By Tess Fox
The Forest, a movie released on January 8, is a horror/sci-fi film based on real places and events. The main character, Sara, travels to the Aokigahara Forest in Japan after her twin sister disappears to search for answers. During the movie, Sara battles evil spirits of the dead who are trying to kill her. Her traumatic past becomes fodder, making it easier for the spirits to victimize her. No matter how entertaining they are, movies like these, about real places and real suicides, 
make a mockery out of mental illness and culture appropriation, reducing the topics to cash cows for big media corporations. For this mysterious forest is a real place with a very real problem with suicide.
The Aokigahara Forest lies in the shadow of Mount Fuji in Japan. Filled with mist and thick shrubbery, it is the second most popular place to commit suicide in the world (in first place is the Golden Gate Bridge in San Francisco, California). 100 corpses are found every year by volunteers who clean the forest. Many are never found due to the density and size of the forest.
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