Well, for one, the media has done a tremendous job of turning the husband and wife mass murderers into celebrities. But it's the country's youth who have turned the couple into the ultimate anti- heroes. Basically, the very thing that makes them most lethal is the exact same thing that captures the public's hearts and minds -- Mickey and Mallory's operatic devotion to each other. In a world where people can't seem to make the simplest relationships work and the slightest emotional commitment is considered devastating, Mickey and Mallory have a do-or-die romance of a Shakespearean magnitude. To the country's youth, 75 percent of which are coming from broken homes, that's appealing. They have an 'us against the world' posture which always appeals to youth. And they've taken that posture seventeen steps beyond. It's not 'us against the world,' it's 'we're gonna kill the world.' They're exciting. I read their file and I find myself turning the page like it was a paperback. Why do disillusioned youths get into Mickey and Mallory?
Natural Born Killers (1994)
DR. REINGHOLD
A screenplay character in Natural Born Killers (1994).
- lines
- 4
- words
- 430
- scenes
- 2
- dialogue
- 3.0%
- avg words / line
- 108
- shortest / longest
- 42 / 172
Sample dialogue
Well, for one, the media has done a tremendous job of turning the husband and wife mass murderers into celebrities. But it's the country's youth who have turned the couple into the ultimate anti- heroes. Basically, the very thing that makes them most lethal is the exact same thing that captures the public's hearts and minds -- Mickey and Mallory's operatic devotion to each other. In a world where people can't seem to make the simplest relationships work and the slightest emotional commitment is considered devastating, Mickey and Mallory have a do-or-die romance of a Shakespearean magnitude. To the country's youth, 75 percent of which are coming from broken homes, that's appealing. They have an 'us against the world' posture which always appeals to youth. And they've taken that posture seventeen steps beyond. It's not 'us against the world,' it's 'we're gonna kill the world.' They're exciting. I read their file and I find myself turning the page like it was a paperback. Why do disillusioned youths get into Mickey and Mallory?
scene 43 — INT. OFFICE - DAYInsane, no. Psychotic, yes. A menace to living creatures, yes. But to suggest that they're insane gives the impression that they don't know right from wrong. Mickey and Mallory know the difference between right and wrong. They just don't give a damn.
scene 63 — INT. DR. RHEINGOLD'S OFFICE - DAYWhy do disillusioned housewives read romance novels? Why are you filming this special? Because you know as well as I do, you say, 'Tonight at nine Charles Manson speaks,' everybody's going to tune in to hear what he says. Mickey and Mallory have shocked a country numb with violence. They've created a world where only two exist and anybody who inadvertently enters that world is murdered.
scene 43 — INT. OFFICE - DAYSo the prison board is left scratching their heads wondering what they're gonna do. Well, what they decided to do was to set up a kangaroo medical court that found them crazy. Then they get them transferred to Nystrom Medical Asylum or Lobotomy Bay as it's referred to in the psychiatric circle. Put 'em on a strict dope and electro shock diet, and Mickey and Mallory cease to be a problem to anybody except the orderlies who clean out the bedpans, which, if you want to see them get theirs, that's all well and good. But there's something being said here. Forget the immorality for a second. Forget the corruption and the skullduggery involved. What the board is saying is 'we give up.' Mickey and Mallory ran amuck there, too. All the powers that be can't deal with these two kids. And whatever can't be assimilated has to be terminated.
scene 63 — INT. DR. RHEINGOLD'S OFFICE - DAY
Bookends
Insane, no. Psychotic, yes. A menace to living creatures, yes. But to suggest that they're insane gives the impression that they don't know right from wrong. Mickey and Mallory know the difference between right and wrong. They just don't give a damn.