There are spankings and there are beatings. I watched the film. This was a beating.

Even in a spanking, if you are swatting the kid on the butt--the ONLY place they should get swatted*--more than two or three times you are overdoing it. For a small child, one good swat for something like running into a street is usually enough to get their attention.

*Okay, once in a while they got one light smack on the head when I couldn't reach their butts (they were sitting on them). They're too old for either now, and I would have to stand on a chair to reach the top of my daughter's head anyway.

My Dad mastered a single finger-flick on the top of the head (think of shooting a marble) that hurt like heck. That and the belt. He could fold it in half and pull it rapidly in two directions to make a whipcrack noise that weakened the knees just to hear it. The ultimate deterrent--throughout my entire childhood he never actually used the belt to hit any of us.