12 January 2012

Fight Club

The first rule of Fight Club is "You do not talk about Fight Club". The second rule is "You DO NOT talk about Fight Club." I guess we'll have to break both rules. Fight Club is a dark action movie that centers around a nameless protagonist (Edward Norton) and his associate Tyler Durden (Brad Pitt). These two, fed up with the corporate world, start an organized fight club to vent their frustrations through the act of violence. Their club catches on, and eventually spreads all over the country. Pretty soon, the fight club becomes more than a tool venting, but a weapon of change, as the club starts to commit crimes in order to bring down the corporate world. The most interesting struggle, however, is the struggle for control between the narrator and Tyler, which ends in a shocking, dramatic twist ending.

Fight Club's main theme is the struggle between the corporate juggernaut and the masses. In the beginning of the film, Norton's character describes how he has become a slave to the corporate titans, as his house is, in his words, "an Ikea catalog". He works for a highly prominent, unnamed car company, and he describes his frustration for working for such a seemingly cold, heartless company. There is also the struggle with the "coming of age" between the narrator and Tyler. Both have pretty good jobs, and by society's vision of the American Dream, should be completely content. But both feel empty by their jobs and the effects of consumerism. Their parents told them going to school and getting these jobs would satisfy their every need, but instead, it has left them broken. These feelings represent the postmodern view of the broken promises of the modern age, and Generation X's sense of betrayal.

This film left me with many questions that I believe could stir great conversation and debate.

1. How does consumerism affect our relationship with our society and the Kingdom of God? Are we truly slaves to these corporations?

2. If corporate domination and consumerism are breaking our society away from the Kingdom, should we consider Tyler Durden's approach if "By any means necessary"? Is violence the answer to save us from corporate control?

Up

Recently, I watched the 2009 Pixar animated film Up. If you haven't seen it, you should. Up won many awards including the Golden Globe Award for Best Animated Feature Film. This is the story of an elderly gentleman named Carl Fredrickson along with a young Wilderness Explorer named Russel who tags along as Mr. Fredrickson sets of to his dream location, Paradise Falls. After the love of his life, his wife Ellie, passed away, he decided he was going to fulfill their lifelong dream of visiting Paradise Falls. They take off on their adventure in Mr. Fredrickson's house floating by balloons. After facing many challenges, thrills, struggles, and animals, Mr. Fredrickson and Russell learn about each other and create a deep friendship.

Mr. Fredrickson's desire throughout the film was clinging on to his relationship with his wife, Ellie. They were the best of friends and had the same dreams. They went through a lot together including Ellie's inability to get pregnant. After a long life together, Ellie passed away leaving Carl alone. He became the grumpy old man and continued to dwell on his relationship with Ellie. He was an individual and desired isolation, hence his desire to move his house to Paradise Falls. But after his adventures with Russell, he began to realize he needed to let go of his past with Ellie.

Up sheds light on aspects of the kingdom of God. In Kraybill's article "Down is Up", the kingdom is describe as collective, interdependent, social, counter-cultural and more. At the beginning of the film, Mr. Fredrickson is very individualistic and alone. He opted out of moving to the retirement community and turned down any chance at friendship. His desire was to stay alone. However, after a series of adventures, he discovered what meant more to him was friendship. He created a friendship with Russell. He shared his thoughts, fears, and hopes and Russell did the same. Russell became Mr. Fredrickson's community. At the end of the film, Mr. Fredrickson left his house at Paradise Falls and returned to the city with Russell. He became happy-hearted and social with others.

As well as being a very entertaining animated film, Up also gives insight to the community God desires in his kingdom. We are not meant to be alone. A huge aspect of the kingdom is community and being social. There will be friendship and it will be a relational, collective, interdependent place.

QUESTIONS:
1. Despite our possible desire for being alone, why does God want a community in His kingdom?
2. Why do we sometimes find it difficult to be social and to involve ourselves in a community?
3. Why is it so hard to let go of things (people, possessions, places, etc.)?

All My Days - Alexi Murdoch

I chose the song All My Days by Alexi Murdoch for my cultural artifact. (you can find lyrics for the song here) Commissioned for 2009 film Away We Go, this song, shows two different empires, fitting in perfectly with our class theme.

The first half of the song through repeating phrases such as “I’ve been trying to find” and “All of my days” explain his expectations from a world that cannot fulfill his wants, no matter how hard he searches. Murdoch’s “days keep turning into night” with no friends and no answers.

In the second half you hear a revelation: “Now I see clearly It’s you I’m looking for.” The second half of the song is now full of hope - no more loneliness, and questions are answered, shown in the line “I know I’ll feel this loneliness no more...for I look around, And it seems He found me” Here, although the days keep turning into night, morning will still come the next day.

The music mirrors this split feel. The music starts out slow and calm, but almost mournful. After a small musical interlude, the music fades down matching the revelation shown in the lyrics. This fade allows one to feel the same change Murdoch is experiencing. After this pause, the music once again picks up, but rather than a mournful feel, it is a much brighter, happier feel.

I believe this song split into two opposite views correctly shows the contrast of the Empire and the Kingdom. In the Empire, although one may search “All of your days” will never find true happiness and will always be searching for more. But once you find the truth through converting to the Kingdom of God, questions will be answered, and love will prevail. For it is through God that we find our hope.



Discussion Questions:

  1. How does todays society try to fulfill the hopes of the American people?
  2. In contrast, how does the Kingdom of God fulfill hope?

Vogue magazine

For my cultural artifact, I looked through the pages of the December edition of Vogue magazine. This magazine is a huge part of the "fashion world" and is geared toward the women who are the most influenced: young adults. Flipping through pages and pages of advertisements, I noticed a few things. These ads took up most of the magazine and they were all aimed at reeling women into the life of the empire.
These ads promoted all sorts of products from watches to mascara, but they all gave the same message: that to fit in you have to be perfectly beautiful. Women trying to do accomplish this impossible feat turn their allegiance over to the empire. They long to be absolutely perfect on the outside instead of looking at all of the qualities that God has given them. The ads in this magazine are masking the real beauty that God has given women and are leading them to a life of disappointment when they do not reach the peak of perfection. If the goal of these ads is to change a woman's idea of beauty, then they are achieving that goal.
The main technique of ads is to critique women's imperfections. In one ad it says, "Hey wrinkle face! That's what people could say if you use a liquid makeup that setles in lines and makes you look older." Chances are that when you walk down the street, you will not be called "wrinkle face," but this ad really targets a woman's deepest fear of not being pretty enough for the world- for the empire. Women really need to stop longing for the impossible beauty that advertisements encourage and recognize the beauty that God has graciously given them. After all, that beauty was created by God and is perfect in His eyes.
What will happen to a woman's idea of beauty if these advertisements continue to skew the expectations of the empire? What can people that live for the Kingdom of God do to help these hypnotized women?

Artifact 1 - Bones

The dark Fox comedy of Bones tells the story of a quirky group of scientists working in the Jeffersonian Museum in Washington DC. The story starts when FBI detective, Agent Seeley Booth recruits the "squints" in his crime solving endeavors of peculiar murders. In this particular episode, are several twists and turns which the team faces as they are introduced to a new tech-savvy killer. Throughout the seven seasons the show also has a side story, like any good television drama, with the two stars: Dr. Temperance Brennan and Agent Booth. Their deep arguments and partnership feeds a flame that eventually leads to them having a baby together.

In other episodes throughout the series, a case arises which evokes an argument surrounding religion, or lack there of, which needs to be addressed. Booth and “Bones” as Dr. Brennan is dotingly nicknamed, have separate views on the way the world is ran. Booth, being brought up Catholic believes in the omnipresent God being aware and working in the world and everything in it, even sin, evil, and murder. Bones finds no satisfaction in the “myth” of religion. She has such a strong belief science, that every other argument seems illogical.

I find arguments and viewpoints like those Dr. Brennan brings up very interesting, and I think that it is very important in this day and age to understand the different views of others. This artifact gives us a chance to test out our discernment skills. Every day we are confronted with temptations and opinions that jeopardize our faith and what we believe in. The witty banter between a Catholic and a Scientologist on a television show aren’t true examples of scrutiny that Christians face when protecting their faith, along with the confusion that they face when asking others about what they believe that is different. The show Bones shows the great need for intellect when fighting for what you believe in.

Discussion questions:

1. What reasons are there for a need of education in other religions in order to better understand why you believe what you believe?

2. What are the best arguments that Christians have over other religions? Can these be proved? If not then why do we believe them?

The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo

The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo is a film based on the book with the same title, written by Stieg Larsson. It is based in Iceland, and follows the journalist Mikael Blomkvist throughout an investigation he is pursuing in order to clear his name and regain his credibility. Blomkvist is in search of answers as to what happened to Harriet Vanger, a sixteen year old girl who disappeared 40 years and is believed by her uncle, Henrik Vanger, to be murdered. Throughout the investigation, Blomkvist is being followed and observed by Lisabeth Salander, a young and withdrawn computer hacker with a dark past. She eventually joins with him in the investigation to uncover the grotesque secrets within the Vanger family's history.
The film carries with it deep running themes of corruption with society and authority, and the importance of truth and justice. For example, Salander has been constantly stepped upon and beat down by the judicial system, and is taken advantage of multiple times by the guardian that was set in place to look after her and assist her. This corruption has forcefully made many of the decisions in her life for her, and has placed bars up around her as to what she is able to do. Along with the corruption of authority, the theme of truth and justice is prevalent throughout as Slanader and Blomkvist are determined to reveal what happened to Harriet, no matter the costs. They dig into the Vanger family's past mercilessly in order to bring to light the atrocities that were committed.
These themes of truth, justice, and corruption that weave through the film also tie into what we have learned thus far in class. We must dig and search for absolute truth, and seek out and serve justice, for the world that we live in currently is so broken that distorted that it is often difficult to decipher what is real and what has been built up and sugar coated by the system set in place. The corruption that runs through every aspect of creation permeates our existence, and it is up to us to discern and decipher in search of the truth. Despite the knowledge that we will never be able to fully comprehend absolute truth, should we still throw ourselves mercilessly into the hunt for it? Are the positive qualities within the film overpowered by the graphic content?

The Daily Show and The Colbert Report

For an artifact, I watched an hour of television. The Daily Show and The Colbert Report are both satirical, left-leaning, political commentaries on Comedy Central. They are similar in structure and style, since The Colbert Report is sort of a spin-off of The Daily Show. Both involve mocking people or ideas to show how ridiculous they are. Stewart, of The Daily Show, has a straight forward approach, while Colbert parodies a conservative. His character is absurdly over-patriotic and selfish. He acts a bit like an Emperor, because his set is covered with American symbolism and a few pictures of himself.

The episodes that I watched both focused on the recent Republican Primaries. Stewart is quick to point out the hypocrisy of Mitt Romney during one of his celebration speeches. Romney scolded Obama for not keeping his campaign promises then proceeded to make a few lofty promises of his own. He said, "I will insist on a military so powerful no one would ever think of challenging it." Perhaps Romney was excited or taken out of context, but we all know politicians tend to make empty promises on the campaign trail. Both shows also examined the use of vicious attack-ads to gain voters. These ads are essentially imperial propaganda. There is no openness for interpretation. They present negative facts about other candidates, before literally telling you who to vote for.

Stewart's guest interview was with conservative Jim DeMint. According to Stewart, he and DeMint debated economics for over 25 minutes. From what I could gather from this interview, both believed that our economic problems (evil) are caused by ignorance and could be solved by reasonable debate. But, Stewart and DeMint seemed absolute in their opposing principles. In America, we are encouraged to believe that all problems can be solved simply by choosing the correct political party. This is somewhat of a modernist, totalizing approach. However, Colbert takes a more post-modern, apathetic view. He has a segment called End of the World of the Week. Perhaps he feels that our problems are too large to be fixed, so we should just laugh at them.

1. Do you think attack-ads are equivalent to propaganda?

2. Does America need to get more than two worthwhile political parties?

Potter Magic

Last night I watched the second Harry Potter movie, Chamber of Secrets. As I am sure everyone knows by now, Harry Potter is a wizard. He lives in a world that is run by Muggles (non-magical people), but his schooling takes place in another world entirely. In the second movie Harry is faced with a few obstacles, first, an unknown force tries to keep him from going back to Hogwarts (the school he attends) and then an old mystery arises and starts attacking students at the school. Harry and his friends Ron and Hermione, find themselves in a race against time to solve the mystery and protect the school they love. As many Christians, who watch and read Harry Potter, might say the series is a good example of good vs. evil, an allegory of a redeeming Jesus figure (Harry) and an encroaching devil (Voldemort). In The Chamber of Secrets we see these two rivalries clash. This movie shows us that evil can get in anywhere. It can attack the weakest members of our group or society and that person, unknowingly and unwillingly can hurt the people around them. Often times evil comes from places that we would guess. An example from The Chamber of Secrets, would be how Lucius Malfoy sneaks the journal into Ginny Weasley`s cauldron. But that is not the only way. Evil can also manifest itself in characters that seem friendly, but aren’t. This type of evil is shown in Chamber of Secrets in the character of Tom Riddle, who in the end turns out to be a form of Lord Voldemort. I think that this artifact gives us hope for things to come. It shows us that evil can be defeated, and things are not always going to be bad, and there are people who can help us when we don’t feel like we can succeeded. One line that is famous from this movie if from Dumbledore, the head master, he said, “You will find that help will always be given at Hogwarts to those who ask for it.” If we look at Hogwarts as being the Kingdom and Dumbledore as a God character, then we merely have to ask and God will be there to help us; no matter what.

Artifact 1- Vampire Diaries

For my cultural artifact I chose to watch an episode from season two of CWTV’s The Vampire Diaries. This series is a suspenseful, romantic horror series which takes place in a fictional small town haunted by supernatural beings. The main focus of the series is the love triangle between a human and two brother vampires. The episode I watched was “Kill or be Killed” in which one of the vampires has to decide to go against everything he thinks is morally right and against his natural being in order to protect himself and his lover.

This cultural artifact tells so much about human purpose. In these episodes humans are solely for vampire consumption and there is a great contrast between the two vampire brothers in what they believe is right. Stephan does not drink human blood and suffers great weakness because he only consumes animal blood. Damon however, is a ruthless killer and feeds on humans for strength and entertainment. This artifact reveals the fragility of human life and the choices those with power have to make. This artifact encourages one to hope for good to overpower evil. While Stephan is suffering from his choice the audience hopes that he will be able to overcome the hardship he is presented and prove to Damon that there is a way to fight the inner demon they are possessed with. While Damon and Stephan both have the great desire for human blood, Stephan has chosen to fight against it and that gives hope for humans as well to be able to recognize that not all vampires are bad. We can apply this lesson to the in the real world as we strive for awareness of how challenging fighting against a strong impulse can be and how love, support, and guidance should be provided to those who need it. I am aware that humans don’t often have the desire to drink blood but we are hindered by alcoholism, sex addiction, eating disorders, and mental incapability.

1. 1.How are we to reach out and support those who are struggling to turn away from life in the empire and live for the kingdom of God?

2. Although this is clearly not a “Christian” television show, do you think it is possible to derive the good versus evil theme and apply it to our discussion using a Christian viewpoint?