Toying with Your Emotions

[migrated from myspace blog]

I am always impressed by a body of storytelling (usually TV or movies) that succeeds in getting the audience to root for the "bad guy", often without even realizing that they're doing so. This is something that was definitely not always present in television and film, partly because of old Hollywood's own self-policing production code, part of which read, "The sympathy of the audience should never be thrown to the side of crime, wrongdoing, evil or sin." I'm sure this is not the earliest incident of the director manipulating the audience into rooting for the bad guy, but the earliest that always pops into my mind is the scene in Psycho where Norman Bates is trying to get rid of Marion's body (for his mother, of course). Hitchcock saw the audience as his playthings, whose emotions were his to manipulate.

Having the audience cheering on murderers is still pretty rare (guess we can add in Dial M, The Perfect Murder, and The Sopranos), but the number of heroes, or at least anti-heroes, we see on the wrong side of the law (even if the system is corrupt) is practically endless; Han Solo, the crew of Serenity, Robin Hood, arguably Batman, The Score, Heist, The Usual Suspects, Ocean's 11 (12, 13), Three Kings, Out of Sight (what the heck, Clooney? 5 heist movies?), The Thomas Crown Affair, The Italian Job, Rififi, La Trou, A Simple Plan, maybe Fargo, the list just goes on and on, including Season 2, Episode "?" of LOST, which is what brought about this post.

Apparently stealing things is also popular for remakes, looking back at the list (Rififi is set for a 2009 remake).