So, I saw the Possession of David O'Reilly, and I thought Europeans are hardcore Options

[Wounded Ronin]

So yesterday I saw The Possession of David O'Reilly.

http://m.imdb.com/title/tt1535617

I thought it would be intelligent and hardcore because it's European, but instead it was an hour and a half of grownups pretending to be scared of the dark.

When I think of England, I think of suicide charges against Roman hastati. I think of the Battle of Hastings. I think World War I.

The characters were locked in a house and menaced by monsters of some kind. They eventually started carrying chef's knives from the kitchen but they were complete pansies who were afraid to engage even when they did have a visible target. In their situation I would have rather constructed a spear from a broom handle, a meat fork, and duct tape, instead of trying to wield a chef's knife against critters of unknown origin. This should be common sense. But they spent the whole movie screaming, looking traumatized, and running.

How could these be the same people who suicide rushed the Romans, or who ran across no man's land lugging bolt action rifles?

I began to wonder if the contents of the film have anything to do with restricted access to firearms in the UK which tends to make people think of themselves as victims. I mean if the same film took place in Arizona the homeowner would probably just take a .45 and bang, end the movie.

The only upshot was I felt that the lead female was attractive. But she would have been more attractive had she gone into Bodecia mode.

[Tanegar]

My gut reaction is that it isn't (or isn't solely) restrictions on guns that make people think of themselves as victims, but I don't really have anything to back that up.

[Doc Chase]

I would prefer a shorter-handled weapon in an enclosed space. If we were in the haunted field, spears are great! Indoors, I think I'd like something I can swing more easily.

(I'd also make a spear Fallout-style, with three knives around the broom handle)

[Kagetenshi]

In their situation I would have rather constructed a spear from a broom handle, a meat fork, and duct tape

Really? It seems to me like the rigidity would be miserable, which combined with a not-very-sharp point seems like a fancy way to end up poking the monsters with the broom handle. I'll admit that I haven't done any serious duct-tape-juryrigging, so you might be able to simply wrap it thick enough, especially if the meat fork's shape is fortuitous.

How could these be the same people who suicide rushed the Romans, or who ran across no man's land lugging bolt action rifles?

They're not. IMDB describes the characters as "young", and a review mentions use of a cell phone, meaning that the film almost certainly takes place no earlier than 1991. Even assigning the very generous age of 40 to the "young" characters, none of them were alive to cross no man's land with bolt action rifles, let alone to fight the Romans—even in Severus's 209 campaign.

I began to wonder if the contents of the film have anything to do with restricted access to firearms in the UK which tends to make people think of themselves as victims. I mean if the same film took place in Arizona the homeowner would probably just take a .45 and bang, end the movie.

Clearly Arizona is simply more hardcore than Pennsylvania, where in Night of the Living Dead only one major character manages to put up any sort of fight. I'm not sure what access to firearms was like in the Pittsburgh area in 1968 relative to modern Arizona, though.

~J

[Doc Chase]

Clearly Arizona is simply more hardcore than Pennsylvania, where in Night of the Living Dead only one major character manages to put up any sort of fight. I'm not sure what access to firearms was like in the Pittsburgh area in 1968 relative to modern Arizona, though.

~J

I want to say pretty decent up until the 90's.

[Wounded Ronin]

Really? It seems to me like the rigidity would be miserable, which combined with a not-very-sharp point seems like a fancy way to end up poking the monsters with the broom handle. I'll admit that I haven't done any serious duct-tape-juryrigging, so you might be able to simply wrap it thick enough, especially if the meat fork's shape is fortuitous.

I thought about kitchen improvements over a chef's knife, and the key thing I was thinking about was deep puncture wounds versus a tendency to slice. Basically if you have to get through hide you're going to likely cause a lot more trauma with a thrust than you would attempting to slash with a light weapon.

They're not. IMDB describes the characters as "young", and a review mentions use of a cell phone, meaning that the film almost certainly takes place no earlier than 1991. Even assigning the very generous age of 40 to the "young" characters, none of them were alive to cross no man's land with bolt action rifles, let alone to fight the Romans—even in Severus's 209 campaign.

I meant the same people in the Robert E. Howard sense where Solomon Kane "is" an anglo saxon barbarian at heart.

Clearly Arizona is simply more hardcore than Pennsylvania, where in Night of the Living Dead only one major character manages to put up any sort of fight. I'm not sure what access to firearms was like in the Pittsburgh area in 1968 relative to modern Arizona, though.

~J

The guys in the original Night of the Living Dead didn't have the right mentality.

[Kagetenshi]

I thought about kitchen improvements over a chef's knife, and the key thing I was thinking about was deep puncture wounds versus a tendency to slice. Basically if you have to get through hide you're going to likely cause a lot more trauma with a thrust than you would attempting to slash with a light weapon.

I think the basic thinking is sound, but (and again, I still haven't actually tried this, so I could be underestimating duct tape) I'm inclined to think the issues with implementation leave you better off with the knife—the trick then would be to focus on stabbing rather than slashing, and to try to throw body weight behind it.

Actually, I just took a look through our knife blocks, and aside from noting that we've got awful carving forks (I think we've got a better one somewhere) I think giving up on the kitchen knives as a source of serious armament is probably the right call. Maybe they could be used to whittle the broom handle to some kind of point?

I might have to make a tour of the house, disregarding things that were meant to be weapons (or training weapons).

I meant the same people in the Robert E. Howard sense where Solomon Kane "is" an anglo saxon barbarian at heart.

I still have 1,626 pages left to go before Solomon Kane shows up, so I can't comment. Though if it's anything like Esau Cairn, pages upon pages are spent talking about how unusual he is.

The guys in the original Night of the Living Dead didn't have the right mentality.

But they had lightly-restricted access to guns, so it wasn't a victim mentality (or if it was it was from another source). How then do we identify the mentality or its source, or seek to correlate a mentality to a cause?

~J

[Kagetenshi]

Ok, so after completing a circuit of the ground floor, the obvious stand-out candidates are gardening equipment (ok, it's actually out in the shed, but I thought about it while touring the floor) and fireplace tools.

However, for purposes of this thought experiment I'm going to disqualify them both as potentially unavailable in a more modern household. Based on your description (I haven't actually seen the film) I'm going to assume thick-hided opposition resistant to any purely blunt trauma that isn't very forceful. I'll set as my standard for "very forceful" at about an unrestricted one-handed swing with a full-size baseball bat. Crowbars are in, (ordinary) chairs are out, that kind of thing.

Lug wrenches are one candidate, but the kind we have next to the spare tires are short and not terribly heavy by our standards, so I'll nix them. We've got some lamps with heavy bases; they wouldn't last more than a few swings, but I think they'd meet the criteria above for causing damage. Good cookware is massive enough to be a candidate, but it's awkward enough that I don't think it'd swing well enough to qualify. Heavier and longer-handled hammers are better than nothing.

…Huh. Well, maybe I set my standards too high. Possible sporting goods, crowbar, cannibalizing beds or similar for metal bars, pipes… pipes! Metal pipes might be cannibalizable, and not only would you be able to hit things with it, they'd be able to mount a carving fork or a knife with an appropriately-sized handle in a more central position.

But yeah, on reflection I think the impromptu-spear plan isn't so bad—not because I've reconsidered the issues with it, but because the impromptu-weapon situation seems more dire than I'd initially anticipated. Rig up the spear, take a knife for backup, and try to find an extra broom handle to try to sharpen.

~J

[KarmaInferno]

Get some machetes. Simple, easy to understand, durable. Some are even good for stabbing.

I have a standard one and a kukri-style one, the latter of which has a decent stabbing point.




-k

[Kagetenshi]

Get some machetes. Simple, easy to understand, durable. Some are even good for stabbing.

I have a standard one and a kukri-style one, the latter of which has a decent stabbing point.

They'd fall under my disqualification rule. I figure a group of unprepared Londoners is more likely to have a pitchfork or pointy/sharp hoe than a machete, too.

~J

[hermit]

I thought it would be intelligent and hardcore because it's European

Uhm, bellingerent and hardcore is Japan. Europe generally is rugs, bad words, naked bodies in various shades of attractivity and sex (Skins, for instance). European action movies tend to suck ass, except for some French ones.

When I think of England, I think of suicide charges against Roman hastati. I think of the Battle of Hastings. I think World War I.

In reality, it's more like smashing music, binge-drinking and legal prostitution. Oh, and the best curries ouside the subcontinent.

For grautitous and extreme violence, Japan is the way to go (that includes violent sex).

[KarmaInferno]

They'd fall under my disqualification rule. I figure a group of unprepared Londoners is more likely to have a pitchfork or pointy/sharp hoe than a machete, too.

~J

Sharpen the business end of a good hand shovel, then. The mid-size kind, with the 2 to 3 foot long handle used for light gardening.

Pretty much the equivalent of military entrenching tools, which have been used as pretty devastating improvised melee weapons in the past. The weight will let you use it somewhat like an axe.



-k

[Wounded Ronin]

They'd fall under my disqualification rule. I figure a group of unprepared Londoners is more likely to have a pitchfork or pointy/sharp hoe than a machete, too.

~J

Seriously. If we go there, I'll just wield an Albion longsword or AR carbine.

[Wounded Ronin]

Uhm, bellingerent and hardcore is Japan. Europe generally is rugs, bad words, naked bodies in various shades of attractivity and sex (Skins, for instance). European action movies tend to suck ass, except for some French ones.


In reality, it's more like smashing music, binge-drinking and legal prostitution. Oh, and the best curries ouside the subcontinent.

For grautitous and extreme violence, Japan is the way to go (that includes violent sex).

Man, but what about World War I, where all the Europeans decided it would be a good idea to take turns running across no-man's land?

What about the fact that for much of modern history Europe basically schooled the world by punking everyone with firearms and the dawn of modern military tactics?

I cannot believe they regulate firearms so much in Europe. They should give every European a bolt action rifle, or even a musket, in order to celebrate their historical heritage.

[Tanegar]

I cannot believe they regulate firearms so much in Europe. They should give every European a bolt action rifle, or even a musket, in order to celebrate their historical heritage.

My theory is that five thousand years of more-or-less constant warfare has made Europeans literally gun-shy. That very historical heritage makes them not want to celebrate it.

[Blade]

I cannot believe they regulate firearms so much in Europe. They should give every European a bolt action rifle, or even a musket, in order to celebrate their historical heritage.

Actually in France when people were given guns, they used them every few years to make another revolution, so we decided to stop. (IMG:style_emoticons/default/smile.gif)

And more seriously, World War 1 was a truly horrible war. We had new weapons (automatic guns, mortars, gaz grenades without Geneva Convention) and old tactics (send more men than the opponent and charge). That's when Europe shifted from a very war prone mentality to a pacifist one. World War 2 just took the point further.
World War 1 was, after all, "the war to end all wars"... (Even if everybody forgot that when they were given the opportunity to have a sequel with nazis and atomic bombs).

[hermit]

Man, but what about World War I, where all the Europeans decided it would be a good idea to take turns running across no-man's land?

What about the fact that for much of modern history Europe basically schooled the world by punking everyone with firearms and the dawn of modern military tactics?

I cannot believe they regulate firearms so much in Europe. They should give every European a bolt action rifle, or even a musket, in order to celebrate their historical heritage.

Because, unlike you Americans who know shit about what war is like, we've had more than our share of it (I say we because this can easily be said for any European nation).

And not every country regulates firearms as much as the large ones. Switzerland *requires* every male above 18 to have a working assault rifle and no less than two mags of ammo at the redy in their homes at all times, probably because they feel an invasion os somehow overdue. However, Europeans generally are much less prone to consider shooting people in the face the ideal of problem solution than Americans - Swiss in particular - so it doesn't make the news quite as much.

Actually in France when people were given guns, they used them every few years to make another revolution, so we decided to stop.

As if you guys need firearms. Unsuspectingly thinking it was a good idea to enjoy New Year's Eve under the Eiffel Tower with my lady cost me a $300 jacket due to a firebomb. Can't you at least keep your street fights in the suburbs? (IMG:style_emoticons/default/grinbig.gif)

But wasn't there something about a firefight between hunters and rabid animal rights activists a while back?

[Kagetenshi]

And more seriously, World War 1 was a truly horrible war.

It was a war fought by pikers. Less than 2% of the total population of all the participants dead, even if you take out the big US population sitting across the Atlantic ocean. Take out India and you still don't top 3%. The US was able to hit 3% a good 50 years earlier.

I will give it to the participants, they did manage to kill more people in combat than by disease.

Because, unlike you Americans who know shit about what war is like

*Cough cough*

But wasn't there something about a firefight between hunters and rabid animal rights activists a while back?

An organization advocating for the rights of rabid animals? Seems a little… specialized, don't you think?

~J

[hermit]

An organization advocating for the rights of rabid animals? Seems a little… specialized, don't you think?

In the world of activism that'd be perfectly viable, but the rabid ones are the activists here.

*Cough cough*

146 years is a long time. It's so tedious to invade the states, the only real enemy you have is yourselves. Not much war to be had there.

[Kagetenshi]

146 years is a long time. It's so tedious to invade the states, the only real enemy you have is yourselves. Not much war to be had there.

To be fair, IIRC we've been involved in military operations somewhere in the world for all but a handful of years in the country's history. That said, it is true that we've mostly chosen to do it somewhere far away.

~J

[hermit]

That's what I meant. Invading elsewhere - something the US has, I think, in one way or another continuously done in the past 60 years - is a whole different kind of conflict, but yes, technically war, too (and just as much of a bad experience for servicemen sent to some hellhole). So 'not at all' is not entirely right, but you've not been on the bad (receiving) end for more than a century. Europe has, and has concluded that war is bad, in general (though some countries more than others, as can be seen in the Libyan mess). That'S where differing attitudes come from. And why our action movies tend to badly, badly suck.

[Wounded Ronin]

Back when I was a little kid, my mom always used to tell me, "Europeans got the bejeesus bombed out of them in World War II, and that's why they don't like it." In other words that has kind of been the conventional wisdom or even the liberal orthodox dogma concerning Europeans.

But in recent years I have come to question that. If having been on the bad end of a war makes you opposed to violence in general and not want people to have firearms, then why aren't American vietnam war veterans with PTSD and/or permament severe injuries universally opposed to war and firearm ownership?

Like, look at John McCain. He was tortured for years in Vietnam. He got it pretty bad. Who here is man enough to say that he could tolerate or take years of torture at the hands of demented North Vietnamese captors? But it doesn't make him unconditionally against war or private firearm ownership.

Last year I helped to care for a Vietnam vet who basically had a huge list of crippling injuries because he had been blown up. But he owned firearms, enjoyed shooting them, and was not opposed to private firearm ownership.

Morevoer, all the Europeans who fought in World War I and World War II are probably not really the majority of the population anymore. Probably most of the Europeans who are the quickest to voice some left-wing proto-pacifist platitude nowadays did not serve in either of the wars. I would guess.

I remember some commentators or essayists talking about the shame of Vietnam and the American psyche. Specifically how the US had been reluctant to engage in foreign conflict in the period of time following the abandonment and destruction of South Vietnam, and this was related to a psychology of shame following that event. So, I think that perhaps for the Americans who had directly or indirectly been affected by Vietnam there could have been some sense of aversion towards war afterwards, but it eventually went away as that generation aged and was replaced by people who had not experienced it.

Bottom line is that since there aren't a lot of Europeans left who were actually in World War II, I don't really buy the whole "ancestral memory" thing as to why Europeans tend to be opposed to military intervention and private firearms ownership.

[Kagetenshi]

But in recent years I have come to question that. If having been on the bad end of a war makes you opposed to violence in general and not want people to have firearms, then why aren't American vietnam war veterans with PTSD and/or permament severe injuries universally opposed to war and firearm ownership?

Like, look at John McCain. He was tortured for years in Vietnam. He got it pretty bad. Who here is man enough to say that he could tolerate or take years of torture at the hands of demented North Vietnamese captors? But it doesn't make him unconditionally against war or private firearm ownership.

Last year I helped to care for a Vietnam vet who basically had a huge list of crippling injuries because he had been blown up. But he owned firearms, enjoyed shooting them, and was not opposed to private firearm ownership.

But (in one division) they were on the good end of a war. They were invading someone else's country, not being invaded.

~J

[hermit]

What Kage says.

It's one thing to go through hell and come back, and another if out of the blue hell descends on you and you find your home razed, your wife raped and your children shot dead because they offended someone's ideas of racial, ideological or religious purity, because they belong to a people someone has declared all-out war against, or because a mad leader decided to make a point.

Americans have not experienced that in almost 150 years, because on your continent, the only force that might be dangerous to you are you yourselves. You should be happy about that, actually. It's no place you want to be in.

Morevoer, all the Europeans who fought in World War I and World War II are probably not really the majority of the population anymore. Probably most of the Europeans who are the quickest to voice some left-wing proto-pacifist platitude nowadays did not serve in either of the wars. I would guess.

No, but the currently dominating generation was incredibly influenced by the post-war years, and there's a very strong never again vibe going on. There's also an immense feeling of shame (for the former Axis countries mostly) and fear it might happen again for everyone else going in that generation.

I guess that's hard to understand from the outside though.

[KarmaInferno]

Yeah, I think it's partly just the fact that Americans had a home to go back to. They could leave the horror behind.

When your home IS the battlefield, it changes things.





-k