Why do people in movies commit suicide by slitting their wrists in the wrong direction?
It is commonly known that the probability of surviving after slitting your wrists is much higher if you cut horizontally and that you should cut along the forearm to cut a longer portion of the artery and bleed quicker if you plan to commit suicide.
However, people are often depicted in movies slitting their wrists horizontally.
Is this done on purpose to increase the probability that somebody imitating the movie will survive for example, or is this just a mistake or a coincidence that a majority of movies follow this convention?
Best Answer
Movies are for telling stories and entertaining. To do that effectively, it is sometimes easier to repeat an incorrect but widely held belief. Showing a more factual version may be more difficult, may take more screen time, or may break up the flow of the story.
For example, many ways that firearms are depicted in movies are factually wrong (or impractical or both) but have become familiar enough that they can be repeated and everyone watching understands what is supposed to be happening. Likewise, movies regularly show elevators failing and falling down. When elevators fail, they fall up (I have experience with it. I know. Also a recent news story shows a video of it happening). It would take to much screen time to explain this to viewers, and that gets in the way of the story (unless the story is about elevators or guns and how they work).
Also, I am sure that no one wants to make the movie that helps anyone commit suicide. If they're determined, they'll find out on their own, but I don't want to help them.
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Answer 2
Statistics show that most people who try to commit suicide don't really want to die. That should be enough for their being unsuccessful in the attempt. In addition, even those who really want to die don't have any knowledge of anatomy so as to perforate the right artery. Movie makers aren't any experts either.
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