There's no point in hiding it. Movies and this very video are proof that humans love
watching bombs, explosions and destruction. But why is that? What makes people so fascinated
about them? We want to speculate about eight possible reasons. Here they come.
Listen to this...
Noisy environments are proven to increase our blood pressure and lead to distressing
symptoms like insomnia. Which makes it all the more strange that when it comes to our
entertainment - be it night clubs, movies, motorbikes or fireworks -
the louder the better.
And though people might not appreciate a lot of noise in their daily lives,
they can certainly enjoy an explosion
or two when they’ve signed up to see them – like when people go to a horror movie
for a good scare.
Without a doubt, fire has been the most important chemical reaction humans have been able to produce.
From our ancestors to the present day,
fire has been an essential tool and a source of fascination.
And the fact that no one can ever quite be
in total control of it ensures that fire remains an exciting or awe-inspiring sight.
Of all the purposes an explosion can have, we could say that the most noble one is that
of engineering and communications. Crucial infrastructures that we take for granted have
only been possible thanks to the use of explosives. Dams, tunnels, roads and bridges wouldn't
exist today if we had not blown up mountains, rivers and fields.
Like in the film “Hope & Glory”, some British children during WW2 longed for a bomb
in their garden. Months of build-up and preparation led to great anticipation amongst the youngsters
who looked up into the sky hoping to see German planes or become the envy of their friends
by having their very own unexploded bomb. Of course, those who actually experienced
the horrors of the Blitz didn’t see it that way. But today, with a half-century between
us and the War, we see the Blitz from a safe distance and, in a sense, some people view
these images through a child’s eyes - where the mythologising of war leads to the perception
of an exciting struggle between the forces of good and evil.
And one cause of this is what we see at the cinema.
Film being an audiovisual medium that tries to engage an audience emotionally, it's pretty
straightforward that explosions are an asset for many movies. Millions of people, everyday,
watch characters being killed in fiery explosions. There's no question that, over the decades,
movies have created an aesthetic pleasure out of the best blast and increased our appetite
for the next big boom.
A bit of psychology: Observing explosions and destruction in general allows us to confront
death without actually having to live through it.
According to professor Emily Godbey (an expert on the subject) our fascination towards destruction came with the rise of industrialism
during the 19th century. “The unexpected, no matter what it is, brings a certain kind
of excitement to people's lives... when they've been making widgets in a factory."
Watching explosions offers a safe way to get a thrill.
One might agree, it all depends where you watch it from.
As we've seen, watching explosions from a distance (physical or temporal), or at the
movies, allows people to see the destructive power of weapons from the safety of their
own home. From swords to guns, there is a long tradition of fascination with weapons -
and bombs are no exception. If anything, they could be called the ultimate weapon. But bombs
have allowed even the wielder of these weapons to watch from a safe distance.
More destructive and less dangerous for the user, bombs carry a huge moral dilemma, as the user can
avoid the responsibility that comes with any weapon.
And here is the mother of controversial points. In history, some people have justified the
existence of mass-destruction bombs, arguing that they're the only way to stop more people dying.
The heavy impact and the devastating destruction they produce, such as at Hiroshima, force military leaders and politicians
to sit down and resolve violent conflicts.
Or even prevent conflicts from happening -
that was the theory behind Mutually Assured Destruction during the Cold War.
It is indeed a very cruel way to look at it,
but from a purely tactical point of view, bombs have the power of being definitive.
So those were some thoughts on why people love bombs. But it’s easy to
forget in a cinema screening room the reality of war. In the real world - in history -
in British Pathé archive footage, the explosions are real and deadly.
And for the victims, there is nothing to admire in bombs.