Movies and murder.

Two weeks ago, I photographed this mural, on a video store's wall, next to the Spider House Café in Austin, Texas:



At the time, I asked Chris, "Who's the guy with the hammer?"

I've got the answer now:

The inspiration for perhaps the most inexplicable image in the set that Cho Seung-Hui mailed to NBC news on Monday may be a movie from South Korea that won the Gran Prix prize at Cannes Film Festival in 2004.



The poses in the two images are similar, and the plot of the movie, “Oldboy,” seems dark enough to merit at least some further study...

In a Times review, Manohla Dargis wrote that the film’s “body count and sadistic violence” mostly appealed to “cult-film aficionados for whom distinctions between high art and low are unknown, unrecognized and certainly unwelcome.”

Will the Virginia Tech murderer change anyone's opinion about violence in the movies? Do the people who already avoid extremely violent movies have new power to shame those who like them... or perhaps to get major studios to shun them and prestigious organizations to refrain from giving them the "Gran Prix prize"?

(In case you don't know French: "Gran Prix prize" means "Grand Prize prize.")

ADDED: More images from the murderer and the movie.

MORE: Are you worried about copycats getting inspired by the murderer's promotional materials? But the murderer looks like a complete dork with these movie fantasies! Maybe these videos will inspire some kids to get a real life and give up on their angsty nonsense.