Erasure of Boundaries between Good and Bad in “The Road”.

Erasure of Boundaries between Good and Bad in “The Road”.

           

The world of ‘The Road’ is a post- apocalyptic world where a disaster had already taken place and the conditions of human beings after that disaster are depicted. The time frame of a post- apocalyptic world of civilization is instantly after the calamity and it focuses on the psychology of the survivors in a world where nothing remains for them. In ‘The Road’ also we see that the civilization has come to an end due to an unknown disaster and most of the people are killed and a lot of them have abandoned the place, the people who are left are forced to kill other humans and eat them. The weaker ones have been slaved by the stronger that are using them as food. There is no vegetation and crops have also failed. The story is revealed to us by a series of different flash backs from which we come to know about his wife and her giving birth to the child and then committing suicide and the father and son left by them.

In the post modern world everything seems to break out of the predetermined boundaries. They do not follow the tradition and norms that were previously followed by everybody. Today everybody has his own definition of things. The things that are good for one person may be bad for the other. Erasure of boundaries in terms of good and bad means that things that were considered good are now termed bad. They may be good for us but for the other person under specific circumstances they may be considered bad. There is no clear distinction between good and bad. ‘The Road’ is one such movie where there is hope for survival and good. So whatever the characters do under those circumstances is the best they can do for themselves. The world in the movie is a disastrous place where they have no food to eat, no water to drink and no other person to talk with. They just have themselves and the father does not trust any other person and do not allow anyone to come near to his son. The son, on the other hand, wants to have some other human to talk with and is also willing to help anyone he finds on the road.

In the beginning of the movie when they visit a farm to check out for food, they come across people hanging in the farm house. The father tells the son that no body murdered them but they committed suicide when there is no solution left because if the person will not finish himself he will be cannibalized by the cannibals. So the person has to die one way or the other. They consider it good for them but traditionally everyone will consider it a bad thing. According to them it is good because it is an honorable death for them. Suicide in our world is not considered good and any body who commits suicide is considered a coward but in a situation where they have no other choice for them, it is the right thing to do. They live in a world where there is no boundary between good and bad.

The father always keep two bullets in his pistol so that whenever they are caught in a situation where they are unable to get themselves out, they will commit suicide. He is mentally prepared for this and do not hesitate for a moment. For him this is correct and good because if he will not kill himself, he will be killed by the cannibals or may be he will be eaten up alive and his body cut into pieces. So killing himself is better than being eaten up by animal like humans.

From the very beginning of the movie we see that the father is teaching his son how to put the gun in his mouth and pull the trigger to finish himself. No father is expected to teach such a thing to his son and even fathers are expected to keep their sons away from arms and weapons. But here we see the opposite of it. The father is all the time teaching his son that he is supposed to commit suicide if he feels that he will be caught. He even tells the child that he has to keep the gum tilted in his mouth and then pull the trigger so that it would kill him at once. This he does because he loves his son a lot and do not want the cannibals to kill his son in front of him. In such a situation whatever the father is teaching his son is considered good because it is obvious that no father wants his child to be killed in front of him.

Through a flashback, we come to know that his wife do not want to give birth to the child. She is of the view that the child should not come to this world where there is no hope for any body. The father do not agrees with her and keeps on telling her that they will survive the difficult time and will be happy one day as they used to be. The wife is very pessimistic about life and she feels that it will be wrong to give birth to a child in such circumstances where the boy would have no hope and no future. Being a mother she will always think for the best of her child and no mother would want to kill her child unless she feels that the world will be a worst place to live in. Being a spectator of the movie one cannot say whether it is good or bad as we see the child throughout the movie. There is no change in his condition, he is starving and malnourished and he has no hope for survival as well. A mother would never want to see her child in such conditions.

From another flashback in the movie, we see the husband and wife arguing after the birth of the child. The husband succeeds in convincing the wife to give birth to the child but the wife keeps on insisting and telling her husband that their condition will not get better and they will be killed one day. She wants him to bring an end to their misery but the husband considers it a bad thing and do not agrees with her. She tells him “other families are doing it”, which means that it was common for them and there is no question of good and bad in it. It is the right thing to do as the coming time will be more difficult to bear the hardships of that time. The wife finally leaves the home with very few clothes on, in the cold and never returns. The husband tells she died in the dark and cold. The same husband who was convincing his wife not to commit suicide teaches his son the way of committing suicide. One cannot distinguish which one is good and correct and which is not.

After the scene when the father kills a cannibal to save his son from him, the son questions his father, “Are we still the good guys?” and the father tells him that they are good guys and they will remain good guys no matter what they do. Here as well the boundary between good and bad is erased because the cannibals are also killing other humans and the same is done by the father. The cannibals kill others to feed them because they do not have anything to eat and all the crops are destroyed and food is finished. So they decided to eat other humans. The father on the other hand tries to find whatever is left to eat and survive on it. Also he kills the cannibal to save his son. Both of them consider them selves good.

While travelling south they come across a house and decide to check it out for food. The house seemed to be occupied by somebody but it was empty at the moment. The father and son sneaked into the house like robbers. Robbing anybody is considered bad and there is a punishment entitled by law for the robbers but here there is no law and any one can take any thing they like. In the house they do not find anything to eat. When they were searching the kitchen they found a door at the floor of the kitchen. The father opened and went down to have a look. It was the basement of the house where some people were locked. Some of them were missing some body parts like arms, hands and legs which were cut off by the cannibals. The father ran out of the basement with his son and closed the door. He did not tried to help them out, he only saved himself. If it were any other situation, the hero would have helped the trapped people and fought the cannibals but here nothing happens. They both hide in a toilet and when he overhears one of the cannibals coming up, he gives the pistol to the child to shoot himself if any one enters or they are caught. The son hesitates to shoot, so the father takes the pistol in his own hands and points it at the forehead of the boy. Such an act is not normally expected from a father. He could have fought and escape but his first thought is to use the pistol and kill them selves to save them. They are only left with one bullet and the father saves that bullet for the child so that the child may not be tortured by any one. The father thinks for the good of his child by doing this but it does not seem to be the correct decision to us. We consider suicide to be a bad thing and we believe that one should die fighting but should not lose hope.

At another place when they come across an underground storage of food the child asks his father, “We did good, didn’t we papa?” and the father answers in positive. They enjoy the food and eat to their full. The child loved that place and had in mind that it belonged to somebody else and they are eating their food without permission but the father told him it was the right thing to do and we also saw that the owner of the place had died long ago. So he did not consider it a wrong thing to eat and live in their place as it was abandoned.

After moving out of the under ground storage place the father and son come along an old man on the road. The father does not want to help the old man and save the food for them but the child wanted to help him out. He gives him a food can to eat so that he can have the energy to walk. The father tells the child that they cannot keep the old man because they will run out of food and the old man will die any way so they will waste food on him. They offer him dinner and he accepts. The father asks the old man whether he has thought of dying or killing himself to which the old man replied that death is a luxury and he has never thought of it. He used the word “luxury” for death implying that life in this world is a misery and pain. It is a punishment and the old man also tells him that there is no god because if there were any god he would have seen them and done something for them. The old man seems to be very disappointed and hopeless of the conditions in the world. Hopelessness prevails every where and people only think about themselves. There is no boundary between what is good and what is bad. The father and the child leave the old man and go on their own way. They do not care what will happen to him and they are also aware of the fact that either the old man will be caught by the cannibals and killed or he will die on the road.

Further on the road when the father and the son are being robbed off their stuff, the father runs after the robber and punishes him by taking all their belongings and all his clothes as well. He leaves him naked in the cold to die. The child does not want to do this to the black man and asks his father to return his belongings as there are only few good people left in the world and they should help each other and not be the bad people. The son thinks that the father is doing badly to the black man and he forces his father to go back and help the black man but the man was no more there. He leaves the clothes and some food for him by the side of the road. The father thinks it is foolish of his son to do so and he should trust every body as he will not always be around to help him.

By the end of the movie the father and the son come to a street where some body shoots arrows at them and one of the arrow hits the father’s legs. In return the father shoots a flare at the man and man dies. The lady in the house curses him and he comes out and carries on his way. He did not ask any thing to the lady. He went into the house to kill the shooter and when he finds him dead, he is satisfied and leaves. He does not care about the woman and did not offer her any help. He continues on his journey with his child.

Throughout the movie we see that humans have no value, people are dying but no body cares. Every body is thinking of himself and taking away things from others and making their condition more miserable. They do not think about their acts beings good or bad, they even do not think about the consequences of their acts on others. In this world where they have no hope and no food, they only think of their own survival and few good people who are left alive also know that they will also die one day and there will be no change in their miserable survival.

Work cited

The Road. John Hillcoat, 2009. Film.

The Deadly Sins - Seven

The Deadly Sins - Seven

Seven is a horror thriller which may be disturbing for many people. The movie is situated in an unidentified city with constant rain. It tells the story of two detectives – one who is about to retire and the other who is at the beginning of his career. Initially unwilling to work together, they are forced to work together to catch a psychopath serial killer.

David Fincher succeeded in creating a horrible world in seven where he created a nameless and unidentifiable monster that is without any background and has no fingerprints. He remains faceless throughout the major part of the movie. The power of this movie lies with the villain. John Doe plans at creating a master piece by punishing the people for their sins. With the first three murders, his message starts to appear and the two detectives – David Mills (Brad Pitt) and William Somerset (Morgan Freeman), figure out the reason of all murders to be a planned sequence according to the seven deadly sins mentioned in Christianity. The mystery of the story/ movie lies in the fact that will the detectives be able to catch Doe before the completion of his so called master piece or will he be able to complete all seven murders and disappear as nobody can identify him and he can be every where and be any one. The film takes a turn when, unexpectedly, Doe surrenders at the police station and confesses his crime, but at this time he has only completed five murders and two are still remaining to complete the whole. What he has in mind about them is not known to any one except Doe himself.

Somerset (Morgan Freeman) is the more literary of the two detectives and he is the one who concludes that the killer is using his crimes to preach a sermon. He is calm and is aware of the situation and also knows how to deal with difficult situations. Mills is a hyper police man who gets angry very soon and indulges in a fight with any one. He hits back a photographer when he secretly tries to take his picture.  John Doe’s (Kevin Spacey) method of murder is planned and disgusting. The way he leaves the pride victim with and option to kill herself by taking an over dose of sleeping pills or call for help. He already knows that she will not call for help and commit suicide by eating sleeping pills. In the opening credits and the ads of the film the killer is not identified by name, it is deliberately done to leave his identity as a surprise for the viewers. He has played his role very well.

The film keeps the viewers involved in it and creates an environment of suspense and horror from the beginning. The way the murders were pre-planned and executed is amazing. With every victim, he kept the clue for the next one. He kept the sloth victim alive for a year and takes photographs for his different phases of decaying and even he kept his hand to leave a clue. He does not want to hide the murders or himself rather he wants to show it to the whole world. He does a detail study of all his victims and is aware of everything about their lives.

The lesson conveyed by the movie is that one should not go around killing others for their sins and also that one should have control on oneself and keep oneself away from sins. Every body has committed a sin but it is not on one person to decide the fate for the other. The law is there to punish the sinners. It also tells us about the Christian belief about the sinners and the punishments for them in hell and also gives reference to some great works of literature.

People above the age of 18 may watch the movie also people who have interest in literature and have a literary back ground will have a clear under standing of the movie. As the movie involves murder scenes, sensitive people should not watch it as some scenes are very disturbing. I would rate the movie 4 out of 5. It is very well made in its details, everything is linked to the other and nothing is out of place.

POLITICAL IDEOLOGY IN THE FILM DR.STRANGELOVE

POLITICAL  IDEOLOGY  IN THE FILM  DR.STRANGELOVE

The film Dr.Strangelove  was based on  the serious book, RED ALERT, by Peter George. The director of the film Stanley Kubrick transformed the serious book into a black comedy that burlesqued the global  nuclear destruction and the typical American Cold War mentality.Kubrick  altered the message that the author  Peter George offered his  readers in the novel. In fact, Kubrick was struck by so  many paradoxes of US nuclear policies and strategies that he forced himself to alter the genre to convey his concerns effectively. Dr.Strangelove  is an anti- war film which shows the absurdity  of the nuclear war and  the basic male instinct of killing. Kubrick satirizes the anti-communist hysteria in the US during the period of the cold war and immature values of its leaders. This irrational paranoia led to the self –destructive and extremist policies.

The film represents a period of history.  The film can notbe understood unless the readers  know something about the political ideology of 1960’s.At the end of the 2^nd world war, America  emerged as a world  power and world powers  Britain and Germany were devastated by the war. America homeland was untouched by the  war, Germany the greatest enemy was defeated ,America found a new ideological enemy that would be able to compete with US for the world power. The  struggle of dominance  between these nations began as soon as the World War ended.  These started  piling up the weapons of  atomic bomb. This attitude  shaped the foreign policies of these two nations up to the extend that it was assumed that the third world war would be in atomic war. This conflict or the cold war dominated the foreign policy of these countries for almost fifty years.The next decade was marked by paranoia of nuclear war and anti-communist obsession.American  leaders and public were trying to put up a resistance against communism. Americans believed that the conflict  with Soviets was ideological and so in order to protect  the American way of life, they should struggle socially as well. The American  government propaganda against communism let people assume that communism was bad and communism also means a dictatorship which was against the democratic spirit of the American nation. Politician Averell Harriman said that in dealing with Russians ‘’ we might well have to face an ideological crusade just as vigorous and dangerous as Fascism and Nazism”(Clarfield   82) He compared the advance of the Soviets into Eastern Europe to, ‘’a barbarian invasion of Europe’’ (Clarfield 82). The Soviets were considered to be as dangerous and barbaric as Nazis, thus making them a thread to US power. Some politicians like Senator McCarthy capitalized on the anticommunist obsession in order to gain popularity. Even though the US was the most powerful country in the world,’’ the nation plunged into a crisis of fear. Frustratedin Korea and terrified by the Soviet bomb , many Americans vented their anger on domestic scapegoats who could be conveniently be blamed for the Soviet threat’’.( Clarfield and  Wiecek 143) The government used, ‘’a powerful confluence of federal ,state, and local agencies that were dedicated to finding , exposing and trying to suspect communists through the use of infiltration and informants.( Peterson and Moser) Paranoia of communism was so widespread that the government supported the outrageous violations of the constitution. The consequence of the paranoia was extremist policies built on the misunderstanding of communism. It was argued that Soviets were determined to destroy America and ultimately the US would fight ,’’to preserve our way of life’’. They ‘’replace the iron curtain with an open door.”(Clarfield and wiecek 138) The government believed that the US,’’ should develop all weapons necessary to thwart communist aggression. They brushed aside moral arguments as ‘’fool hardy  altruism’’. (Clarfield and W iecek 132).The government thought that communism was so bad that it was necessary to do anything to stop it ,even doing something immoral.A competitive arms race between the Soviet Union and the US began because each nation wanted to have an advantage in a potential conflict. If this conflict occurred ,it would lead to the destruction of the world due to the proliferation of more destructive nuclear weapons.

This conflict between America and Soviets was depicted well in the film Dr.Strangelove. General  Ripper, an Air Force base commander, orders a squadron of B-52 to drop a hydrogen bomb on Soviet Union’s military targets. He is the only one who knows the code to call off the mission.  At the pentagon, the US president speaks with the joint chiefs in the war room about the problem. General Turgidson sees this as an opportunity to completely destroy the, ’’Commie bastards’’ but the president is a pacifist and he invites the Russian ambassador into the war room. Together they call  the Russian prime minister and warn him about attack and also explain that it was unintentional. while talking on the phone the prime minister reveals the existence of their ‘’doomsday device’’ .These bombs would be automatically detonated in the case of a nuclear attack and it would also destroy  all the  plants and animal life on the earth. This device can not be neutralized. The whole world is kept oblivious of the device and its destruction. At the Air Force Base, an army unit permeates to arrest Gen .Ripper so the code can be asked, but he kills himself to avoid torture. Fortunately, his senior officer is able to deduce  the code ‘’OPE’’, written in his hand writing on the writing pad. The bombers respond to the code and return except one pilot  Major Kong whose radio has been damaged. In the war room, Dr.Strangelove, a disfigured ex-Nazi scientist,(name Strangelove was loosely based on the real man named Werner Von Braun whom the United States rehabilitated in order to know about the missile design)suggests a plan to save a few thousand Americans by hiding them in a deep mine shaft for 100 years until the radiation returns to a safe level. Finally, Major Kong who does not get the message of aborting mission, succeeds in dropping the bombs and the doomsday device is triggered, resulting in the destruction of the world.

The political ideology of America in 1950 and 1960 presented the obsession about communism. Most of the politicians did not have much understanding of communism and it result was the destructive policies of US. It is very much evident in the major characters of the movie. For example,General  AmericanTurgidson continually makes fun of communism and says they are stupid. Turgidson thinks that communists are not as good Americans. He says ‘’I’m beginning to smell a fat commie rat. Supposing Kissov is lying about the fourth plane, just looking for an excuse to clobber us………..The Russkie talks big but frankly ,we think he is short of know how. You just cant just expect a bunch of ignorant peons to understand a machine like some of our boys’’.

Then he also says ‘’ If we have done nothing to suppress their retaliatory capabilities , we will suffer virtual annihilation,…..if on the other hand, we were to immediately launch an all out and coordinated attack ……we ‘d stand a damn good chance of catching ‘em. We would therefore prevail, and suffer only modest and acceptable civilian casualties from their remaining force which would be badly damaged and uncoordinated.’’ So Turgidson was of the opinion that American civilian causalities would be acceptable if Russia was destroyed. He did not think about both America and Russia ,he wanted to destroy all of Russia even if some American  citizen were killed. Thus, he valued  the destruction of communism more than the innocent lives of American citizens.

The another main character General Jack Ripper was also did not have much knowledge about communism.He even  said ‘’on no account will a commie ever drink water……..water is the source of life….And as humans beings .you and I drink fresh water,……..pure water…..’’ He thought that communists did not drink water. Kubrick believed that the misinterpretation and hatred of communism which resulted in paranoia of Ripper led to the nuclear attack and then the annihilation of the world.

Arthur M. Schlesinger Jr. in his foreword to American History /American Film: Interpreting  the Hollywood Image (1979 ) recognized the relationship between films and their audiences. He noted that an audience was an active collaborator with film maker ,’’seizing from the film what it needs for its own purposes of tutelage and fantasy’’. This collaboration occurs when the audience recognize similarities between its world and the film maker’s celluloid world. So this film had a huge impact on the audience and critics both.  They gave mixed responses. The film made audience draw some comparisons between the characters and contemporary figures and sentiments. The deranged General Ripper(Sterling Hayden) who ordered the 843^rd bomb wing to attack the Soviet Union, represents conservative thinking of the 1950’s and early 1960’s that believed that an international communist conspiracy had insinuated American society. General Buck  Turgidson (George C. Scott) represented military commanders such as General Curtis LeMay, commander of the Strategic Air Command  and  exponent of utilization of nuclear weapons, and to stop the spread of communism. President MerkinMuffley (Peter Sellers ),  whose character was drawn from the appearance a liberal diplomat, Adlai Stevenson. He failed to prevent the disaster created by Ripper and suggested that US nuclear policies would only lead to destruction and war. Kubrick constructed the character of Dr. Strangelove also Pter Sellers to criticize certain members of the scientific community and man’s  in ability to control the technological progress.

Some audience laughed and also became worried about what they regarded as a  nuclear threat, others flouted at what they  regarded as anti-American propaganda. Newspapers such as the New York Times and magazines such as Commentary provided forums for the opinion of the critics, intellectuals and the public. Letters were printed that praised and criticized  Kubrick’s film. In a letter to the Times, a critic Lewis Mumford pointed out Kubrick’s criticism of the public’s ‘’cold war trance’’ Film critics debated the worth of the film which often centered on Kubrick ‘s political message rather than the motion picture’s artistic qualities. In 1978, Lawrence  Suid argued that Kubrick made film to ‘’warn nation about the possible dangers of the safeguard system’’ Suid also argued that Kubrick’s message was lost in the audience laughter, yet letters and reviews indicate that some audience members recognised the realism of the film. Another critic Margot  Henriksen,argued in her article Dr. Strangelove ‘s America :Society and Culture in the Atomic Age (1997), that Kubrick warned audience that,if they failed to challenge the cold war consensus, their fate would be same as President MerkinMuffley’s

In his essay ‘’ American Historical Review’’ John E. Conner, examined the use  films as a historical  documents. He proposed that the historian should attempt to ‘’understand how a film represents or interprets history’’ ,to confirm theories about ‘’ then current social and cultural values’’, to uncover ‘’factual data not otherwise available’’, and trace the history of film and television. He suggested that in order to understand a film’s contemporary impact , a historian must understand the audience experience .This experience can be understood through the study of ‘’other films current at that time, the novels ,the news, and magazines stories and other social or cultural influence that may have oriented the viewer at some specific place and time in the past to respond to the film in one way or the other.’’ So Dr. Strangelove represented and interpreted the contemporary events and the way in which Kubrick reflected and challenged contemporary values and beliefs.

Some Americans accepted Kubrick’s warning of the nuclear destruction. Initially, the film became a reference to 1964 Republican presidential nominee Barry Gold water, who appeared willing to wage nuclear war to halt the spread of communism. Dr. Strangelove became an icon for those who questioned the nation’s cold war policies .By the early 1980’s Dr. Strangelove  had become a point of reference for the historians , journalists, and politicians. So the American political ideology was very evident in the film.

                                               WORK CITED

1.Stanley Kubrick, How I learned to stop worrying and love the cinema, ‘’Films and Filming 9 (June 1963): 12-13 Peter Bryant, Red Alert (New York: Ace Books , 1958)

2. Kubrick, ‘’How I learned’’ 12.

3. Gene D. Phillips, ed., Kubrick, How I learned ,” 12-13.

4. Lewis Mumford, Strangelove Reactions,’’ New York Times, 1 March 1964, sec.2 , p.8.

5. Lawrence Suid ,’’ The Pentagon Conformity: Dr. Strangelove American History/American Film: Interpreting the Hollywood Images ,eds.

6. John E. O’ Connor, ‘’History in Images /Images in History: Reflections on the importance of film and Television Study for an understanding of the past. ‘’American Historical Review 93 (December 1988).