Steve X...at first I didn't like your comment. But then I remembered a comment by Martin Scorsese (I think)...where he said that violence on the screen should show the pain and suffering of the victims...including surgery, physical-therapy, psychotherapy, etc. So much violence is just 'Bang...your dead! Ha! Ha!' If the number of violent acts depicted were drastically reduced...and the goriness drastically increased...including ER and OR scenes...this might be the way to go. Certain storylines require some violence...but it should never be glorified...and it should never be non-stop gratuitous violence. I'm not advocating sugar-coating everything...holding hands and singing kumbaya.
Your WWI scene reminds me of the slogan 'What if they had a war...and nobody came?' Supposedly the Russians were getting their butts kicked so badly by the exotic German weaponry...that they had to post guards with shoot to kill orders (to improve morale)...to keep the Russian soldiers from running away. Very, very sad.
Namaste
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