Notes: The Ideology of Zizek's Guide to Films

Iva 2022-12-06 19:36:18

1. "Extreme Space" 1988 (They Live)

Put on the glasses with the function of "ideological criticism", and see the dictatorship in democracy, the invisible order of society supports the apparent freedom of individuals, and the human beings are controlled by "alien". >>>Ideology is our spontaneous relationship with society, the pain of knowing the truth makes you give up your freedom, because living a lie doesn't require suffering. Freedom hurts.

2. The sound of music 1965

The basic idea of ​​psychoanalysis is how to distinguish between pleasure and simple pleasures. "Climb every mountain" >>> "Pretend to give up, so you can have it all", which is also the key to the operation of ideology.

Most psychological cases show that guilt comes not from having too much pleasure, but from not being able to (full) enjoy pleasure.

3. "Different Dances" 2000 (Coca-Cola commercial)

The essential attributes of commodities in postmodern society: hedonism (you have the responsibility to consume and enjoy) and desire inflation (desire can never be fully satisfied).

The more you drink (consume), the more thirsty (desire) you get.

>>>Desire is for desire itself. The desire to continue to desire. Therefore excess always accompanies.

Brings up another case of "surplus": Kinder Fun Eggs.

The teaching of anti-metaphysics (seeing the essence through the exterior): We aimed at a higher goal precisely in order to be able to enjoy the surface. The surplus enables the enjoyment of the surface, which makes it a perfect commodity ).

4. Universal applicability of Bei Jiu's "Ode to Joy"

Political movements: German Nazis for public celebrations; Soviet Union as communist hymn; considered advanced bourgeois music during China's Cultural Revolution; Southern Rhodesia as national anthem, considered to be a proclamation of national independence and liberation; played during the Olympic Games in East and West Germany Bei Jiu replaces the national anthems of the two parties; designated as the EU Union anthem in 1992... >>> An empty container open to all possible meanings, however this frame is never as neutral as it appears. >>>

5. "Clockwork Orange" 1971 (Clockwork Orange)

Alex loves Beethoven the most, and Bei Jiu's movements are cleverly used in the film. "The first movement, which Bay clearly identified as belonging to ideology. The second movement depicts the part that the official ideology has not been able to restrain and tame. Bay practices ideological criticism in pure music."

6. "West Side Story" 1961 (west side story) >> London riots 2011

the contradiction of ideology function between classical (classical: I don't understand the reasoning, but still doing it) and cynical (cynic: I understand the reasoning, but still doing it)

Consumerism and Violence

7. "Taxi Driver" 1976 (taxi driver)

It directs outbursts of violence to its extremely suicidal dimension. The usual pattern of fantasies is to construct imaginary situations where one is desired by the other, but the reality is that the "victim" refuses to be rescued. So suicide violence is a bloody intervention in chaotic reality. >>> "Humanitarian Intervention" in the U.S. Military

8. "Jaws" 1975 (jaws)

Sharks symbolize a single collection of many fears, so eliminating a single target solves the confusion of facing multiple fears. >>>Fascism

A conservative ideological narrative explaining the deterioration of society: not an inherent contradiction of social development, but the result of foreign aggressors. In the ideological system, some false and concrete images are needed to fix the imagination.

9. Cabaret 1972 (cabaret)

"Tomorrow belongs to me" >>> German chariot "Voyage" liberates and plays with elements of Nazi militarism.

10. Starbucks Coffee

Between the resolute pursuit of capital expansion and ecological awareness, corporate social responsibility is contained within consumerism.

Benjamin: we experience history not when we are engaged in events, only when we see the waste of culture being halfly taken by nature, and at that point we can get what history means.

The Redemptive Value of Post-Disaster Movies: Inertia of the Real

11. "Titanic" 1997 (Titanic)

Through short-lived natural disasters, love is eternally redeemed at the ideal level. Then through the two elements of disaster and love, the real ideological message is obscured: the upper classes try to regenerate by ruthlessly taking the vitality of the lower classes.

12. "Full Metal Jacket" 1987 (full Metal jecket) >>> "If" 1968 (if...)

Unwritten (obscene) rules are essential for integration and group identification.

13. The dark knight 2008

Keep order with lies. Plato's "Noble Fable" >>> America's War in Iraq >>> Do whatever you want with the meaning of democracy and religion.

14. The loves of a blonde 1965

Two contradictory aspects of "the big other": the secret order of things and the orderly carrier of appearances. The construction of the individual requires a fictional "Other" as a medium for remembering and accepting real ideas. >>>Jacques Lacan "The Big Other does not exist, man is born alone."

15. "Brazil" 1985 (brazil)

Kafka: "For a modern, secular, non-religious person, the (state) bureaucracy is the only remaining connection to the divine dimension." The impenetrable omnipotence of the bureaucracy is divine pleasure.

16. The last temptation of christ

The root of hysteria is the questioning of the authority that determines self-identity: why am l what you're telling me that I am ? The unique feature of Christianity is to place this hysterical questioning on God (as the subject) body. The difference between Judaism and Christianity is the difference between anxiety and love. Judaism adheres to the anxiety "che voglio": what do you(god) want from me, and the fear of the unfathomable God (the other). Christianity resolves conflict with an imaginary love.

17. "Reborn" 1966 (seconds)

The right and wrong of dreams: The right dream should point to a dimension beyond the existing society; the wrong is a mirror image of society that is idealized consumerism.

18. Zabriskie point 1970

The hippie revolution of the 1960s (make love not war)

Towards freedom is not just about changing reality to match your dreams, but changing the way you dream.

Benjamin: "Every real revolution, it is not only towards the future, but also redeems the ghosts of the failed revolutions of the past and finds a home in a new freedom."

Funny Easter Egg: "I may be freezing to death, but you'll never get rid of me. All the ice in the world can not kill a true idea. (Fight ! )"

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The Pervert's Guide to Ideology quotes

  • Slavoj Zizek: This is an old conservative wisdom - asserted long ago by philosophers from Plato - especially, and then Immanuel Kant, Edmond Burke and so on and so on. This idea that the truth is too strong. That a politician should be a cynicist who, - although he knows what is true, tells to ordinary people what Plato called 'a noble fable' - a lie.

  • Slavoj Zizek: One of the great platitudes - which are popular today - when we are confronted with acts of violence - is to refer to Theodore Dostoievsky's - famous statement from 'The Brothers Karamazov': "If there is no God then everything is permitted. "