![]() He murders Dickie’s best friend Freddie to cover up this crime, and he gaslights Dickie’s suspicious fiance Marge-bad behavior indeed. Tom Ripley murders his vivacious new friend Dickie and assumes his identity, and his wealth. Ripley by Patricia Hightower comes to mind. Then there are thrillers where bad behavior occurs without overt consequences. “I’m scared Jimmy, and I don’t want to lose my family.” (Dan Gallagher from Fatal Attraction). ![]() ![]() The moral lesson is clear: If you have sex outside of marriage, you jeopardize your entire family. She brings her rage to his front door, and then into his home when she boils the family’s pet rabbit on their stove. After a family man, Dan Gallagher, engages in a brief extramarital affair, the woman he sleeps becomes obsessed with revenge. It’s the “scare ‘em straight” teaching method.Ĭonsider the Fatal Attraction screenplay by James Dearden. A character makes a crucial mistake or commits a crime and the result is a shocking, over-the-top, often violent or deadly outcome. Bad behavior shapes the heart of many popular thrillers. ![]() ![]() This is what I call the morality of immorality. How? By displaying catastrophic consequences for “bad” behavior. Where fiction draws wavy lines toward “morally-correct” conclusions, thrillers fling straight and piercing arrows into the heart of morality itself. Thrillers, those beloved and highly consumable escapist pleasures, are often mistaken for immoral fluff. ![]()
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