Movies - Natural Born Killers

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	Movies - Natural Born Killers

Natural Born Killers is a 1994 motion picture directed by Oliver Stone and starring Juliette Lewis and Woody Harrelson. Rodney Dangerfield, Robert Downey Jr., Tom Sizemore and Tommy Lee Jones are also featured.

Quentin Tarantino wrote the screenplay, which Stone, Richard Rutowski, and David Veloz extensively edited. Tarantino, unhappy with the rewritten version, publicly disowned the script and asked that his name be removed from the screenwriting credits. Despite Tarantino's objections, his name still appeared in the credits.

The movie intended to highlight the sensationalised way crimes are depicted in the media and the way killers are virtually regarded as cultural heroes. But it was criticized by the press for its excessively graphic and violent content, and because of this many people (including many of the film's biggest fans) often seemed to miss the real point of the film: it is a highly stylized critique of violence glamorized by the media.

Plot summary

The film opens with Mickey Knox (Harrelson) and his girlfriend Mallory (Lewis) in a roadside cafe. Mallory kills a man when he acts inappropriately toward her. Mickey, meanwhile, knifes two other customers and shoots the chef and the waitress. They leave one witness alive, as is their custom, to tell the tale.

After the titles, there is a flashback sequence to how the murderous pair met up. Mickey was a delivery man who turned up at the house where Mallory lived with her abusive father (Rodney Dangerfield), her mother and her younger brother. The scene is portrayed as a sitcom with a canned laughter track, the "audience" laughing hardest when Mallory is subjected to lewd comments and molestation by her repulsive father. When Mickey arrived with a delivery of beef, he fell in love with Mallory and whisked her away on a date, stealing her father's car in the process. Mickey was arrested and imprisoned for car-theft, but he escaped and returned to Mallory's house. He kills her father by drowning him in the fishtank (while he is simultaneously hit in the head with a tire iron), and burns her mother alive in her bed. They spare her ten-year-old brother (who was played by Oliver Stone's son, Sean). Mickey then takes Mallory away with him.

Back in the present the pair continue their crime-spree, slaughtering their way across the southwest United States and claiming fifty-two victims. Following them are two characters who have an obsessive interest in Mickey and Mallory for the purposes of acquiring fame and glory, as well as furthering their own careers. The first is a policeman, Detective Scagnetti (Sizemore), who is seemingly in love with Mallory. He wants to be the hero by capturing the pair and saving the country, though it is plainly revealed that Scagnetti has a lifelong obsession with serial killers. Journalist Wayne Gale (Downey) hosts a show called 'American Maniacs', profiling serial killers in a blatantly sensationalist way. Various clips of his program on Mickey and Mallory are shown, with Gale sounding outraged as he details the pair's crimes, although off-air he clearly regards their crimes as a fantastic way of boosting his show's ratings. It is Gale who is mostly responsible for elevating Mickey and Mallory into heroes, with his show featuring interviews with people expressing their admiration for the mass-killers as if they were pop stars.

While lost in the desert, Mickey and Mallory are taken in by a Najavo man (known as "Old Indian") and his son. After the duo fall asleep, the Old Indian begins chanting besides the fire, invoking nightmares from Mickey about his abusive father and mother. Mickey wakes up in a rage and shoots Old Indian before he realises what he is doing. Mallory and Mickey are both traumatised, marking the first time the couple feel guilty for a murder. Mallory exclaims, "You killed life!," implying Old Indian was more worthy of living than their previous victims. While running from the scene, the two are bitten repeatedly by rattlesnakes.

Eventually the pair are arrested after a shootout at a drugstore, Scagnetti on hand to claim the glory. The movie then jumps ahead one year. After a surreal trial that is shown in a flashback in clips from 'American Maniacs', complete with fans outside the courthouse with banners saying "Murder ME Mickey!!", the homicidal couple have been imprisoned but are shortly due to be shipped to a mental asylum after being declared insane.

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