Movies, Violence in

Definitions and Debates

Like the existing research on television violence, most investigations of movie violence draw on either George Gerbner's definition of violence (i.e., physical force, with or without weapon, against self or other) or the National Television Violence Study's definition of violence (i.e., a threat or use of physical force intended to harm one or more animate beings). More inclusive definitions of violence have been advanced; for example, Bradley Greenberg's definition includes verbal aggression.

At the core of the debate over definitions of violence is the fact that not all acts of violence are equal. For example, the brutality of the Holocaust depicted in Schindler's List (a film frequently screened in high school classrooms for its educational merit) is quite distinct from the blood and gore found in the Scream trilogy (a series of films popular among teenagers for their entertainment and shock value). What about violence found in films viewed by young children? An example can be seen in The Lion King, when Mufasa is murdered by Uncle Scar while Mufasa's son Simba watches. Clearly, not all violence is equal in its severity, graphicness, and realism; yet, what the research shows is that there is a high level of violence in movies viewed by young people.

Violent Content

Several content analyses have been conducted to investigate the presence of violence in film. These studies vary in terms of the film genre, the film's target audience, and the contextual features coded (e.g., weapons, gender of perpetrator and victim, etc.). Yet, these studies share a common objective of documenting the quantity and type of violence in movies.