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It wasn't the first horror film my children saw (they watched Jaws, Alien, and Stranger Things) but the most terrifying and traumatic experience they've seen wa

It wasn't the first horror film my children saw (they watched Jaws, Alien, and Stranger Things) but the most terrifying and traumatic experience they've seen was the shipwreck scene in the Black Stallion. If you want to frighten children, murder what they love while they watch: their parents and animals. Coincidence both Bambi and the Black Stallion were written during or in the immediate aftermath of world wars?

masklinn 4y ago
> Coincidence both Bambi and the Black Stallion were written during or in the immediate aftermath of world wars? Meh. Every generation has its angsts, and writers putting it down to paper. Watership down was written in the very late 60s / very early 70s.
- anthk 4y ago
  Bambi was a movie for war kids who lost a parent (or both) in the war.
Cthulhu_ 4y ago
One thing I've really noticed is that a lot of people - children and adults both - have no qualms about depictions of violence and murder of people in media, but they get really squeamish when it's (cute) animals. I wonder what causes that, is it just a kind of desensitization? Or a built-in kind of justice that bad people dying is fine but innocent animals isn't?
- kumarsw 4y ago
  This is a pretty well-observed phenomenon that the relative sadness of humans and cute animals dying in movies and real life is (presumably) reversed. Someone had even coined a term for it - “dog-dying-in-movie sad.” I’m at a loss to explain why, but it feels like Peak Internet Discussion so hopefully someone here will feel like expanding on it.
  - selimthegrim 4y ago
    See also - John Wick
- watwut 4y ago
  There are movies that show violence against people in a way that hits and in a way that people react to. However, not in typical action/war/thriller story. The context matters. The depictions of violence of people in media if typically very intentionally written in a way that does not make you feel too bad. The killed people rarely have personalities or matter. Modern media rarely kills characters that people had a chance to know or relate to. They are not cute and their deaths are sort of "clean". The cute animals people are squeamish about are played up for cuteness, the owner is played up to be sad. It is all very intentionally made up to make you feel sad.
whywhywhywhy 4y ago
Parents being murdered is in plenty of kids movies. I don't think it has much to do with war I think it's more just you're writing a story with kids as the protagonists. How do you build a plot where they can overcome things if their parents are still in the picture. Don't think its much deeper than that.

masklinn 4y ago

> Coincidence both Bambi and the Black Stallion were written during or in the immediate aftermath of world wars? Meh. Every generation has its angsts, and writers putting it down to paper. Watership down was written in the very late 60s / very early 70s.

anthk 4y ago
Bambi was a movie for war kids who lost a parent (or both) in the war.

Cthulhu_ 4y ago

One thing I've really noticed is that a lot of people - children and adults both - have no qualms about depictions of violence and murder of people in media, but they get really squeamish when it's (cute) animals. I wonder what causes that, is it just a kind of desensitization? Or a built-in kind of justice that bad people dying is fine but innocent animals isn't?

kumarsw 4y ago
This is a pretty well-observed phenomenon that the relative sadness of humans and cute animals dying in movies and real life is (presumably) reversed. Someone had even coined a term for it - “dog-dying-in-movie sad.” I’m at a loss to explain why, but it feels like Peak Internet Discussion so hopefully someone here will feel like expanding on it.
- selimthegrim 4y ago
  See also - John Wick
watwut 4y ago
There are movies that show violence against people in a way that hits and in a way that people react to. However, not in typical action/war/thriller story. The context matters. The depictions of violence of people in media if typically very intentionally written in a way that does not make you feel too bad. The killed people rarely have personalities or matter. Modern media rarely kills characters that people had a chance to know or relate to. They are not cute and their deaths are sort of "clean". The cute animals people are squeamish about are played up for cuteness, the owner is played up to be sad. It is all very intentionally made up to make you feel sad.

whywhywhywhy 4y ago

Parents being murdered is in plenty of kids movies. I don't think it has much to do with war I think it's more just you're writing a story with kids as the protagonists. How do you build a plot where they can overcome things if their parents are still in the picture. Don't think its much deeper than that.