Free Republic

Down at the beach, every other trash can is wrapped in what suddenly seems an unnerving image, given the recent school shootings, including last week’s in Texas. There’s baby-faced Alden Ehrenreich, as Han Solo in Solo: A Star Wars Story from Lucsfilm and Disney, aiming squarely at the viewer with an outsized handgun (and it is exactly that, whatever fantasy blast it is presumed to emit in the latest installment of the sci-fi epic). Just below, a smiling Emilia Clark, as Qi’ra, clutches a double-barreled pistol. They are flanked by Joonas Suotamo, Chewbacca, who totes the space equivalent of an...

President Trump on Thursday warned about the influence of violence in movies while discussing school safety and mass shootings, suggesting it could be a contributing factor to recent mass shootings. Trump made the comments during a meeting at the White House on school safety attended by lawmakers and top administration officials, where the president addressed a number of issues in addition to gun violence. "We have to look at the internet, because a lot of bad things are happening to young kids and young minds, and their minds are being formed, and we have to do something about maybe what...

The problem isn't Hollywood, it's real life, where killing long predates film. What we see on the silver screen can be helpful. By Betsy Sharkey, Los Angeles Times Film Critic February 15, 2013, 7:00 a.m. I abhor violence. As a rookie police reporter years ago I saw the damage guns, knives, broken bottles, metal pipes, hands — humans — can inflict. From the terrifyingly premeditated to the unfortunately accidental, those images still have the power to shake me to the core. They will never leave me. I don't, however, believe the movies are to blame for these acts. As good...

A Parker County 17-year-old wrote in a confession released Thursday that the horror movie remake of "Halloween" gave him the idea to kill his mother and sister. Jake Evans is on trial for the Oct. 3 slayings of his 15-year-old sister, Mallory, and mother, Jami in their upscale Aledo home. The confession was introduced as evidence. In a four-page written confession to police hours after his arrest, Evans said he had watched the remake of "Halloween" three times earlier that week. The 2007 Rob Zombie film is about a 10-year-old boy who murders several people and kills a number of...

For discussion and education purposes only.Greensboro, North Carolina-AP -- A North Carolina fifth-grader has been charged with assault for knocking out a boy in a school bus fight over a snack cake. (snip) ...According to the principal, when the boy sitting next to him asked for a bite, Kevin said no and was smacked in the face with a stuffed Tweety Bird. Kevin hit back, but was slammed against a window and hit in the back. Then he fell in the aisle and was stomped.School officials say when the bus driver pulled the aggressor off him, Kevin was unconscious.

This summer, copies of a nearly 200-page screenplay wrapped in a glossy white cover discreetly made their way around Hollywood. "Uma Thurman is going to KiLL BiLL," read the hand-written, red-and-black scrawl on the cover — a chilling promise of the relentless mayhem inside. The violent movie being born from these pages will not be released by the Walt Disney Company's Miramax Films unit until October 2003, if all goes according to plan. But the second coming of the film's director, the long-absent Quentin Tarantino — and the inevitable debate about his prospects in what was supposed to be moviedom's...