There are quite a few movies that have shopping malls as their basic location for the movie, or use a mall as part of one of the major scenes in the movie. Following is a synopsis of some of these movies that could not have been made, or would not have been the same, without the presence of a shopping mall included in the movie.

Paul Blart: Mall Cop/2009
Director:Steve Carr
Starring:Kevin James as Paul Blart

With his dreams of becoming a New Jersey State Trooper dashed, Paul Blart, played by Kevin James from “King of Queens”, is relegated to making the best of himself at his job as a mall security guard. While living at home with his mother, played by Shirley Knight, and sister Maya, played by Raini Rodriguez, Blart longs for finding someone who can love him for who he is. On the biggest shopping day of the year, Black Friday, the mall is overtaken by renegades dressed as Santa’s helpers who chase everyone out of the mall at gunpoint, except for the people who remain as hostages at the mall’s bank. One of the hostages left behind is Amy, played by Jayma Mays, who is a kiosk worker in the mall with whom Paul Blart has been lovingly attracted to. What ensues is a plethora of comedic events as Blart uses his Segway scooter to try and defend the mall against the skateboarding, bike-riding thugs that plan on stealing $30 million dollars from the credit card receipts of the stores in the mall. A series of up and down events that have Blart experiencing various victories and losses throughout the movie comes to a head when Blart’s surprising courage and quick-thinking helps put an end to the threat of the would-be robbers.

This is an obvious mall movie because almost the entire movie takes place within a mall, and the plot is based on a mall security guard.

Observe and Report/2009

Director: Jody Hill
Starring: Seth Rogen as Ronnie Barnhardt

Much like the aforementioned Paul Blart, Ronnie Barnhardt is also a mall security guard who takes his job very seriously. While Barnhardt has aspirations of becoming a police officer, to him his role as a mall security guard is much like that of a real policeman, and his attitude throughout the movie exudes that, in part due to his bi-polar personality. The main premise of the movie is Barnhardt’s obsession with catching the infamous mall “flasher”. This obsession becomes even greater when the girl of his dreams, Brandi, played by Anna Farris, who is a make-up counter sales girl at the mall, has an encounter with the “flasher”. In comes Detective Harrison, played by Ray Liotta, to help close the case, which infuriates Barnhardt and leads to some altercations between the two throughout the movie. In addition to the “flasher” problems, there is also a rash of robberies taking place at the mall which Ronnie plans to solve. It is later found that the thief is none other than his co-worker and right hand man Dennis, played by Michael Pena. Circumstances surrounding this fact lead to Barnhardt eventually losing his security job at the mall, until he decides to come in as a regular person and pay for a cup of coffee, which he had been getting for free as a courtesy from what would turn out to be his love interest in the end, Nell, played by Collette Wolfe. On this day he finally ends up catching the mall “flasher”, and gets his job back as head of mall security.

Almost the entire movie takes place within the mall and the entire storyline has to do with things that are happening at the mall, making this another obvious choice for this mall movie list. For the Observe and Report trailer, visit .

Mallrats/1995

Director: Kevin Smith
Starring: Shannon Doherty, Joey Lauren Adams, Jeremy London, Jason Lee and others

To deal with being dumped by their girlfriends on the same day, two friends, Brodie Bruce(Jason Lee) and TS Quint(Jeremy London), decide to spend the day at the local mall. Their trek through the mall puts them in contact with various characters, such as Jay and Silent Bob, as well as friends and ex-girlfriends, and even the girlfriends who just recently dumped them. They try to win the girls back, with Brodie trying to outsmart his arch-enemy Shannon Hamilton(Ben Affleck) before he has a chance to corrupt his ex, and TS getting help from Jay and Silent Bob to wreck the game show of the father of his ex. The film features a variety of stars and reckless, bawdy humor, along with alternative music and the appearance of pop culture icons.

This is another obvious choice for this list as almost the entire movie takes place in a mall, and the plot is based on all the happenings that occur within the mall itself.

Fast Times at Ridgemont High/1982

Director: Amy Heckerling
Starring: Sean Penn, Judge Reinhold, Jennifer Jason Leigh, Phoebe Cates, Robert Romanus, Brian Backer, Ray Walston

The movie follows a group of California teenagers obsessed with sex, music, and malls. It was actually based on the real-life chronicles of writer Cameron Crowe. This was a breakout role for Sean Penn as stoner/surfer Jeff Spicoli, as well as Jennifer Jason Leigh, who played the role of Stacy Hamilton. Both her and Cates, who played her best friend Linda Barrett, worked at Perry’s Pizza in the mall, with Mark Ratner(Brian Backer), who became a love interest of Stacy, employed at the mall cinema and his friend Damone(Robert Romanus) using the mall to scalp concert tickets. This was truly one of the best films ever to come out of this decade, and one that still relates to many teens even to this day.

While the main story was based on the characters and not the location, the movie would not have been the same without the presence of the mall. Most of the main characters worked there or were involved in scenes hanging out there, making this a logical choice to be included on a list of mall movies.To view the poster for this movie, visit http://www.imdb.com/media/rm3921321216/tt0083929.

Other mall related movies:
Night of the Comet/1984
Valley Girl/1983
Back to the Future/1985
Bill and Ted’s Excellent Adventures/1989

Truth about ASI and Mall Violence

The following are statistical commonalities of an ASI;

• Most ASI last between 8 to 15  minutes.
• 98% of active killers act alone .
• 80% have rifles and 75% have more than one weapons (on average about 3 weapons per incident.)
• ASI shooter typically ambushes their target by surprise and then hunts down stunned and paralyzed bystanders .
• They are not confrontational when police presence are visible, and surrender quickly when confronted with an armed person .
• 90% of the shooter commits suicide on-site .
• 22% of the shooter taking their own life before the police can respond.
• From events profiled from 2004 to 2008, 67% of the shooters were between the age of 15 and 25, while 33% are older than 25.
• Unarmed civilian have interrupted or ended an ASI episode 50% of the time .*
• Armed civilian have interrupted or ended an ASI episode 25% of the time .

*This is not advocating unarmed civilian should attempt to engage a shooter. Law Enforcement recommends civilian should either hide or getaway from the shooter and leave the confrontation to the police.

Recent Major Mall Shooting Accidents

Date	Location	Mall Name	Wound	Death
5/29/1972	Raleigh, NC	North Hills Mall	8	4
2/21/1983	Baton Rogue, LO	Mall of Louisiana	1	0
10/30/1985	Delaware County, PA	Springfield Mall	7	3
6/24/1988	Plantation, FL	Broward Mall	1	0
4/23/1990	Atlanta, GA	Perimeter Mal	4	1
8/5/1996	Gloucester County, NJ	Deptford Mall	2	2
6/21/1998	Brooklyn, NY	Fulton Mall	8	0
4/28/2000	McKees Rocks, PA	Robinson Town Center	0	2
12/23/2001	Los Angeles, CA	Slauson Super Mall	3	0
11/18/2004	St. Petersburg, FL	Gateway Shopping Mall	1	3
2/13/2005	Kingston, NY	Hudson Valley Mall	2	0
11/20/2005	Tacoma, WA	Tacoma Mall	6	0
5/27/2006	Oklahoma City, OK	Crossroads Mall	1	1
11/18/2006	Annapolis, MD	Westfield Annapolis Mall	2	0
2/12/2007	Salt Lake City, UT	Trolley Square Mall	4	6
4/29/2007	Kansas City, MO	Ward Parkway Center	2	4
6/13/2007	Columbia, SC	Columbiana Shopping Center	1	1
11/27/2007	Houston, TX	Greenspoint Mall	0	2
12/5/2007	Omaha, NE	Westroads Mall	4	9
1/26/2008	Jacksonville, FL	Regency Square Mall	1	1
2/2/2008	Tinley Park, IL	Lane Bryant Store	1	5
3/15/2008	Tukwila, WA	Westfield Southcenter Mall	1	0
4/3/2008	Miami, FL	Dolphin Mall	0	0
6/17/2008	Tampa, FL	Lakeland Mall	1	0
7/2/2008	Atlanta, GA	Popular Coffee Shop	2	0
10/8/2008	Nashville, TN	Knoxville Center Mall	1	1
11/5/2008	West Ashley, FL	Citadel Mall	1	1
12/23/2008	Rockville, MD	Westfield Wheaton Shopping Centre	3	0
3/26/2009	Moreno Valley, CA	Moreno Valley Mall	4	0

In the 30 shooting profiled on the table, 29 of the suspect were male. The sole female shooter was Sylvia Seegris , who was 25 years old when she started her rampage on October 30, 1985. On that day, she entered the Springfield Mall, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, she was armed with a Ruger Mini 14 rifle and fired twenty rifle rounds. In the process, two men and a two-year old toddler were killed and seven bystanders were wounded.

When she was disarmed and restrained by an unarmed shopper, she was asked why she did what she did. Sylvia said, “My family makes me nervous”. Like Robert Hawkins, Sylvia Seegrist had a long history of mental disturbances, which includes extensive struggle with paranoid schizophrenia, and she was committed and discharged from mental institution numerous times.
Despite the gruesome violence that occasionally surface around malls, and the number of people caught up in the rampage, malls are some of the safest public spaces in the world. Newer American malls are developed away from crime-heavy area for safety reason as well as demographic.  In the 37 years profiled mall shooting, only 30 shooting spree were recorded, and the total wounded were at 76 and total death at 48. While this seems like a large number, according to International Council of Shopping Centers, 190 million people visit the U.S. malls a month.

Malls are among the safest environments in American social life. It is where we work, play, socialize and relax. Violence at the mall is dramatic because it happens so rarely and when it does happen, it is also intense and dramatized by the media reporting. The extreme and rare nature of ASI at the mall creates unfounded fear and irrational dread. With increasing awareness, improved security training, and more vigilant guards, mall violence will surely be as rare as a movie about a mall robbery that ends happily.

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National Security Implication

Ever since the 9/11 terrorists attacks on the United States, Homeland Security and state officials are concerned about attacks on retail malls. They worry that malls across the country might become “soft” targets for terrorists, since malls give potential shooter a large number of targets, high media visibility, lack of an onsite armed security response, and easy space to escape from. Many popular culture content creators have already explored this type of nightmare scenario. Tom Clancy, the military thriller writer who predicted the use of 747 as a weapon of mass destruction on the US Capitol Building, wrote about Islamic terrorists attacking an American mall in his novel, “The Teeth of the Tiger. ”  The popular real-time action drama “24”, starting Kiefer Sutherland, also had an episode where the terrorist attacks a busy shopping mall with nerve gas .

Making Mall More Secure

The increase of mall violence in 2007 and 2008 prompted most mall operators to hire more security guards and increase the number of mall patrols. While these measures improves the public’s confidence in the safety of retails malls, most security experts do not believe the measure will be effective in deterring a determined shooter. Some advocates propose a more secure physical environment like those used in Israel. Where terrorist bombing and shooting occurs frequently, armed security officers guard all Israeli public spaces, access to public spaces are monitor by metal detectors and vehicles searched for bomb and firearms. However, American mall operators point out that the proposed security precaution will have a significant chilling effect on mall visitation.  No one expects retail malls to implement any drastic security upgrades such as those used in Israel, even in the face of rising violence.

Although mall operators won’t implement security screening and access control, law enforcement, mall and retail operators are making more effort to improve emergency responses. The biggest law enforcement paradigm shift came after the Columbine massacre in Colorado. Prior to Columbine, the law enforcement’s standard operating procedure has been to contain-and-defuse. This time-tested strategy has worked well when dealing with bank robbery, hostage situation, and domestic disturbance, but the Columbine School massacre rendered the containment strategy ineffective by showing that some shooter plan on dying in the process of their rampage and just wants to inflict as much carnage as possible before they go out in a blaze of glory.

The lesson after Columbine has been that time is essential to reduce the loss of life that might occur if the police respond with the traditional contain-and-defuse strategy. Especially after 9/11, law enforcement now responds to an “active shooter incidence” by locating and disabling the shooter first before securing bystanders and the environment. In an ASI situation, first responders will not render medical and other assistances until the police conclude the hunt for the shooter. In situation, most bystanders might be detained and treated as suspects until the law enforcement agents can be certain that the shooter is no longer active, and then move to secure and assist.

Working to complement the changes in local law enforcement strategy during an ASI, the National Retail Association, International Council of Shopping Centers and the U.S. Department of Homeland Security have created an emergency response protocols for ASI. The protocol recommends the mall operators and retail owners create operating procedure and train the employees on what to do when faced with an ASI. In the 15 page publication, the retail operators are asked to establish policies that deals with store employee response, improved communication and premise access with local law enforcement, training employees on what to expect from first responder, how to assist local law enforcement, and post-shooting issues.

(To Be Continued…)