mr. Scagnetti kills a prostitute at a motel; this shot resembles the past one’s with the background representing what they are thinking. The prostitute is thinking joy with happy music rolling with the clouds and sunlight, while Mr. Scagnetti is think thoughts of the devil he sees his self with horns coming out of his head. Dwight McCluskey (Tommy Lee Jones) a redneck prison warden who wore a pencil thin tooth brush mustache with a duck tail hair cut resembling a fifty-seven studabaker and pork chop side burns. Always walked around grabbing his crotch, he is a hard ass to all the prisoners who ends up getting killed by his inmates during a prison riot.
Edited Scenes
The courtroom scene was completely edited from the movie by the Motion Picture Association because of the graphical violence that occurs. Ashley Judd plays Grace Mullbury, who is the sole survivor of eighteen brutal murders that occurred one night. Grace is the only witness willing to take the stand to testify against Mickey and Mallory Knox, knowingly that she is going to be crossed examined my Mickey who’s representing Mallory and himself. As Mickey started to examine Grace, her memory starts flashing back to that horrible evening as she sees blood all over Mickey and Mallory. Mickey knows this as he is badgering her on the stand along with terrorizing her with his voice and his body language. As Mrs. Mullbury answers the question in anger from Mickey, his inter demon was laughing at her while she was saying that he is not human. Just as Mickey asks his last question about fate, he starts to jab his pencil into Graces chest numerous of times until she dies at the witness stand. It was a very bloody and horrible scene and I can see why the Motion Picture Association would want that edited from the public. Additional scenes of the movie that were cut out by Oliver Stone his self are the Hun Brothers. The Hun Brothers are twin brothers that are body builders who turned into celebrities. They also have been victimized by the Knox’s whom they sawed off there legs after not noticing who they were until after the doing it. A commercial was also edited from the movie; it had Dennis Leary doing his mad man rap on Mickey and Mallory. This commercial was ninety seconds long and would of fit perfectly during the channel surfing segment of the film. Natural Born Killers also had two different alternative ending. This one was edited out, with a psycho guardian angel that ends up killing them. This angel plays a character by the name of Owen, who was in the first scene (diner) of the movie that disappears as the camera rolls on him. He is also in the background of a couple of different shots of the movie watching on, being their protector. As Mickey and Mallory are escaping from prison Owen comes from the fires of hell with guns to assist in the escape. After Mickey, Mallory and Owen have escaped they are driving in a van down highway 666. Owen asked Mickey if he could have a taste of Mallory, Mickey gets very mad at Owen for propositioning him. While Mallory is sticking a gun in Owen’s face and mocking him on how good the sex would be. Mickey had enough with Owen so he pulls the van over and tells him to get out, this is when Owen shoots Mickey in the face with a shot gun as Mallory watches on then he turns to Mallory and shoots her in the face also. In a sense this would be a good ending to the movie. A guardian angel who too is one of them a killer, but this ending doesn’t leave an opening for a sequel to Natural Born Killers.
My personal thoughts of Natural Born Killers is that this movie is very chaotic with a lot of energy. I believe the purpose of the movie is to have people think of the violence that is out there and how crime has invaded life with the media-promoted criminals like Charles Mansons, O.J. Simpson and the Menendez brothers bringing it into a circus. With aggression becoming a major part of the build up of the media doing live coverage from robberies to war, people tend to that violence is cool. What Natural Born Killers did is just bring it to our attention.
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