Probably, traditionally, like every year, you and your whole family will sit in front of the TV to watch the cult "Home Alone". I'm guessing that many of you admire the main character - after all, he is such a charming and, above all, brave hero. What if I told you that the same charming Kevin is also a sadist with psychopathic tendencies, and the two burglars known from the movie did not deserve such brutal treatment?
But let's start from the beginning. Kevin McCallister - this is the name of the main character of the film, is an 8-year-old boy who is accidentally left at home while his family goes to Paris for Christmas. In the second part of the boy's adventures, in the movie "Home Alone in New York", history seems to repeat itself. This time, our hero accidentally boards a plane flying to New York, instead of to Miami, where his family was supposed to spend Christmas.
In the first part of "Home Alone" we can look at the conditions in which our main character grows up. He belongs to a privileged family, which is visible both in the architecture of the family's huge and luxurious house and in the expectations of the burglars, who describe the McCallister house as the richest on the entire street.
And here comes the thought - the boy is not missing anything. Yes, but this is only an appearance. Even though Kevin grows up in a wealthy environment, he experiences a lack of adequate attention and understanding from his family. As we well know, luxury cannot replace the warm relationships with loved ones that Kevin misses. His emotional needs are neglected, which increases the feelings of loneliness and misunderstanding. Additionally, our hero must deal with difficulties resulting from his relationship with his brother. His lack of acceptance and sympathy makes Kevin vulnerable to an even greater sense of alienation.
These conditions, combining a privileged background with a lack of proper attention and emotional support, create an ideal environment for the development of sadistic and psychopathic tendencies. Kevin, despite superficial well-being, struggles with internal conflicts and lack of understanding, which leads to the development of qualities that should not be nurtured in a child.
At this point, it is worth touching on the definition of sadism and psychopathic tendencies to understand how closely they fit the sweet (seemingly) Kevin.
Sadism involves taking pleasure in watching others experience pain or discomfort. People with a sadistic personalities exhibit repetitive, cruel behavior and aggression. The amount of sadistic behavior of Kevin is downright terrifying - from scaring people, through shooting them, to burning them and setting traps. Now let's look at some of the most common psychopathic traits, combining them with examples from the movie.
The first feature is superficial charm. At first glance, nothing is disturbing in Kevin's smile - this optimism makes us feel good and automatically arouses positive emotions. However, this is only appearances - our hero certainly knows how to play a cute boy, as long as it brings certain benefits. However, under the guise of innocence, there is cunning towards intruders, and perhaps even manipulation towards us, the recipients. After all, he's such a charming and brave boy, isn't he?
The second feature of a psychopath is excessively high self-esteem. Kevin is an eight-year-old who thinks he can outsmart everyone. This awareness can be defended in the second part of the film, but there we can also notice that Kevin actually enjoys escaping from his captors. It is worth noting here that in one of the scenes, our hero recorded incriminating evidence about the criminals chasing him and could have reported them to the police at any time, but for some reason, he did not do so.
Another thing is the fact that Kevin felt great in the role of a 10-year-old tourist traveling through New York. It is worth remembering that the boy had the option of returning to his family - in the first situation it was enough to call the police, and in the second - to notify the airport staff that the boy was not on board the plane. Instead, our hero chose to wander around New York alone and waste his parents' money on a hotel and other pleasures.
The third feature is the constant need for stimulation. Stimulation is an activity that arouses interest and excitement. And we can conclude that Kevin deliberately puts himself in a dangerous situation to feel intense emotions. The boy may be deliberately exposing himself to danger to gain a reason to take revenge on his tormentors later. This is closely related to the concept of being a sadist. With each physical injury and insult he throws at the criminals Harry and Marv, the boy becomes happier and happier. The definition of sadism clearly states that sadistic people exhibit repeated aggressive and cruel behavior, which is exactly what Kevin does to Harry and Marv. Our hero loves the dominance he has over them and the fact that he causes them pain.
The fourth feature is pathological lying. In the movie "Home Alone" we can see that the boy's lies are much less serious. He lies to the cashier when he does his grocery shopping, and he lies to his parents when they ask him about what he did while they were away.
However, in the second part of Kevin's story, the boy committed full-blown credit card fraud, lying (or technically, withholding the truth) to the airport clerk, which resulted in him being left alone in New York at his own request. Then, he also concealed the truth from the staff of the hotel where he was staying and lied to the owner of one of the toy stores, Mr. Duncan. This leads us to a simple conclusion - Kevin's lies have evolved over time, becoming something like a pathological lie, i.e. one that is repeated extremely often.
When we combine Kevin's charm and the previously mentioned features, we get a very manipulative person. Why? The boy manipulates people into thinking that they are worse than him, e.g. less intelligent. Example? In the first part of "Kevin..." our hero is in a store and is shopping. He walks up to the counter, and when the cashier asks him about his mom, Kevin quickly turns the tables. He makes the salesman feel stupid for questioning an innocent-looking 8-year-old boy.
Another feature of our hero is manipulativeness. Kevin's adventures show us how quickly he can come up with a good lie that adults will be willing to believe. This is evidenced, for example, by Kevin's arrival at the Plaza Hotel. During check-in, he makes the receptionist feel confused by the story the boy told. His behavior shows that by making up stories on the spot and lying pathologically whenever the opportunity arises, he easily achieves his goals and gets what he wants. Therefore, it is not surprising that he easily manipulated the actions of burglars, who, moreover, were neither exceptionally intelligent nor clever.
The sixth characteristic is a lack of remorse and guilt. Here, in addition to the two thugs - Harry and Marv, there is a poor pizza delivery guy involved. You may wonder - why him? But this supplier is a 17 or 18-year-old kid who is probably going to school and working minimum wage trying to make ends meet. How did Kevin behave towards him? He left him an 80-cent tip and scared him with the sounds of gunshots. As a result, our supplier got into his car and drove away in panic. Who knows if he even made it back to work alive or if he was in a car accident. One thing is for sure. This boy was too traumatized to even report the incident to the police. And Kevin has no reflection on the fact that you shouldn't pretend to shoot people, especially in the United States.
Combining all 6 features, we have the perfect foundation to talk about Kevin not as a small and sweet boy, but as an absolutely cruel, unscrupulous young man who, moreover, is not adapted to life in society. Kevin is portrayed as a complex character, exhibiting manipulative traits, a lack of empathy and a tendency to cruelty, which suggests the presence of sadistic tendencies.
Let's also analyze Harry and Marv, two criminals, or more precisely, thieves, who in the first film call themselves the Wet Bandits, and in the second film they call themselves the Sticky Bandits. Harry and Marv decided to rob the houses on Kevin's street, including the property of the boy and his family. In fact, this house was their most important prize. However, their goal was not achieved because they were sent to prison. And this was right after they had suffered advanced injuries that no human could survive. The same thing happened in the second movie. When Harry and Marv tried to rob Duncan's toy chest, they were beaten and then arrested. They got what they deserved, right? Well, not really.
When considering the morality of Kevin's actions against criminals, we draw attention to the fact that although they are villains, Kevin's self-defense calls into question the limits of the acceptability of self-defense. Even though Harry and Marv's goal was to commit a crime, Kevin resorts to extreme measures, including numerous traps that seriously injure them. In the context of ethics and morality, one may ask whether such behavior is proportionate to the act. If you catch someone committing a crime, can you afford to torture them before the police arrive?
Kevin not only stops thieves from stealing, but also deals damage to them that may exceed the limits of self-defense. Even though the Wet Bandits suffer the consequences of their actions, the question arises whether Kevin transgressed certain moral standards by torturing the perpetrators rather than doing anything else that would be far short of abusing them. There is also the issue of justice and whether lynching can be considered equivalent to real social justice. Although Harry and Marv face deserved consequences, Kevin's methods lead to reflection on the ethical aspects of his actions. Defending property or safety is understandable, but when we cross boundaries that ruin someone's health or life, the question arises about the moral justification of such actions.
Moreover, there is a risk that this type of lynching may set a dangerous precedent, where individuals decide to punish others outside the legal system. And here the question arises - whether justice should be provided only by authorized institutions or individuals.
Kevin is a spoiled child who lives in the richest house on his street - he likes to get angry, he is selfish and thinks that the world revolves around him. Let's go back to the beginning of "Home Alone." When the boy wakes up, it does not occur to him that his family has abandoned him, but that they evaporated and his greatest wish has come true. What does he do in such an unpleasant situation for a small child? Does he cry or maybe feel negative emotions? Well, no. He celebrates freedom and the fact that he can use the comforts of home as much as he wants.
The boy believes that he has magical power thanks to which he eliminated the existence of his family. And of course you can understand that someone said in anger and nerves that he wanted his family to disappear. But Kevin, after regaining his composure, is still glad that he finally got rid of his loved ones. After arguments, people usually do not want bad things for the other person, because without these extreme emotions we look at the world more objectively and we do not want our loved ones to disappear. Kevin, on the other hand, wants his family to be gone, even though he looks at the matter coldly and distantly.
It's downright terrifying when we, the audience, are left alone with Kevin. The hero then looks into the camera, looking us straight in the eye and sending a signal that we are now in his world after he eliminated his parents. Kevin is very aware of the consequences of his own actions. He knows that he has, in a sense, caused the disappearance of his own family and does not want to face the consequences for his own actions. So what does he do to avoid taking responsibility for the disappearance of 11 people? He pretends to be a noisy party so that no one will suspect that no adult is home. These artificial people are actually meant to show how Kevin views others, and Harry and Marv are a metaphor for Kevin's guilt. We, from our viewer's perspective, know that they are thieves, but Kevin does not know this, he interprets them as people who have come to draw consequences for what he did, that is, for the disappearance of his entire family.
Kevin, remembering one of the criminals as a Policeman, has no problem torturing him. This is one of the reasons why the boy did not call the police, because from his perspective he was the one who tortured the Policeman. So in the scene where the boy runs away from the thieves' car, he is not actually running away from them, but from the specter of punishment that he is afraid to accept.
If our hero did not have sadistic traits, his behavior in the situations presented in the movie "Home Alone" would probably be more empathetic and based on healthy interpersonal relationships.
Under normal circumstances, a child who is provided with emotional support and understanding from the family behaves in a completely different way. In a threatening situation, such as sudden and unplanned loneliness, the child's reactions would be directed towards seeking help and safety, rather than using traps or inflicting physical harm.
The lack of sadistic traits means in practice that the child would be more willing to resolve conflicts peacefully and cooperate with others rather than manipulate or torture. Finally, such a child would likely demonstrate greater awareness of the consequences of his or her actions.
And someone will probably say that he is just a child and has the right to unusual behavior. However, we must remember that every cruel adult murderer or criminal sends certain signals during adolescence to which society must respond. For example, when a child abuses animals, it is an appropriate signal to react, because this trait will germinate and in a few years it may be transferred to people. Downplaying such behavior with the phrase "he's just a child" is extremely irresponsible. If a person (regardless of age) takes pleasure in causing suffering to others, it is worth reacting before it is too late. If a child is a pathological liar, this trait will also develop in adulthood.
I encourage you to examine Kevin's story for yourself. Consider whether this analysis is not quite accurate and people are fooled by his sweet face, when in fact under this mask there is a sadist with psychopathic tendencies.
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