Whose world is this?

A long time ago, where the start we will never really see clearly, stories of the Gods and Mystiques were told. In the form of Lord Rama and Ravana (Ramayana). And people of the Middle East, feed on tales about the Arabian Nights; Englishmen & women, girls and boys, had a good staple on legends of medieval conquests… …

These epics, and many-many others, we know they usually are narrated around heroes and villains. Through telling us their actions, their attitudes and the effects of their behaviors, and of course ultimately their punishment or reward, people who hear them are informed about what are acceptable values, virtues and moral in their society.

Now, I’d just like to fast-forward, to the here and now (your ‘here’ and your ‘now’). If we were to float up and travel around the skies over the malls and across cities, and continents, I wonder how many DVD’s and cinemas, no, cineplexes nowadays, will we be able to find in the world? If there isn’t a number in your head, I’ll take it that you are thinking, there’s a LOT. And we all know it means audio-visually narrated stories are gaining more and more grounds over the years.

Other than the already well-argued, thoroughly researched, brutally attacked notion that movies has the potential to corrupt minds and feed illusions, and fantastic logics, and gender stereotypes, and biased political agendas, and false identities, and violence, and …. (Ooops..where was I?) Ah..! Despite all these piled up high, how can this image and sound flicker, be a threat to the mind of a spiritual person?

I’m going to talk about this as a Christian since that is my faith, and it’s the values I gained from the Bible that allowed me to realize any insights or knowledge as discussed below. And I hope my readers who are of a different faith will try to examine if there’re any similarities of beliefs where we can agree upon together.

Film Snoop

“ For we do not wrestle against flesh and blood, but against principalities, against powers, against the rulers of the darkness of this age, against spiritual hosts of wickedness in the heavenly places.”

Ephesians 6:12

Only recently it became interesting for me that Heroes and Villains are so easily distinguished on screen, but rarely so in actual daily interaction with people and situations. And conflicts are normally very obvious and usually occur externally, therefore requiring some sort of external actions to be carried out to resolve it. We see Superman or Spiderman or their female counterparts harnessing their super powers to solve a problem, which usually involves a Destroyer. Or more subtly, a portable x-ray scanner fights with never ending financial problems, marriage problems, parental problems (which are caused by other people) to survive. Of course, in the end, our guys in these cases will receive their ‘rightful’ happiness, or happyness in the latter.

Having been told these nicely woven stories, what are they about then? We are not satisfied at the level of storytelling, because we know we can see 2 hands and a bunch of numbers, but we only know it’s 2.46pm if we know it as a clock; and that we need to hop on a car fast if we’re scheduled to meet somebody at 3pm. We all make meanings out of the movies that we watch, and the process happens so fast and so automatic that we don’t realize it. We simply get a gist of idea about the whole movie. Very often people can revisit the process. Sometimes it’s conscious and deliberate, when we write a review or talk about it with a friend; other times, it slips right into the unconscious mind without much processing.

So, if we take some time to read about film analysis, we are giving ourselves an opportunity to lift up the clock cover, and peek into its insides. And we now begin to see the working mechanics of a movie. Whoa..!! screws, escapement, pin, wheels, rings… can’t see it all in one glance! I feel that movies are like that too. A lot of people talk about the flow of its mood, techy-s spill conversations with camera angles, lightings, edit/directorial gestures, tru-blu film students will tell you about mise-en-scene, social symbols, character building and consistency, signs and code… … (that was a mouth-full)

Now at this point, if you may allow me, I’d like us to remember a movie, the one you were so attracted to its world, inside that movie. Or maybe just one movie where you felt the environment was quite nice, you don’t mind living in there.

Hmm... Have you ever asked yourself, Why do I want a life like that?

What is in that world that’s appealing to me?
And why am I attracted to that?

See, we are all, upright and civilized city people. We’ve seen what will happen to criminals, we’ve seen that bad will be punished, good will be rewarded, and we all get that message. But what happens when this binary system doesn’t work anymore? Especially not so hard and fast even in our faith? When villain is no longer the big Goliath or the Anakites who can be overcome by flesh and blood, what is the evil one, trying to sell to us now?

Lie – Get what you want. Plus, you can do it without God!
(1)

From a Biblical point of view, this classic one our Jesus tasted too:

“The devil took him to a very high mountain and showed him all the kingdoms of the world and their splendor. "All this I will give you," [the devil] said, "if you will bow down and worship me."

Matthews 4:8-9 (New International Version)

In the case of the common moviegoers – us, perhaps it doesn’t seem so grand. I’m using the verse as an analogy. What are movies showing us, in terms of the world’s splendor and glory; of which we are told that we can attain if we think and behave like the protagonist?

The “bow down and worship => world’s splendor” comes in so many forms: “Believe that we should strife at all cost to be wealthy.” Or “You’ll have more friends if you act cool”. “Luck will come to you if you keep buying on chance.”, “Girls will look at me longer if I have broader shoulders, and thicker chest.”, “If I continue to droop my head and not speak to anyone, one day, somebody will notice me and talk to me.”

Taking all these under the microscope, it’s easy for us to say that we won’t fall into that trap because they appear so obvious now. They have been stripped off their sexy lingerie so that they don’t seduce us, now. And often, I find it a bit tricky to identify whether a suggested value/ idea in a movie is wearing a devil’s horn or an angel’s halo. Sometimes, we might even think we see a halo, but which in fact is actually a straw ring.

The Great Enticer

The world is very skillfully and persuasively lulling its inhabitants to embrace its values. The Spirit of the world doesn’t wage wars with us, presenting itself in horns, sly faces, deep red shirts, mafia codes or powerful machine guns. Instead, we are now gently being invited to dwell in the promised world of beauty, of enchantment and colour, drama, fantasy and fascination, bursts of juices of excitement at every turn of the corner… of utter satisfaction, if we would just succumb to the prescribed ideas. Love it, nourish it in our minds, and play the act in our daily life. We can hear that so clearly in the cartoon Aladdin’s song – A Whole New World. You might still remember the melody:

I can show you the world
Shining, shimmering, splendid
Tell me, princess, now when did
You last let your heart decide?

I can open your eyes
Take you wonder by wonder
Over, sideways and under
On a magic carpet ride

A whole new world
A new fantastic point of view
No one to tell us no
Or where to go
Or say we're only dreaming

(2)

A good many movies chant this romantic musicál to its audience. And if you notice, a lot of times, the lure becomes more suggestive because of the innocent way it was put together (by script writers, directors, costume managers, music composers, editor, sound engineers…) sometimes not even intentionally. Appealing to our child’s mind, “How can something so beautiful, so right, so wonderful, majestic, not be good?”

Conclusion

For that, I’ve come to believe that anybody who has a history with television or the cinema, should all be given a chance to see where we are at, within the system of mass communication. And also to know what our attention is worth to content makers, with a whole bazaar of agendas, be it to have us grab that bite, or lick our fingers, see the world as a philosopher sees it, or worse, as a certain political party wants us to see it. And it seem o’ so right and eye opening, when we sink ourselves trustingly on the magic carpet, ready to go for a ride!

But where are we going?

… And according to whose map?

I guess these are some of the questions that we, as audience, need to retain power on.

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References:

1) Kenneth Copley (2001). The Great Deceiver: Unmasking The Lies of Satan. Chicago: Moody Press.

2) Tim Rice (1992). A Whole New World. Taken from: http://www.niehs.nih.gov/kids/lyrics/aladdinworld.htm

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Sharon Chong
28/4/07
:o)