Which Way, L.A.?
Aurora and Hollywood: Violence in Movies
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Aurora and Hollywood: Violence in Movies

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Nobody thinks the movie The Dark Knight Rises produced the deadly atrocity at last week's screening in Aurora, Colorado. But does Hollywood have the responsibility to talk about the possible impact of a culture of violence? Also, a massive study of 32 three-career families: the kind where mothers and fathers have jobs in addition to their task of raising children. We hear about kitchens and clutter. On our rebroadcast of today's To the Point, drought in the Midwest, a slow moving disaster.

Main Topic

Violence: On Screen and Off ()

Before Friday's massacre in Aurora, Colorado, The Dark Knight Rises was expected to break box office records. That's one reason there was a midnight screening there and at other theaters around the country. The final numbers for the first weekend are just coming out as we record this program, but it appears it scored the third-biggest opening of all time for a 2-D picture, right up there with the first Dark Night and Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows, Part 2. After the preview LA Times film critic Kenneth Turan called it "masterful filmmaking by any standard," and said "all you want to do is see it all over again." Now, he says, "If you are deeply involved in the movies, this tragedy feels…like a death in the family."

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Reporter's Notebook

In-Depth UCLA Study of 32 Families ()

book.jpgLife at Home in the Twenty-First Century: 32 Families Open Their Doors is the title of a new book, which exactly describes the contents. It's an inter-disciplinary study by archaeologists, anthropologists and other social scientists, documenting the daily lives of 32 families. For one week each, videographers roamed through the house, learning how space was used – and even went along when the kids were driven to school. We hear more from one of the authors and one of the subjects.

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Main Topic

Drought and King Corn ()

Image-for-WWLA.jpgMore than 1000 counties in 29 states – the most ever -- have been declared natural disaster areas. This year's drought is making Midwestern cornfields look like the Dust Bowl of the 1930's. With both food and energy dependent on corn, is America over-reliant on one crop?  Will prices rise at the grocery store?

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Underwriters

Which Way L.A.? is made possible in part by the Ralph M. Parsons Foundation, the Rosalinde and Arthur Gilbert Foundation, the Nathan Cummings Foundation, and the John Randolph Haynes and Dora Haynes Foundation, which supports study and research into policy issues of the Los Angeles region.

 

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