For the top 10 major causes of death in the United States, we examine how cinematic representation of overall and by-gender mortality diverges from reality. Movies strongly overrepresent suicide and, to a lesser degree, accidents. By gender, we find that media largely overrepresents male mortality and underrepresents female mortality, particularly for heart disease and cerebrovascular disease; the two exceptions for which women are overrepresented are suicide and accidents.

Background: The common phrase ‘representation matters’ asserts that media has a measurable and important impact on civic society’s perception of self and others. The portrayal of health in media, in particular, can shape and perpetuate misunderstandings about the true prevalence and burden of disease in society.

Objectives: Here, for the top 10 major causes of death in the United States, we examine how cinematic representation of overall and by-gender mortality diverges from reality.

Methods: Using crowd-sourced data on over 68, 000 film deaths from Cinemorgue Wiki, we employ natural language processing (NLP) techniques to analyze shifts in representation of deaths in movies versus the 2021 National Vital Statistic Survey (NVSS) top ten mortality causes.

Results: Overall, movies strongly overrepresent suicide and, to a lesser degree, accidents. In terms of gender, movies overrepresent men and underrepresent women for nearly every major mortality cause, including heart disease and cerebrovascular disease (Chi-square test, p-values < 0.001). The two exceptions for which women are overrepresented are suicide and accidents (Chi-square test, p-values < 0.001).

Conclusion: We discuss the implications of under- and over-representing causes of death overall and by gender, as well as areas of future research.