10 ms·

John Carpenter’s ‘They Live’ was supposed to be a warning

108 points by skanderbm 5y ago

westcort 5y ago
Slavoj Zizek noted the importance of his film in “The Pervert’s Guide to Cinema.” I highly recommend the film and “The Pervert’s Guide to Ideology” as an explanation of our current world systems.
- slibhb 5y ago
  Zizek is a performer. There's not a lot of substance in his many (is he at 100 yet?) books. It's blather and bad jokes interspersed with paeans to violence. It's ironic that someone who rails against capitalism publishes at such a frenetic rate while covering the same ground. I'd call it intellectual consumerism. The article is also weak. They Live works because it's so stripped down, almost a fable. But as a serious look at modernity, there's not much there. The idea that "the rich are aliens" is creepy. It mainly serves to make their murder morally permissible.
  - FooBarBizBazz 5y ago
    The Black Mirror episode "Men Against Fire", again with glasses that turn people into monsters, is a good counterpoint. In the one, the monsters are the truth; in the other, the monsters are the lie.
  - ianleeclark 5y ago
    > Zizek is a performer. Most definitely and I think he'd agree. > There's not a lot of substance in his many (is he at 100 yet?) books. Which books specifically of his are you speaking about? > It's ironic that someone who rails against capitalism publishes at such a frenetic rate while covering the same ground. He himself has said that he makes a good slave, he just needs to know who his master is.
    - slibhb 5y ago
      > Which books specifically of his are you speaking about? How many of his ~70 books am I required to read before forming an opinion? I've read one and a half, the one being one of his "philosophical" books and the half being a more accessible political one. I'm confident that no one who has anyhting to say writes like that. Give me Chomsky, give me Butler, give me Rorty. I don't have to agree to appreciate a thinker but I have to be convinced there's thinking going on. > He himself has said that he makes a good slave, he just needs to know who his master is. This clowning bullshit is a good reason not to take him seriously. Bad jokes are perhaps Zizek's greatest sin. I can forgive anyone almost anything if they're funny. But no, it's dud after dud.
      - deleted 5y ago
        [deleted]
      - ianleeclark 5y ago
        > How many of his ~70 books am I required to read before forming an opinion? I like to follow the rule that I only talk about things which I know about. I think it's a pretty good rule. So I personally wouldn't talk about an entire person's collection from such a limited introduction because it would feel a tad bit hasty to me. Instead, I would talk about the works that I had read--this might prove difficult if you can't recall the names. > This clowning bullshit is a good reason not to take him seriously. It's a dad-joke that he told at a talk. Heaven forbid the man try and add some levity to situations.
        slibhb 5y ago
        So I need to read all ~30,000 pages of Zizek before forming an opinion. Or at least a negative opinion. Wonderful system you've developed. > It's a dad-joke that he told at a talk. Heaven forbid the man try and add some levity to situations. It's not funny. Anyway, like I said, it's a performance. The fact that you (and he) would agree with that judgement doesn't make it any less damning. I watched part of a lecture he did on youtube. Absolutely unwatchable. If he has a point he's unable to communicate it. But the real point is mystifying the audience, creating the impression that they're witnessing a genius thinking out loud, and the terrible jokes don't help. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rHP1OwivAL0 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rHP1OwivAL0 if anyone is "interested". Notice Avital Ronell (sex offender and NYU professor) introducing him. It's bizarre how Zizek bullies her through the starting of the lecture while playing it off as a joke between friends.
  - Barrin92 5y ago
    If you think there isn't a lot of substance I don't think you've actually read any of his stuff. Sublime Object of Ideology and his work on Lacan in general are well-respected. There's not a lot of nonsense in his theoretical work at all. When he engages the public, or whatever you find on youtube which is what I suspect you've seen of him based on your impression, he does indeed joke around a lot. But this has to do with his inherent distaste for 'preaching'. He's no fan of climbing on a pedestal and pretending to speak from a position of authority, he's said himself he's always considered that authoritarian.
    - slibhb 5y ago
      > Sublime Object of Ideology and his work on Lacan in general are well-respected. There's not a lot of nonsense in his theoretical work at all. Well respected by some and not others. Lacan as a philosopher has boosters and detractors...much like Zizek (and every other philosopher). I'm with the detractors. I've read 1.5 of his books (not the one you mentioned) and I tried to watch an academic lecture on youtube. I've read various secondary sources (which are mostly highly critical and I found convincing). Your argument comes down to "anyone who doesn't think highly of Zizek is dumb/hasn't read him/doesn't understand him". It's so low effort. > When he engages the public, or whatever you find on youtube which is what I suspect you've seen of him based on your impression, he does indeed joke around a lot. But this has to do with his inherent distaste for 'preaching'. I have no problem with intellectuals making jokes. Zizek isn't funny. > But this has to do with his inherent distaste for 'preaching'. He's no fan of climbing on a pedestal and pretending to speak from a position of authority, he's said himself he's always considered that authoritarian. Most people who "don't like to preach" end up, you know, not preaching.
      - sammalloy 5y ago
        Zizek has always struck me as the Deepak Chopra of philosophy.
  - jessaustin 5y ago
    The idea that "the rich are aliens" is creepy. It mainly serves to make their murder morally permissible. One hopes you can muster this ardent sympathy for the millions of people killed in wars that the rich started and by healthcare deficiencies that the rich have arranged over the last several decades.
    - slibhb 5y ago
      One would hope that you could come up with a better theory than "the problem with the world is rich people" but one would be wrong, apparently. Rich people are, in fact, human. They are drawn from the general population.
      - Khaine 5y ago
        Ummm, isn’t that literally what marxists and communists believe? That the proletariat must rise up and overthrow the bourgeois
        slibhb 5y ago
        Some of them believe that but it's not a Marxian belief. Marx's argument is "structural". The contradictions of a capitalist economy and society are the problem. The bourgeois are a symptom of that, not the cause. Killing all the bourgeois wouldn't solve the problem in itself, a radical restructuring of society is required.
        jessaustin 5y ago
        That which is necessary is not always sufficient.
      - SturgeonsLaw 5y ago
        Well yeah, they're human, that doesn't mean they're incapable of inflicting widespread suffering. It ain't poor people buying politicians, starting wars and pushing propaganda though the media.
- CyberRabbi 5y ago
  For the mind of the average consumer, whose worldview has nearly been entirely shaped by the ideas presented in Hollywood movies, yes the narrative that Zizek presents through those same Hollywood movies can be entertaining and inspire a sense of understanding.
riffraff 5y ago
I wonder how many people familiar with OBEY iconography variations[0] or OBEY Clothing actually watched They Live. It's a pretty corny movie, but it's quite good. And regarding warnings, I can't help but feel Idiocracy is also one we're not paying attention to. [0] I own a t-shirt with futurama's hypnotoad, and I love it
- bthrn 5y ago
  Obey Clothing was founded by Shepard Fairey, most notably known for his Obama Hope poster in 2008. Shepard often cites They Live as inspiration for his art, with his Andre the Giant Has A Posse campaign starting in 1989. As an aside - one of my favorite works of his is Greetings From Iraq[0], from 2005. It satirizes a classic Yellowstone National Park postcard from the 1930s[1], in a criticism of the Iraq War. [0]https://www.icaboston.org/sites/default/files/styles/original_crop/public/greetings-iraq-2005-01.jpg?itok=943YfHTq https://www.icaboston.org/sites/default/files/styles/origina... [1]https://www.discovernw.org/mm5/graphics/00000001/DYNW_PLU10671_500x705.jpg https://www.discovernw.org/mm5/graphics/00000001/DYNW_PLU106...
  - riffraff 5y ago
    I know that Shepard Fairey is familiar with They Live, my (abstract) question is how many people familiar with him know of the movie.
- deleted 5y ago
  [deleted]
- cableshaft 5y ago
  I did finally see it for the first time last year, and I think it could use a modern remake. The best parts were the messages he saw while wearing glasses, and everything else was just okay for me. In particular I found the ~15 minute one-on-one fight scene to be tedious after five minutes, and the pacing seemed really uneven, like it felt like they really took their time for the first hour, and then tried to shove all the rest of the plot into the last thirty minutes. Clever idea and some great imagery with the messages, though. I'm glad I saw it for that.
pmoriarty 5y ago
"They Live, meanwhile, sort of became reality... Drones in the sky, conspiracies in our heads, militarized police in the streets, economic inequality in every corner of society, media that seeks to control our minds" Max Headroom and Brazil were a couple of other 80's scifi films which were uncannily prescient.
- alisonkisk 5y ago
  Aside from the obvious drone tech, none of that is prescient, it's just a common problem in societies.
jessaustin 5y ago
But the meta-narrative of "They Live", about the fear of being controlled by some massive conspiracy only you and a select group of “awakened” radicals can see, is a different matter. That is the story of how many of us now see reality. While the text of "They Live" isn’t all that scary, the subtext is among the most terrifying aspects of life in the modern world. So, it's important not to fear the actual deficiencies in democracy and self-rule that majorities of people in many nations recognize, but it's totally rational to fear the fear of those actual problems. "Meta-narrative", indeed.
- CyberRabbi 5y ago
  > self-rule Chomsky argues that democracy, at least in the US, is by and large not characterized by self-rule: https://www.salon.com/2013/08/17/chomsky_the_u_s_behaves_nothing_like_a_democracy/ https://www.salon.com/2013/08/17/chomsky_the_u_s_behaves_not...
  - a1369209993 5y ago
    Pretty sure that was (part of) the parent's point, actually.
    - CyberRabbi 5y ago
      Yes I was legitimizing that real concern
  - jessaustin 5y ago
    There was a fairly definitive study out of Princeton: The central point that emerges from our research is that economic elites and organized groups representing business interests have substantial independent impacts on U.S. government policy, while mass-based interest groups and average citizens have little or no independent influence. Our results provide substantial support for theories of Economic-Elite Domination and for theories of Biased Pluralism, but not for theories of Majoritarian Electoral Democracy or Majoritarian Pluralism. https://scholar.princeton.edu/sites/default/files/mgilens/files/gilens_and_page_2014_-testing_theories_of_american_politics.doc.pdf https://scholar.princeton.edu/sites/default/files/mgilens/fi...
CrazyPyroLinux 5y ago
I have come here to chew bubble gum and kick ass, and I'm all outta bubble gum.
- mavhc 5y ago
  I originally knew that quote as "I have come here to chew gum and kick ass, and I'm all outta gum.", which sounds much cooler
- sammalloy 5y ago
  > I have come here to chew bubble gum and kick ass, and I'm all outta bubble gum. I have fond memories of playing Duke Nukem 3D modem to modem and hearing him say those words.
pmoriarty 5y ago
"...in They Live, ideology is not imposed, Zizek postulates. Rather, Nada puts on the glasses in order to see how things really are, because ideology is "spontaneous relationships to our social world" and therefore indivisible from reality. The glasses, therefore, finally remove ideology from the equation." Except that in They Live ideology is imposed by the aliens. "In the movie's most notorious scene, Nada tries to impose this truth on another person, brawling with Armitage for several minutes in order to force him to put on the glasses. This endless fight scene, possibly the longest in cinema history, is a metaphor for the struggle to achieve enlightenment. "To step out of ideology ... you must force yourself to do it," Zizek concludes. "Freedom hurts."" But Piper's character didn't have to force himself to put on the glasses. There was no struggle and it didn't hurt. Zizek is amusing and I agree with many of his left-wing sentiments, but a lot of what he says is pure bullshit, concocted to sound profound with zero substance to it if you think about it for half a second.
- narag 5y ago
  Except that in They Live ideology is imposed by the aliens. He thinks that ideology is good so for him the glasses are ideology, not the cut-through-ideology tool. But Piper's character didn't have to force himself to put on the glasses. There was no struggle and it didn't hurt. Using the glasses did cause headaches, but in the real world it's just the same. Once you rebel against bullshit your life becomes very uncomfortable real soon.
  - pmoriarty 5y ago
    "He thinks that ideology is good so for him the glasses are ideology, not the cut-through-ideology tool." But he's deluded. Regardless of his beliefs, the aliens have in fact imposed an illusion (or "ideology" in Zizek jargon) on him, and the glasses do in fact let you see through that (as he himself does later). He can think whatever he wants, but that doesn't change these facts. "Once you rebel against bullshit your life becomes very uncomfortable real soon." So, contrary to Zizek's contention, it's not his "enlightenment" that causes problems, but his trying to fight against those with power. A lesser man might have thrown away the glasses after seeing the truth, or perhaps consciously and deliberately started cooperating with the aliens, as various traitor characters did in The Matrix and V, for example.
dominicjj 5y ago
So on the one hand, They Live should not be regarded as 'Cliffs Notes explaining the oppressive power structures underpinning the so-called civilized world.' But on the other, The Thing is about 'the ways we are undone by our inability to see and understand other people.' The author seems to want it both ways.
jl6 5y ago
Mostly unrelated shoutout to Flashback, the 90s game that totally ripped off They Live’s glasses but was great anyway.
beebeepka 5y ago
I've had bad luck showing They Live to youngsters. I don't know if it's the style or the message but they all seemed bored to death. I love it but then again I am a borderline paranoid old fart
- nabla9 5y ago
  Range is something you develop later in life, or not at all. Young people in each generation like mostly stuff that is made for them. There are people who say "2001: A Space Odyssey" is unwatchable because it has low pace. They just don't have patience to watch a movie like that and they take out their phone to do something during the scene.
  - alisonkisk 5y ago
    2001 was intentionally slow to make you feel how boring space travel is. It's a clever idea but it's a movie for a much slower paced world with fewer options for things to do.
    - pvaldes 5y ago
      Probably. The same trick of deliberately boring the viewer for creating a sense of immersion had been used 19 years before, in the (excellent) film 'Stray dog'.
  - developer93 5y ago
    It was unwatchable because it relied on you having read the book to know what was going on. I would usually recommend reading the book and skipping the movie.
  - selfhoster11 5y ago
    We are also much busier these days. Asking someone to spend time watching 2001 is asking for a lot.
- Joeboy 5y ago
  A great, but awkward, feature of the film is that it starts off feeling like a rather earnest documentary about urban poverty, and then gets bigger and more sensational throughout the movie. It doesn't surprise me that some people get put off by the beginning.
gweinberg 5y ago
The fight scene where RRP forces the other guy to put on the glasses was the inspiration for the cripple fight episode of South Park. And that really is the best thing to come out of the film. Really, it was every bit as shallow and superficial as it seemed. "People I dislike are like evil space aliens". "No, it's YOU GUYS that are the ones like evil space aliens." There was no more depth to it than that.
- tomdell 5y ago
  Really? The core idea I got from the movie is that our desires are driven by advertising - that maybe the constituent parts of our personality are largely just impulses instigated by external forces to consume various things, to work, spend money, and propagate to keep the economy in a state of constant growth for the benefit of the wealthy who don't need to work - landowners, large stock-holders, etc. The campy, stupid action movie aesthetic is sugar coating for what I found to be an interesting theme.
  - lurquer 5y ago
    > The campy, stupid action movie aesthetic is sugar coating for what I found to be an interesting theme. Hehe. I think you’ve got it backwards. You have Rowdy Roddy lined up to do a film. You come up with a campy corny idea of him fighting about sunglasses. After that, you come up with some off-the-shelf ‘theme’ to sugar coat the campiness. Real honestly, I would have watched 2 hours of that sunglass fight. That WAS the movie. Best damn fight ever. Wish it had lasted two hours.
aww_dang 5y ago
The author vaguely stumbles through the partisan goal posts with loosely associated leftisms. Globalism isn't a concern. It doesn't mount any propaganda, because: "Look over there, it is capitalism!" If that's not enough, the buffet also includes the tired trope of associating right wingers with anti-semitism. Somehow Trump is mixed into the smorgasbord. There's some irony in him missing the broader point of the film while arriving at a conclusion about ideological blinders.
cratermoon 5y ago
If you haven't seen "They Live", I recommend you watch it on a double bill with Alex Cox's 1984 masterpiece "Repo Man"
csbartus 5y ago
Control is the driving force behind evolution. The total control of thought is inevitable. With that we will enter into a new metasystem where we will be the second most intelligent lifeform. http://metamn.io/gust http://metamn.io/gust
- FigmentEngine 5y ago
  4th... agi, mice, dolphins, humans
jvanderbot 5y ago
I'd like to introduce the writer to ... all of cyberpunk over a beer or weekend.
Vaslo 5y ago
As I read this, I felt like my head fell into the cheese dip back in 1957.
nomdep 5y ago
I will love a remake, I feel the message of the original is lost because of the incredibly corny and low budget production
8bitsrule 5y ago
"Wherever a man goes, men will pursue and paw him with their dirty institutions, and, if they can, constrain him to belong to their desperate odd-fellow society. ⇐ Thoreau (Walden)

108 points by skanderbm 5y ago

Slavoj Zizek noted the importance of his film in “The Pervert’s Guide to Cinema.” I highly recommend the film and “The Pervert’s Guide to Ideology” as an explanation of our current world systems.

slibhb 5y ago
Zizek is a performer. There's not a lot of substance in his many (is he at 100 yet?) books. It's blather and bad jokes interspersed with paeans to violence. It's ironic that someone who rails against capitalism publishes at such a frenetic rate while covering the same ground. I'd call it intellectual consumerism. The article is also weak. They Live works because it's so stripped down, almost a fable. But as a serious look at modernity, there's not much there. The idea that "the rich are aliens" is creepy. It mainly serves to make their murder morally permissible.
- FooBarBizBazz 5y ago
  The Black Mirror episode "Men Against Fire", again with glasses that turn people into monsters, is a good counterpoint. In the one, the monsters are the truth; in the other, the monsters are the lie.
- ianleeclark 5y ago
  > Zizek is a performer. Most definitely and I think he'd agree. > There's not a lot of substance in his many (is he at 100 yet?) books. Which books specifically of his are you speaking about? > It's ironic that someone who rails against capitalism publishes at such a frenetic rate while covering the same ground. He himself has said that he makes a good slave, he just needs to know who his master is.
  - slibhb 5y ago
    > Which books specifically of his are you speaking about? How many of his ~70 books am I required to read before forming an opinion? I've read one and a half, the one being one of his "philosophical" books and the half being a more accessible political one. I'm confident that no one who has anyhting to say writes like that. Give me Chomsky, give me Butler, give me Rorty. I don't have to agree to appreciate a thinker but I have to be convinced there's thinking going on. > He himself has said that he makes a good slave, he just needs to know who his master is. This clowning bullshit is a good reason not to take him seriously. Bad jokes are perhaps Zizek's greatest sin. I can forgive anyone almost anything if they're funny. But no, it's dud after dud.
    - deleted 5y ago
      [deleted]
    - ianleeclark 5y ago
      > How many of his ~70 books am I required to read before forming an opinion? I like to follow the rule that I only talk about things which I know about. I think it's a pretty good rule. So I personally wouldn't talk about an entire person's collection from such a limited introduction because it would feel a tad bit hasty to me. Instead, I would talk about the works that I had read--this might prove difficult if you can't recall the names. > This clowning bullshit is a good reason not to take him seriously. It's a dad-joke that he told at a talk. Heaven forbid the man try and add some levity to situations.
      - slibhb 5y ago
        So I need to read all ~30,000 pages of Zizek before forming an opinion. Or at least a negative opinion. Wonderful system you've developed. > It's a dad-joke that he told at a talk. Heaven forbid the man try and add some levity to situations. It's not funny. Anyway, like I said, it's a performance. The fact that you (and he) would agree with that judgement doesn't make it any less damning. I watched part of a lecture he did on youtube. Absolutely unwatchable. If he has a point he's unable to communicate it. But the real point is mystifying the audience, creating the impression that they're witnessing a genius thinking out loud, and the terrible jokes don't help. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rHP1OwivAL0 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rHP1OwivAL0 if anyone is "interested". Notice Avital Ronell (sex offender and NYU professor) introducing him. It's bizarre how Zizek bullies her through the starting of the lecture while playing it off as a joke between friends.
- Barrin92 5y ago
  If you think there isn't a lot of substance I don't think you've actually read any of his stuff. Sublime Object of Ideology and his work on Lacan in general are well-respected. There's not a lot of nonsense in his theoretical work at all. When he engages the public, or whatever you find on youtube which is what I suspect you've seen of him based on your impression, he does indeed joke around a lot. But this has to do with his inherent distaste for 'preaching'. He's no fan of climbing on a pedestal and pretending to speak from a position of authority, he's said himself he's always considered that authoritarian.
  - slibhb 5y ago
    > Sublime Object of Ideology and his work on Lacan in general are well-respected. There's not a lot of nonsense in his theoretical work at all. Well respected by some and not others. Lacan as a philosopher has boosters and detractors...much like Zizek (and every other philosopher). I'm with the detractors. I've read 1.5 of his books (not the one you mentioned) and I tried to watch an academic lecture on youtube. I've read various secondary sources (which are mostly highly critical and I found convincing). Your argument comes down to "anyone who doesn't think highly of Zizek is dumb/hasn't read him/doesn't understand him". It's so low effort. > When he engages the public, or whatever you find on youtube which is what I suspect you've seen of him based on your impression, he does indeed joke around a lot. But this has to do with his inherent distaste for 'preaching'. I have no problem with intellectuals making jokes. Zizek isn't funny. > But this has to do with his inherent distaste for 'preaching'. He's no fan of climbing on a pedestal and pretending to speak from a position of authority, he's said himself he's always considered that authoritarian. Most people who "don't like to preach" end up, you know, not preaching.
    - sammalloy 5y ago
      Zizek has always struck me as the Deepak Chopra of philosophy.
- jessaustin 5y ago
  The idea that "the rich are aliens" is creepy. It mainly serves to make their murder morally permissible. One hopes you can muster this ardent sympathy for the millions of people killed in wars that the rich started and by healthcare deficiencies that the rich have arranged over the last several decades.
  - slibhb 5y ago
    One would hope that you could come up with a better theory than "the problem with the world is rich people" but one would be wrong, apparently. Rich people are, in fact, human. They are drawn from the general population.
    - Khaine 5y ago
      Ummm, isn’t that literally what marxists and communists believe? That the proletariat must rise up and overthrow the bourgeois
      - slibhb 5y ago
        Some of them believe that but it's not a Marxian belief. Marx's argument is "structural". The contradictions of a capitalist economy and society are the problem. The bourgeois are a symptom of that, not the cause. Killing all the bourgeois wouldn't solve the problem in itself, a radical restructuring of society is required.
        jessaustin 5y ago
        That which is necessary is not always sufficient.
    - SturgeonsLaw 5y ago
      Well yeah, they're human, that doesn't mean they're incapable of inflicting widespread suffering. It ain't poor people buying politicians, starting wars and pushing propaganda though the media.
CyberRabbi 5y ago
For the mind of the average consumer, whose worldview has nearly been entirely shaped by the ideas presented in Hollywood movies, yes the narrative that Zizek presents through those same Hollywood movies can be entertaining and inspire a sense of understanding.

riffraff 5y ago

I wonder how many people familiar with OBEY iconography variations[0] or OBEY Clothing actually watched They Live. It's a pretty corny movie, but it's quite good. And regarding warnings, I can't help but feel Idiocracy is also one we're not paying attention to. [0] I own a t-shirt with futurama's hypnotoad, and I love it

bthrn 5y ago
Obey Clothing was founded by Shepard Fairey, most notably known for his Obama Hope poster in 2008. Shepard often cites They Live as inspiration for his art, with his Andre the Giant Has A Posse campaign starting in 1989. As an aside - one of my favorite works of his is Greetings From Iraq[0], from 2005. It satirizes a classic Yellowstone National Park postcard from the 1930s[1], in a criticism of the Iraq War. [0]https://www.icaboston.org/sites/default/files/styles/original_crop/public/greetings-iraq-2005-01.jpg?itok=943YfHTq https://www.icaboston.org/sites/default/files/styles/origina... [1]https://www.discovernw.org/mm5/graphics/00000001/DYNW_PLU10671_500x705.jpg https://www.discovernw.org/mm5/graphics/00000001/DYNW_PLU106...
- riffraff 5y ago
  I know that Shepard Fairey is familiar with They Live, my (abstract) question is how many people familiar with him know of the movie.
deleted 5y ago
[deleted]
cableshaft 5y ago
I did finally see it for the first time last year, and I think it could use a modern remake. The best parts were the messages he saw while wearing glasses, and everything else was just okay for me. In particular I found the ~15 minute one-on-one fight scene to be tedious after five minutes, and the pacing seemed really uneven, like it felt like they really took their time for the first hour, and then tried to shove all the rest of the plot into the last thirty minutes. Clever idea and some great imagery with the messages, though. I'm glad I saw it for that.

pmoriarty 5y ago

"They Live, meanwhile, sort of became reality... Drones in the sky, conspiracies in our heads, militarized police in the streets, economic inequality in every corner of society, media that seeks to control our minds" Max Headroom and Brazil were a couple of other 80's scifi films which were uncannily prescient.

alisonkisk 5y ago
Aside from the obvious drone tech, none of that is prescient, it's just a common problem in societies.

jessaustin 5y ago

But the meta-narrative of "They Live", about the fear of being controlled by some massive conspiracy only you and a select group of “awakened” radicals can see, is a different matter. That is the story of how many of us now see reality. While the text of "They Live" isn’t all that scary, the subtext is among the most terrifying aspects of life in the modern world. So, it's important not to fear the actual deficiencies in democracy and self-rule that majorities of people in many nations recognize, but it's totally rational to fear the fear of those actual problems. "Meta-narrative", indeed.

CyberRabbi 5y ago
> self-rule Chomsky argues that democracy, at least in the US, is by and large not characterized by self-rule: https://www.salon.com/2013/08/17/chomsky_the_u_s_behaves_nothing_like_a_democracy/ https://www.salon.com/2013/08/17/chomsky_the_u_s_behaves_not...
- a1369209993 5y ago
  Pretty sure that was (part of) the parent's point, actually.
  - CyberRabbi 5y ago
    Yes I was legitimizing that real concern
- jessaustin 5y ago
  There was a fairly definitive study out of Princeton: The central point that emerges from our research is that economic elites and organized groups representing business interests have substantial independent impacts on U.S. government policy, while mass-based interest groups and average citizens have little or no independent influence. Our results provide substantial support for theories of Economic-Elite Domination and for theories of Biased Pluralism, but not for theories of Majoritarian Electoral Democracy or Majoritarian Pluralism. https://scholar.princeton.edu/sites/default/files/mgilens/files/gilens_and_page_2014_-testing_theories_of_american_politics.doc.pdf https://scholar.princeton.edu/sites/default/files/mgilens/fi...

CrazyPyroLinux 5y ago

I have come here to chew bubble gum and kick ass, and I'm all outta bubble gum.

mavhc 5y ago
I originally knew that quote as "I have come here to chew gum and kick ass, and I'm all outta gum.", which sounds much cooler
sammalloy 5y ago
> I have come here to chew bubble gum and kick ass, and I'm all outta bubble gum. I have fond memories of playing Duke Nukem 3D modem to modem and hearing him say those words.

pmoriarty 5y ago

"...in They Live, ideology is not imposed, Zizek postulates. Rather, Nada puts on the glasses in order to see how things really are, because ideology is "spontaneous relationships to our social world" and therefore indivisible from reality. The glasses, therefore, finally remove ideology from the equation." Except that in They Live ideology is imposed by the aliens. "In the movie's most notorious scene, Nada tries to impose this truth on another person, brawling with Armitage for several minutes in order to force him to put on the glasses. This endless fight scene, possibly the longest in cinema history, is a metaphor for the struggle to achieve enlightenment. "To step out of ideology ... you must force yourself to do it," Zizek concludes. "Freedom hurts."" But Piper's character didn't have to force himself to put on the glasses. There was no struggle and it didn't hurt. Zizek is amusing and I agree with many of his left-wing sentiments, but a lot of what he says is pure bullshit, concocted to sound profound with zero substance to it if you think about it for half a second.

narag 5y ago
Except that in They Live ideology is imposed by the aliens. He thinks that ideology is good so for him the glasses are ideology, not the cut-through-ideology tool. But Piper's character didn't have to force himself to put on the glasses. There was no struggle and it didn't hurt. Using the glasses did cause headaches, but in the real world it's just the same. Once you rebel against bullshit your life becomes very uncomfortable real soon.
- pmoriarty 5y ago
  "He thinks that ideology is good so for him the glasses are ideology, not the cut-through-ideology tool." But he's deluded. Regardless of his beliefs, the aliens have in fact imposed an illusion (or "ideology" in Zizek jargon) on him, and the glasses do in fact let you see through that (as he himself does later). He can think whatever he wants, but that doesn't change these facts. "Once you rebel against bullshit your life becomes very uncomfortable real soon." So, contrary to Zizek's contention, it's not his "enlightenment" that causes problems, but his trying to fight against those with power. A lesser man might have thrown away the glasses after seeing the truth, or perhaps consciously and deliberately started cooperating with the aliens, as various traitor characters did in The Matrix and V, for example.

dominicjj 5y ago

So on the one hand, They Live should not be regarded as 'Cliffs Notes explaining the oppressive power structures underpinning the so-called civilized world.' But on the other, The Thing is about 'the ways we are undone by our inability to see and understand other people.' The author seems to want it both ways.

jl6 5y ago

Mostly unrelated shoutout to Flashback, the 90s game that totally ripped off They Live’s glasses but was great anyway.

beebeepka 5y ago

I've had bad luck showing They Live to youngsters. I don't know if it's the style or the message but they all seemed bored to death. I love it but then again I am a borderline paranoid old fart

nabla9 5y ago
Range is something you develop later in life, or not at all. Young people in each generation like mostly stuff that is made for them. There are people who say "2001: A Space Odyssey" is unwatchable because it has low pace. They just don't have patience to watch a movie like that and they take out their phone to do something during the scene.
- alisonkisk 5y ago
  2001 was intentionally slow to make you feel how boring space travel is. It's a clever idea but it's a movie for a much slower paced world with fewer options for things to do.
  - pvaldes 5y ago
    Probably. The same trick of deliberately boring the viewer for creating a sense of immersion had been used 19 years before, in the (excellent) film 'Stray dog'.
- developer93 5y ago
  It was unwatchable because it relied on you having read the book to know what was going on. I would usually recommend reading the book and skipping the movie.
- selfhoster11 5y ago
  We are also much busier these days. Asking someone to spend time watching 2001 is asking for a lot.
Joeboy 5y ago
A great, but awkward, feature of the film is that it starts off feeling like a rather earnest documentary about urban poverty, and then gets bigger and more sensational throughout the movie. It doesn't surprise me that some people get put off by the beginning.

gweinberg 5y ago

The fight scene where RRP forces the other guy to put on the glasses was the inspiration for the cripple fight episode of South Park. And that really is the best thing to come out of the film. Really, it was every bit as shallow and superficial as it seemed. "People I dislike are like evil space aliens". "No, it's YOU GUYS that are the ones like evil space aliens." There was no more depth to it than that.

tomdell 5y ago
Really? The core idea I got from the movie is that our desires are driven by advertising - that maybe the constituent parts of our personality are largely just impulses instigated by external forces to consume various things, to work, spend money, and propagate to keep the economy in a state of constant growth for the benefit of the wealthy who don't need to work - landowners, large stock-holders, etc. The campy, stupid action movie aesthetic is sugar coating for what I found to be an interesting theme.
- lurquer 5y ago
  > The campy, stupid action movie aesthetic is sugar coating for what I found to be an interesting theme. Hehe. I think you’ve got it backwards. You have Rowdy Roddy lined up to do a film. You come up with a campy corny idea of him fighting about sunglasses. After that, you come up with some off-the-shelf ‘theme’ to sugar coat the campiness. Real honestly, I would have watched 2 hours of that sunglass fight. That WAS the movie. Best damn fight ever. Wish it had lasted two hours.

aww_dang 5y ago

The author vaguely stumbles through the partisan goal posts with loosely associated leftisms. Globalism isn't a concern. It doesn't mount any propaganda, because: "Look over there, it is capitalism!" If that's not enough, the buffet also includes the tired trope of associating right wingers with anti-semitism. Somehow Trump is mixed into the smorgasbord. There's some irony in him missing the broader point of the film while arriving at a conclusion about ideological blinders.

cratermoon 5y ago

If you haven't seen "They Live", I recommend you watch it on a double bill with Alex Cox's 1984 masterpiece "Repo Man"

csbartus 5y ago

Control is the driving force behind evolution. The total control of thought is inevitable. With that we will enter into a new metasystem where we will be the second most intelligent lifeform. http://metamn.io/gust http://metamn.io/gust

FigmentEngine 5y ago
4th... agi, mice, dolphins, humans

jvanderbot 5y ago

I'd like to introduce the writer to ... all of cyberpunk over a beer or weekend.

Vaslo 5y ago

As I read this, I felt like my head fell into the cheese dip back in 1957.

nomdep 5y ago

I will love a remake, I feel the message of the original is lost because of the incredibly corny and low budget production

8bitsrule 5y ago

"Wherever a man goes, men will pursue and paw him with their dirty institutions, and, if they can, constrain him to belong to their desperate odd-fellow society. ⇐ Thoreau (Walden)