Popcorn (Ben Elton)
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Popcorn is a 1996 novel and play by the British writer Ben Elton.
It can be seen as inspired by a number of movies from the mid-1990s, most notably Natural Born Killers by Oliver Stone and Pulp Fiction and Reservoir Dogs by Quentin Tarantino.
Plot introduction
The book takes place in different parts of Los Angeles, US. The date is never actually specified, but various clues suggest it is set in the near future. Mostly the story takes place in the center of Hollywood. By showing different environments you can see as a reader the big differences between different social groups in America. From the rich people with guards, like for instance Bruce Delamitri, to the less rich people like Wayne and Scout. But apart from that it doesn’t matter where it takes place, it could be in almost any other country with the same differences between classes. But since one of the most important things with this book is that the country has a huge movie industry where much circles around violence the country where the plot eventually could take place has to be a country like that.Plot summary
The protagonist, Bruce Delamitiri, is an artist who works in the motion picture. Many People in the US think that by making these movies Bruce makes killing cool. They think that he encourages everyone who’s watching these movies to kill, for fun. Bruce on the other hand defends himself by telling everyone that he doesn’t think that he encourages anyone to do anything. He says that it has always been violence but humans are not like robots, just because we see violence we don’t want to improve it(p.13 “people get up from the movie theatre or the TV and do what they just saw”). He also claims that he is just showing existing violence. Unfortunately for Bruce there are two persons, Wayne and Scout, who kills for fun. They are called the Mall Murderers because they kill in the way the artists kill in Bruce’s movies. The climax starts when Wayne and Scout visit Bruce’s house. They want him to tell the whole US that he is responsible for what they have done. In other words he has to tell everyone that he lied before, when he said that he wasn’t responsible for the violence in the US. In the end Many persons has died, Wayne and Scout didn’t get what they wanted, Bruce has lost many persons he knew, for example his ex-wife and his daughter, no one wants to take the responsibility for these persons death.Characters in \"Popcorn\"
- Bruce Delamitiri – main protagonist, an artist
- Wayne –
- Scout –
"Bruce do not consider himself conceited about his work. He was the first to admit it was popcorn, but only if the other popular and corny works like Romeo and Juliet and Beethoven’s Fifth were popcorn too." (p.)
He wants to be laid-back street cool. If someone dares questioning his movies that person is a dork. In other words he is keen on showing his disdain for that person. He believe that everyone play victims, just to blame their faults on something or someone. Everyone looks for an excuse to fail. All these things make you not keen on sympathizing with him. He is really not a person I would like to get to know. It is hard to sympathize with anyone in this novel. The narration has made it impossible to sympathize with any one of the main characters. It is only the people in the background, the people you don’t get to know who you sympathize with, particularly all those who are murdered by Wayne and Scout.
Literary significance & criticism
Mood of the novel
I believe that the narrator, Ben Elton, wanted to create a world full of irony. The story is a satire of the society. We live in a society where no one wants to take the responsibility. A human can do mistakes, but he can always claim that it is because of something, perhaps he or she had a very miserable childhood. Perhaps it is someone else’s fault. All these contents create a witty and neutral mood. The story is full of witticism and when someone gets killed you feel nothing, no compassion, no anger, nothing. It is a little bit terrifying in the beginning but you get used to it. Later on you excuse it by telling yourself that it was just a book, otherwise you would of course have reacted to these non existing feelings.Structure of the narrative
The narrator, Ben Elton, was born in 1959 in London. He could have been inspired to write this book with all the movies during the 1990s(the book is written in 1996), like for example Pulp Fiction. Pulp fiction contains a lot of violence, which the protagonist’s, in Popcorn, movies do too.The book is told from an omniscient point of view. This makes it possible for you to catch many situations and the main character’s emotions. The story is created in retro perspective. It starts to show Bruce the day after it all happened. After that there are glimpses from everywhere in like 24 hours until the day after. The sentences are structurally straightforward but the vocabulary quite extensive. It is written in a mix of irony and wit. But it is probable the narrator wanted his work to be ironic.
Major Themes
Popcorn deals with the theme of taking responsibility for one’s own actions, and how this has been lost in a modern society in which everyone sues everyone else.Awards and nominations
It won the 1996 Crime Writers' Association's Gold Dagger Award.
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