Just when you thought the media was through with whoring off the grieving survivors of the Oklahoma City bombing… Here comes Arnold frickin Swarzenegger with Collateral Damage. Sad you couldn’t pull the switch on Timothy McVeigh yourself? Well, enjoy this revenge fantasy instead.
What’s it about? Here’s the blurb: When his wife and child are killed by a terrorist’s bomb, a man becomes obsessed with finding their killer, teaming up with a most unlike ally: the wife of the terrorist. and the trailer’s here: http://movie-list.com/c/collateraldamage.shtml
Of course, they change it enough so that the killer is Middle Eastern, and the specifics are different. But the title alone is such an obvious bid for the country’s grieving dollar, it makes me sick.
Is it just me, or is this in really, really bad taste?
No worse than the dozens of other times the plot was used. Ever hear of Charles Bronson?
The movie, with that title, had been first announced back in Feb. of 2000. (see http://www.upcomingmovies.com/collateraldamage.html)
So I doubt any connection was intentional. I think the only major movie that was explicitly based on those events was Arlington Road.
Whoops – remove the end bracket if you click on that link. Sorry!
I actually saw the trailer for this film at the movies last night. I was thinking to myself that Arnold can’t seem to make a good movie to save his life these past couple of years, bless his heart. But my eyes almost rolled out of my head when Collateral Damage was revealed as the movie’s title. I’m telling you, the entire audience groaned together.
I think you missed my point. It’s not the revenge for killing family members that sticks out here. It’s the usage of “Collateral Damage” as a title. Which, quoted from McVeigh was endlessly repeated by the media to illustrate what a monster this guy was. To use that as the title to a Hollywood blockbuster, Swarzenegger vehicle about a terrorist who bombs an american building with women and children inside just seems in poor taste to me.
And perhaps as LC Strawhouse stated, this title was choosen before McVeigh made his infamous statement. Still, titles can be changed.
Just seems like quite a ugly coincidence