Unrealistic

[jackfaire]

Should it be worrisome that people vote, make public policy, etc whom would refer to a movie that follows events as they actually happened as unrealistic?

For example a movie detailing the plight of a young girl dealing with Teen Pregnancy and how the community treats her in her small town and then seeing a long list of reviews and comments that refer to the portrayal as being "unrealistic and not something that would ever happen" when in reality that is exactly what happened?

It seems I often see these kinds of comments on any movie/TV show utilizing real life events. I wonder do you think it reveals a level of naivete or do these people truly think that no one really acts that way.

[bara]

People like to make believe that human nature isn't what it is. They want to believe that evil only happens occasionally and in the form of a mass killer. They don't like to accept the hard facts that evil can occur at all levels and in many forms.

[TheHuckster]

You'd have to be more specific as to how that town treated her, and where this happened. Did they shun her? Give her a letter to wear on her dress? Beat her up? Stone her to death?

Movies based on true stories are almost always embellished or dramatized. If they did something to basically make her an outcast in the small community, sure I can totally see that as possible, but movies tend to add a little bit extra things to it that make it cross the line into implausible or overreaching.

[Andara Bledin]

Many of those who deny reality believe that nothing like that could ever happen because they're afraid of a world in which that sort of thing does happen. Reality is too scary, so they just ignore the parts that they're not strong enough to handle.

It's a safety mechanism for those without the mental fortitude to consciously acknowledge just how easily people can be manipulated to do terrible things and that they could be one of those people or the victims of such.

There's a movie out right no, called Compliance, that is catching a lot of flack from people who were too uncomfortable to even watch the whole thing, about how unrealistic it was and how "nobody would do something like that." The truth of the matter is that not only is it based on a true event, but the real event went much farther than the events in the movie (probably partly to keep it down to an R rating).

As the saying goes: Truth is stranger than fiction; fiction has to be believable.

Article at Wikipedia.
Compliance at IMDb.

^-.-^

[jackfaire]

You'd have to be more specific as to how that town treated her, and where this happened. Did they shun her? Give her a letter to wear on her dress? Beat her up? Stone her to death?

The example I am using is an illustration the movie that inspired the thread was close enough that if it hadn't been cast with actors it would have been considered a documentary.

No stoning or anything of the kind was involved. It was a movie about the girls who had a pregnancy pact.

People considered it unrealistic that teens ever want to become parents because, "no one ever wants to become a parent that young" even though many of the young parents I have met did want to and try to become pregnant while 16.

[TheHuckster]

People considered it unrealistic that teens ever want to become parents because, "no one ever wants to become a parent that young" even though many of the young parents I have met did want to and try to become pregnant while 16.

Yeah, in that case I agree the commenters are dipshits if they think there aren't teenagers who choose to become pregnant.

Although on the case of the pregnancy pact, if you're talking about the media circus behind the Glocester incident in Massachusetts, there was no proof that such a pact existed.

[Nekojin]

Although on the case of the pregnancy pact, if you're talking about the media circus behind the Glocester incident in Massachusetts, there was no proof that such a pact existed.

*snort* There's no evidence that Satanic human sacrifices have ever occurred in modern times, but that doesn't stop people from trying to "do something" about heavy metal, Dungeons and Dragons, or whatever else is the current "Satanic Influence" of the day. People believe (or disbelieve) what they want to believe, evidence be damned.

[TheHuckster]

*snort* There's no evidence that Satanic human sacrifices have ever occurred in modern times, but that doesn't stop people from trying to "do something" about heavy metal, Dungeons and Dragons, or whatever else is the current "Satanic Influence" of the day. People believe (or disbelieve) what they want to believe, evidence be damned.

Yeah, I'm sure there have been cases of pregnancy pacts (and human sacrifices) in the past, but when you're talking about a specific event where there was a media circus behind it and the only source they had was "the principle thought so" then I question just how true the story is.