No Heroism?

You mean like Spiderman, Superman, Batman, ... ?

Good point.

''I'm fortunate the pylons were not set to a lethal level.''

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Right. It shouldn't be always rewarded, since that is impossible. The highest form of hero is one who isn't ever rewarded. A true hero acts without expectation of reward.

In a world of moral ambiguity and flawed humans a Patch Adams level superhero would have likely acted beneficent and alerted NSA or some other agency and would have been tossed into a military installation and kept sedated and likely dissected.

The best way to think about the characters actions is to think about what sort of expectations they would have from institutions that suddenly orient toward them when they express their abilities. If i had this ability it would be exhilarating but simultaneously terrifying to know that suddenly people would like to carve my brain and body up to understand how that ability could be harnessed.

The individual you are desiring to see is not a realistic person except along extreme tail of altruistic expression - pathological altruism.

Nihilism is the belief that all values are baseless and that nothing can be known or communicated. It is often associated with extreme pessimism and a radical skepticism that condemns existence. A true nihilist would believe in nothing, have no loyalties, and no purpose other than, perhaps, an impulse to destroy.

This doesn't describe David or me, even Griffon forges a short term alliance with David. David has loyalties as does his mother. David's Loyalties are much more limited. David becomes much like Wikus Van De Merwe from District 9
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1136608/?ref_=nv_sr_1
who is integrated into society and then suddenly, through exposure to the alien technology, physically mutates into an alien and for a short time his sphere of loyalties collapse around him, he cannot even trust anybody, even his step father. Even his wife could potentially lead the company down on him through her naivety.

David wasn’t a sociopath but I thought that he was, in many ways, a very sincere character living in an isolated world where he was insulated from consequences of his crimes. David is the apotheosis of Plato’s Ring of Gyges tale. Because of this David represents a sort of guilty pleasure fantasy of what it would be like if one could get away with certain things, if you could be everywhere at will. One could say Jumper is a commentary that with extreme power comes a *beep* load of abuse of society, it’s the inverse spiderman ethos. Watching this is like loading up Grand Theft Auto and shooting cops and running over pedestrians. You know it’s morally reprehensible and in the Kantian categorical imperative sense we know if everybody did it society would collapse but it’s simulated guilty pleasure and safe to express these things in media, in fact it might discharge negative social impulses.

Stick with Patch Adams man http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0129290/?ref_=nv_sr_1, it’s supersaturated with glucose and almost gave me diabetes.

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I forgot to respond to this

A movie that makes you feel like a better person, rather that one that has a negative effect on you

Take for example a movie like Funny Games, this movie filled me with depression as well as a tremendous sense of injustice, that was the intent. Not all movies should make one feel good. I think that this movie demonstrates that how one reacts to a movie and what they take away from it is different. The movie did not have a negative effect on me from my perspective but you might argue that it did based on the things you value.

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