The Purge Trailer

[mr friendly guy]

If they wanted to do this concept why not set it in a single city where this is allowed? Then you could have the utopia thing just be bullshit spewed by the city council when it reality the city is some sort of closely monitored dumping ground for undesirables and the purge a way to keep the population down so more people can be sent in.

You might be onto something. I suspect the movie will have some sort of twist, and your suggestion seems as plausible as anything I can come up with.

[Crossroads Inc.]

You know I am not sure which is more idiotic...

The concept that you can have some sort of "Utopia" going on when there is one night a year where there are NO LAWS OF ANY SORT.
The concept that, evidently, without laws normal people will turn into twisted butchering killers, instead of, just being normal.
Or...
The concept that movie writters had to come up with in the first place for this!

I mean, say you are a movie writter, you are sitting around the table and you go.
"Hey I got it! lets have a Slasher flick where for one night, the whole nation/world goes mad! Every one goes into lock down to avoid being hacked to bits!"
"Wonderful idea, how should we have it happen? A freak sickness? A mind warping substance? Some demonic black magic to twists souls?"
"No no, how about the Government just says that there will be no laws for one night, so everyone can go murder people!!!"

...

Yeah.. because THAT makes waaaaay more sense!

[Ahriman238]

One thing (besides all the other things, obviously) confuses me. The mob at the door calls the black guy their prey, and seem rather singleminded in pursuing him. If this is just go murder and steal whatever you want, shouldn't they move on once a target becomes hard to reach?

Here's another idea, why did they think a trailer showing a bunch of masked white people hunting a black guy for sport would not get them in trouble?

I was going to say, unfortunate implications there. Think it'd come up in the movie, maybe they're just taking advantage of this night to get rid of the one black guy in the neighborhood?

Why would it get them in trouble?

Because a majority of black people can easily remember living in fear of masked white people hunting down and lynching them?

[Lagmonster]

I'd like to know how they explain people being well aware, for 364 days, which of their neighbours are sadistic bloody-minded butchers. Or even less.

Say one purge you wake up the day after and your car has 'moved' to your next-door neighbours' driveway. He didn't change the plates or the parts or the ignition or anything, he just broke in, hotwired it, and drove it ten feet to the left. What do you do? Walk across the lawn, sigh heavily, and take your car back? Or is it his now because he stole it when stealing was legal?

I wonder what neighbourhood chat must be like? "Hi Bob, how ya doin', ya lucky bastard! Almost beat you to the safe room last night, didn't I? I was right on your tail with my axe." "Ha! You're such a scamp, you sonofabitch, Tom. Just an FYI, I'm going to try to cut you to bloody ribbons next year. Just giving you a heads up because your BBQ last month was kickass. Hey, while I'm here, can I borrow your power drill?" "No problem, Bob. Hey, want to get a beer later with the missus? I'm thinking of raping her if I actually kill you this time."

[Crossroads Inc.]

Curse you Lag! You almost owe me a new keybored from spitting soda out!
That was funny as hell, AND serves to only further show how stupid this whole concept is.

[Scrib]

Why would it get them in trouble?

Because a majority of black people can easily remember living in fear of masked white people hunting down and lynching them?

It's not like it's being depicted as a good thing no? Nor do we know if it's racial yet.

[Ralin]

Because some of us don't see race. We just do not see it.

More seriously, yeah that's probably intended to make it seem even worse.

Also, apparently there are repercussions of some sort afterwards if they're wearing masks.

[Admiral Valdemar]

I'd like to know how they explain people being well aware, for 364 days, which of their neighbours are sadistic bloody-minded butchers. Or even less.

Say one purge you wake up the day after and your car has 'moved' to your next-door neighbours' driveway. He didn't change the plates or the parts or the ignition or anything, he just broke in, hotwired it, and drove it ten feet to the left. What do you do? Walk across the lawn, sigh heavily, and take your car back? Or is it his now because he stole it when stealing was legal?

I wonder what neighbourhood chat must be like? "Hi Bob, how ya doin', ya lucky bastard! Almost beat you to the safe room last night, didn't I? I was right on your tail with my axe." "Ha! You're such a scamp, you sonofabitch, Tom. Just an FYI, I'm going to try to cut you to bloody ribbons next year. Just giving you a heads up because your BBQ last month was kickass. Hey, while I'm here, can I borrow your power drill?" "No problem, Bob. Hey, want to get a beer later with the missus? I'm thinking of raping her if I actually kill you this time."

If the film is 90 minutes of this, like some Family Guy sketch, then I'm in. If it's trying to raise a serious point, or be edgy because Saw finished finally and we love torture porn "horror", then pfft. Maybe if it's on telly one night.

[bilateralrope]

Also, apparently there are repercussions of some sort afterwards if they're wearing masks.

The jury learning you killed a witness against you isn't likely to go down well in a trial. Even if the killing was completely legal.

[Ralin]

The jury learning you killed a witness against you isn't likely to go down well in a trial. Even if the killing was completely legal.

Theoretically speaking, in this really stupid world where Crime Night exists, I suppose you could probably make an argument that me killing a witness against me on Crime Night should be inadmissible on the grounds that it would have a chilling effect on people's legal right to go around capping random people who annoy them on Crime Night.

[bilateralrope]

The jury learning you killed a witness against you isn't likely to go down well in a trial. Even if the killing was completely legal.

Theoretically speaking, in this really stupid world where Crime Night exists, I suppose you could probably make an argument that me killing a witness against me on Crime Night should be inadmissible on the grounds that it would have a chilling effect on people's legal right to go around capping random people who annoy them on Crime Night.

That assumes that the law is treating Crime Night as a right, which sounds stupider than what's shown in the trailer.

[Ralin]

That assumes that the law is treating Crime Night as a right, which sounds stupider than what's shown in the trailer.

I don't think it's a good idea to assume that anything is too stupid for this movie. And from a storytelling point of view it makes sense that they would go full-retard and make Crime Night a sacred inalienable right.

In fact, wouldn't it have to be in order to trump all of my other rights, such as my right to not have my home broken into and my head bashed in?

[Akhlut]

Why are you trying to inject sense into something that doesn't make sense? It's pretty obvious that the entire premise exists to try to tell a story with some sort of theme that is supposed to be quasi-deep. The setting is there to tell the story (which is exactly how it should be), however, the problem with the setting is that it violates suspension of disbelief (people wouldn't really like to live in a society that allows "legal" crime wherein you cannot trust 99% of the population) and the theme itself is probably terrible (humans are awful and have little or no redeeming qualities).

The movie's main draw is going to be mostly from the audiences of Saw, Hostel, and so forth. There's a huge torture porn audience, for some reason, but none of it tells really compelling stories. The entire philosophy seems to be something like all humans deserve horrible torture because we're all inherently evil (oh, hey, it's just like Calvinism!) with little or no hope for redemption.

So, really, trying to analyze how the world works is a fool's errand. It's not supposed to be a realistic examination of a subject (like Boyz n the Hood), it's supposed to be more allegorical (like The Seventh Seal) though, it lacks all of the subtlety, introspection, and thoughtful points that the latter makes.

[Ralin]

Well yeah, but we're posting on a site dedicated to debating who would win in a fight between Star Wars and Star Trek.

If I can't argue about silly things here, I'm not sure what the point is.

[Akhlut]

Well yeah, but we're posting on a site dedicated to debating who would win in a fight between Star Wars and Star Trek.

If I can't argue about silly things here, I'm not sure what the point is.

I've been here for 3 years longer than you. I'm well aware of the original purpose the site. And I don't even mind arguing about silly things.

However, I can already assure you that this movie is going to be garbage. Trying to figure out how it works is like trying to come up with an in-universe reason for MISSINGNO in Pokemon or why you can see the strings on the props in old movies.

[bilateralrope]

That assumes that the law is treating Crime Night as a right, which sounds stupider than what's shown in the trailer.

I don't think it's a good idea to assume that anything is too stupid for this movie. And from a storytelling point of view it makes sense that they would go full-retard and make Crime Night a sacred inalienable right.

In fact, wouldn't it have to be in order to trump all of my other rights, such as my right to not have my home broken into and my head bashed in?

Why does it make sense that they would go stupider ?

It seems to me that you just didn't like me giving you a response to you saying

Also, apparently there are repercussions of some sort afterwards if they're wearing masks.

So you're just making shit up to try and invalidate my response.

[Scrib]

Yeah, the movie is probably trying to make a point.But then, whether a having certain theme allows you to get away with avoiding common sense to show it is nowhere near a settled question. Even for a movie like No Country For Old Men, that had much smaller problems (positively trivial in comparison to this) there was a ton of criticism.

[Crossroads Inc.]

Well the movie is out, and once again cheap mindless horror evidently is HUGELY popular...
The Purge gets 36 Million This weekend alone.

[FaxModem1]

And with only a budget of 3 million, it's made 10 times it's budget.

[PeZook]

Man if only crime was actually caused by "negative emotions" that people are "unable to vent"!

Then computer games and racist Internet forums would be all the crime prevention we'd ever need

[Admiral Valdemar]

The film was boring. I was going to post the other week after seeing it, but it sapped energy from me. It squandered what good ideas it could have exploited in order to tell us another home invasion story, because we can't get enough of these things.

Best part of the whole thing? Lena Headey smacking a bitch.

[Dr. Trainwreck]

On the other hand, this has lots of sequel potential. The Purge 2, for example, could be about a guy who lost his entire family when a mob broke through his house, but he remembers their faces and now has one night to take revenge on all of them. The Purge 3 is about the social collapse that ensues when people start taking their revenge the very next day instead of waiting an entire year. Yay, more profits!

But seriously, debating the plot of this thing is about as sensible as asking "why a girl that sells dildos would need to prove they work by fucking another girl". Everything in these slasher films happens exactly like everything happens in porn: you're not here to ask questions.

[Scrib]

And with only a budget of 3 million, it's made 10 times it's budget.

Glad to see a movie without a completely ridiculous budget, no matter how I feel about the script.

[Steel]

And with only a budget of 3 million, it's made 10 times it's budget.

Glad to see a movie without a completely ridiculous budget, no matter how I feel about the script.

You'll probably find they spent 3 million on the movie, then 30 million on advertising.

[Scrib]

And with only a budget of 3 million, it's made 10 times it's budget.

Glad to see a movie without a completely ridiculous budget, no matter how I feel about the script.

You'll probably find they spent 3 million on the movie, then 30 million on advertising.

Funny, I was passing through Reddit and that's exactly the claim that was made. IIRC the exact words were "triumph of marketing"