h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

Went to see We Need To Talk About Kevin today with a mate and, for the first time in about 6 years, I walked out of a film. It was so upsetting and I've never understood why people get off on this kind of misery porn: if I want to feel crap I simply have to revisit my childhood - I don't need a film to do it.

I was chatting to my aunt and she's one of those people who really gets off (I really can't think of another way of describing it) on these kinds of books/films and I just don't understand why: my aunt has had a hellish life, I don't get what comfort or solace can be drawn from them.

Sitting in a nice pub with a drink and a paper helped restore my equilibrium, it's a much better way to spend a Sunday afternoon. My mate kicked off once he found me after the film but sod him: a) I paid for both of us and b) it was his choice of film and he chose badly.

I can't understand why people feel the need to watch those films either - especially if they involved youngsters

lil x

I have to say that wild horses would not get me into that film. I'm impressed you walked out though. I've never actually walked out of a film. Not sure I'd have the balls.

I've walked out of one movie and wish I'd walked out of several others. The topic of that movie is interesting to me, but I wouldn't want to see a whole movie about it.

I'm with you there. Real life has enough sadness and disappointment that I want a film to take me away from that, not immerse me in it.

It's the reason I'll play a game like Skyrim but not touch Call of Duty with a barge pole. I want escapism, not a death simulator.

I read the book not having much of a clue what it was about. as I went through it I got more of an inkling at at some point realised more or less what had happened - I wish I'd left it there but I finished it.

Seriously it's one book I wish I'd never ever picked up. I can't possibly imagine going to see the film or, indeed, why they have made it into a film at all.

I think sometimes people who've had a tough life want to read about or watch films about similar tough times because it helps them feel less freakish and alone.

Not that I've had the sort of life that's anything like We Need To Talk About Kevin (and I don't think I can bear to go see the film either - too upsetting), but I have had some, ehh, 'issues', and health problems, and reading about people who have gone through similar makes me feel, well, exactly less freakish and alone.

Mind you, most 'misery-lit' does seem to me to be a sort of pornography of grief, written to titillate the prurient and I hate it. I don't feel at ALL comforted by a badly-written or emotionally manipulative (heck, both) thing, I feel alienated and worried. So it's more complicated than just seeking some kind of validation, for me at least. I want to know it's possible to go through whateveritis and still retain integrity, humour, proportion, grace and strength. Please don't let this drown me or turn me into a lesser person. A lot of the 'misery-lit' does seem to be written by the drowned and lessened, despite the 'survivor' rhetoric.

So I don't think I can explain it after all. I am very picky and discriminating about my misery-lit. I wouldn't watch most films based on it, because I KNOW it would upset me and I don't care to be that upset.

Oh, but, yes, I did have another point. I know it was a film that was too hard to watch, but sometimes, things like We Need TO Talk About Kevin need to be said/shown. Not to YOU, obviously. But there is a sizeable group of people in Britain (in any community, no doubt. Definitely in America as well), who are thoughtlessly, stupidly clueless about many issues, and their cluelessness makes things worse for a lot of people, and if watching a film or reading a book like We Need To Talk About Kevin makes them THINK for just a couple of hours...

I have been able to use films and books to explain things to people - to be able to say 'did you see XYZ? Yes? Well, like that, sort of,' and have them GET it, in a way they simply weren't able to grasp it from just my explanations, is gold.

But, yes, you totally should not have to sit through a film that's upsetting you, regardless of who paid for the ticket. I would not make someone see or read something that distressed them, even if it did make my point for me. It's possible they don't 'get' it because it's something they can't think about it distresses them so much.

Ag's first line might sum up why your Aunt finds the stories worth reading. She isn't alone. And perhaps even just to know that others had things worse than she did

How-ever, it's no justification for anyone writing of it, nor depicting it in film. My youth was certainly crap, but I don't have any desire to see how it was for others in similar or worse ...

Sorry Agapanthus, I have to stop making sweeping generalisations. I meant no offence.

I don't mind a sad story, I can deal with tragedy so long as there's some bigger story being told: before the film we saw a trailer for another film called Another Earth that has me very excited. It looks like it could be quite upsetting but it also looks like it's worth it. We Need To Talk About Kevin wasn't like that: it didn't tell any broader story or make some point - there was very little the main character could do to prevent the tragedy because it was so unpredictable. Kevin was a foul brat but then lots of kids are and the vast majority don't end the way he did.

I guess the idea of a kid on a crash course and there being little/nothing the adults around them can do has a lot more resonance for me, working in education and where I've seen similar situations first hand, than for my friend who doesn't know any kids and doesn't have any similar experiences.

Oh, please don't apologise. I wasn't offended and had no reason to be offended. I am just an absolute martyr to the need to present other points of view - or, rather, others are martyrs to MY need to present other points of view. And I do see that given that you work with kids, a film like that would be really quite stressful viewing, and your friend was, eh, tactless? in trying to make you see it.

I thought the point of the book (I read the book) might be that we-as-in-the-general-public-generally can't really make snap judgements about WHY a kid turns into a psychopath, but that lots of people do, and it's not helpful - the whole 'born evil' versus 'it's 100% the parents' fault' thing. Mind you, the book is also quite bleak in that it offers no solutions or answers at all.

Just in case: Spoiler warnings for the book/possibly film also

I think the problem that I have with the book - and I agree, Ag, that it could serve a purpose in showing the wider public that children with "normal" families can also turn out wrong - is that it was so absolutely clear that Kevin was a bad 'un, and so absolutely clear that he was doing some pretty awful things... and yet the mother was turning into his apologist and the father was willfully ignoring the signs.

Of course, it's very easy to say "in that position I would..." but we really don't know what we would do. Although: at the point (I read it a long time ago) where he half blinded his sister my "nobody hurts my child" instinct would have kicked in, I suspect. Even though it's your own child doing it - your job as a parent is to protect them, and if that means turning them in to a secure unit, then that is what you have to do. Becuase, of course, in the end he harmed so many other people and that should be on the mother's conscience and account. And the father's but we know what happened to him.

So, that's why I have a problem with the book. Not the actual story, but the way the parents behaved. Because even in my wildest imaginings can I contemplate keeping my children together under one roof if I suspected and had strong evidence that the one was harming the other.

I do, however, like that it offers no solutions or answers. Because there aren't any, are there? Each case is so different.