Historical or Just Plain Violent? The Dominant Effect of The Baader Meinhof Complex

Uli Edel’s 2008 German film, The Baader Meinhof Complex (Der Baader Meinhof Komplex) has often been criticised for its violent action movie form. The film contains much of the history of the Baader-Meinhof gang, from their inception to their deaths. However, without researching beforehand, it is very easy for the audience to become lost in the story.

Despite this, even if someone was to go into the film completely ignorant of the history and true story it tells, The Baader Meinhof Complex is sure to be an entertaining cinematic experience. Like any other typical Hollywood action movie, there is plenty of explosions, fan service and cool, gutsy characters however the narrative itself is long, complicated and in danger of being forgettable or misunderstood. When dealing with a serious and important historical topic, especially that of terrorism, a dangerous crime practice which continues to proliferate today, it is essential that it is represented in an informative and above all, memorable fashion. This article will explore the nature of the film’s form and its genre features in order to assess whether it producing the wrong effect for the audience. It will look to assess whether it succeeds in memorialising this true story of terror or if it simply works to preoccupy the human mind with gratuitous and visceral violence.

While it was a German film, The Baader Meinhof Complex was popular worldwide after being nominated for Best Foreign Language Film at the 81st Academy Awards and also for the Best Foreign Language Film at the Golden Globes. It was met with many favourable reviews in important Western publications such as The New York Times, The Hollywood Reporter and Vanity Fair. While it can be argued that Hollywood is a vast industry, home to many different kinds of films, all individual films can be put into a particular genre or even several genres at once. According to Bordwell and Thompson, “The term [norm] implies a standard of craft competence, along with dimension of collective decision-making. Norms are preferred alternatives within a tradition…sometimes filmmakers act in awareness of norms. More than other national cinemas,  Hollywood has developed some fairly explicit rules for how stories can be told effectively.” (Bordwell, D & Thompson, K 2011, p.113) In many senses, no film can really operate outside of the genre system. No film can truly be genreless or completely independent from the invisible rules that come along with it. It is not always the case that these norms constrict the filmmaker but they can limit how a text can be read. If a film is a romance, the audience reads it as a romance, bringing with them a set of assumptions and expectations. For The Baader Meinhof Complex, while it is historical in the sense that it tells a true story, its action film form is the dominant genre and lens for viewing. This fact becomes problematic considering that the subject nature is dark, serious and above all things, real. 

Danchev says that “The ethical and political temper of the times can change, making possible or thinkable what was previously impossible or unthinkable- part of the fascination of the present conjuncture. The war on terror, however, raises in acute form the problems of show and tell. What images to show? What stories to tell? What idiom to employ- feature film or documentary, the dramatic or the analytic?” (Danchev, A 2009, p.198) While the film does not address the ‘war on terror’, it explores terrorism all the same. When reading the above considerations in relation to The Baader Meinhof Complex, it is important to ask whether a film about terrorists should be made into an entertaining film. While entertaining movies are always going to sell, making this subject ‘entertaining’ and ‘exciting’ is dangerous as it can trivialise the former. Danchev ponders “If the struggle of man against power is the struggle of memory against forgetting [it] is the struggle of revelation against suppression. That phase is now over. The struggle against suppression has been won...the [images] are in the public domain. It is true that there are some we have not yet seen, but in essence the contents of this extraordinary archive has been disgorged, or downloaded, on the computers of the world.” (Danchev, A, p. 204) In other words, in the film industry, no subject is off limits, nothing is sacred, all can be accessed, twisted and shaped to meet many different purposes. 

In the entertainment industry, violence has always captured the interest of viewers. Obviously, while not every single person enjoys violence as entertainment, it has remained a bestseller for a very long time. In the early stages of the film industry, where moving image was used more to create popular spectacle rather than as a device for storytelling, replicating horror in a lifelike way was a huge break through. According to Schechter, “No sooner had the motion picture camera been invented than pioneering filmmakers figured out a way to make it perform shockingly violent optical tricks...to perceive- and exploit-this particular feature of the motion picture camera: i.e., its unique ability to produce startlingly lifelike images of people being chopped to pieces.” (Schechter, H 2005, p.113) The film which he first speaks of is The Execution of Mary Queen of Scots, a half a minute short film made by Thomas Edison showing Mary having her head ‘realistically’ hacked off. Why would anyone find this entertaining? For the same reason that people of Ancient Rome flocked to watch fights in the Colosseum and why people overtime gathered to see public hangings and witch trials; humans have been conditioned to be entertained by violence for centuries. 

Schechter analyses how the tales of Edgar Allan Poe and the Grimm’s fairy tales worked to sate the human desire to feel and experience the destruction of others.“The great literature offers something besides Beauty and Truth- that it also provides an escape into realms of forbidden experience...which reveled in the horrible rendings of human flesh, blood, and strange sex or sexless relations of the heroes and heroines… Poe himself was fully aware of the popular appeal of the horrific.” He highlights that these desires are only natural, especially since the laws of civilised society bar people from acting out their bloodlust without significant punishment. However, through fiction, it can almost feel as though we are doing what is forbidden without any real blood on our hands. Schechter emphasises that it is “...humanity’s innate endowment of aggression and cruelty- an instinctual inheritance from our bloodthirsty tendencies, for what Henry James’s brother, William, called ‘our aboriginal capacity for murderous excitement.’ After all, as a species we’ve been ‘civilised’ for only a few millennia, compared to the many millions of years we existed as savage hominids who lived by hunting and slaughter.” (Schechter, H 2005, p. 6-9) 

Portraying violence on the big screen however was important to be felt as well as seen. Like the evocative words of Poe, the camera can be used in all sorts of ways to immerse the viewer. Movie director, Ron Satlof recalls working with Don Siegel on the action classic, Charley Varrick (173). “When a guy took a punch and fell, Don would have him fall towards the camera rather than away from it. You didn’t really see a hundred percent of what happened but you felt the impact.”(Taylor, T 2015, p. 152) In The Baader Meinhof Complex, a scene that was highly visceral and outrageous in a similar way is when the German student movement were protesting the visit of the Shah of Iran to West Berlin. As the West Berlin police force and the Shah’s security attack the unarmed protesters, complete chaos ensues. While the scene has an obvious political nature, it serves more highly as spectacle commonly found in an action film. It follows a very similar construction to the famous airport panic scene in Die Hard 2 (1990) “Similarly, in the film’s final act, crowds of people inside the terminal learn that the airport is under siege, and riot. They run, scream, and crash through glass partitions- a fitting climax for the beginning of a new action film model, one that would factor into the coming renaissance of the disaster film” says Lichtenfeld about the striking scene. “In these trends, reactions to destruction are as persuasive as destruction itself. With the rioters of Die Hard 2, even response to spectacle is spectacle.” (Lichtenfeld, E 2007, p. 168) Thus, while the scene is pivotal to the story of the Baader-Meinhof gang, as the student killed in the uproar inspires and instigates their actions, the scene is gratuitous, claustrophobic, full of panic and powerful however, what exactly is this power doing? People are scared of danger but only if it is in close proximity to them. This feeling changes however if you learn about the situation and its effects. As the protest incident happened in what Americans would call a ‘foreign country’, the audience do not fully care. They can sympathise but not truly empathise that is unless they are educated to care. Education and knowledge brings a situation closer to home in many ways. While some movies can really strike a chord in the viewers to remember and reflect on a significant event, the fact that this film is an action movie pushes the story deep into the realm of fiction. Rather than representing a real historical event, this scene, like what can be said of the scene from Die Hard 2 primarily functions to immerse the viewers into a fantastic but rather contrived sense of danger and havoc. A sense that can be witnessed with a sense of safety, that the audience is watching from a safe distance as one may go and watch a dramatisation of Shakespeare’s Macbeth. While it is bloody, coarse and even frightening, everybody in the audience knows it is fiction. Similarly, even though the scene from The Baader Meinhof Complex is to an extent real because it actually happened, the very cinematic construction renders it false and even typically generic. 

Stemming from the innate human desire for violent entertainment, ‘Villains’ are increasingly loved within popular culture. While heroes are strong and brave, they work to assist the law, work for justice and uphold good values, a villain is also powerful and bold and serves nobody or nothing else other than his or her own desires. This freedom from what is morally and societally acceptable and right is refreshing for viewers. Just as almost every narrative needs a hero, the story would go nowhere without a villain, disrupting the peace and challenging normality. Even though good must conquer evil in the end so order can be restored, the villain’s defeat does not lessen or take away the impact and feeling the audience gets from watching what they did. There are many examples of this occurring in popular Hollywood film franchises. While Batman is incredibly popular, the fandom behind The Joker is practically just as great, insuring that Suicide Squad (2016) would be a massive box office hit. While people get the time to know the hero’s story, the villain’s story is often left in the darkness, perhaps where it belongs. This lack of answers however makes audiences all the more curious. For example, the Spiderman film franchise made a movie that explores Venom (2018), one of the most loved villains also known as the black Spiderman (a second movie has been scheduled to come out in 2021). So why do we love villains? While heroes are obviously popular, what they stand for in a way what is stopping humanity from showing and embracing its carnal side. Due to this cultural phenomena, films such as The Silence of the Lambs (1991) were incredibly successful as they play off the idea of the criminal celebrity. Hannibal Lecter, who was based off a real serial killer was portrayed as almost superhuman. While his crimes were utterly barbaric, he was incredibly intelligent. According to Rubin however, “The Sniper (1952) is perhaps the first Hollywood film to attempt to deal seriously with a serial killer on a clinical level, regarding him not as an embodiment of abstract evil but as a problem to be examined and understood...a disturbed young man who expresses his mother motivated hatred of women by picking them off with a long-range rifle.”(Rubin, M 1999, p.43) 

There was a great need for films like this as the audience’s fascination with criminals and killers begs for their origin stories. Not every killer is a genius psychopath and no human is simply evil; every person is influenced by their individual contexts and upbringings. While news coverage of the criminal can stop at defining the person being evil or sick, a feature film which turns that person into a character can do so much more. Simply seeing them being portrayed by a living, breathing actor automatically humanises the criminal, allowing us to empathise with even the worst of the worst. This process is however highly questionable. If a person has done something terrible, should they be given a voice through popular cinematic representation? This however makes the story that more intriguing, as if the viewer is accessing something limited, repressed or even taboo. A perfect example of this was the Lolita films based on Vladimir Nobokov’s scandalous novel. While the audience is well aware that the main character, Humbert is a criminal of the worst kind, a child sex offender, it is almost impossible not to like him, laugh, smile and cry with him. The Baader Mienhof Complex deals with the members of the gang, especially Ulrike Meinhof in the same way. They made sacrifices and tough decisions. They had family and homes they left behind. While some may assert that The Baader Meinhof Complex tries to glamourise criminals, villains of society and make them into heroes, I believe the opposite is happening. Rather than trying to make heroes out of them, the film makes them all the more likeable by not denying their ‘villain’ status. 

Villains in their badness possess a dangerous quality of coolness and confidence that heroes can never exude. Newitz highlights that “For Americans, serial killers like Henry Lee Lucas and Ted Bundy are media celebrities. This is so widely known, and so generally condemned...the promotion and popularisation of charismatic young Americans who murder people and commit other violent crimes.” (Newitz, A 1999, p. 65) While it is wrong, there is something really attractive and exciting about criminals. Also, unlike many of the people in the audience and what could be called everyday heroes who use words and act on more of a grassroots level to achieve their goals, villains act out, and in a big way. Specifically in terms of the Baader Meinhoff gang, they did not sit at home and detest the political injustice they believed was going on, they acted in order to instigate and bring about a change on a large and noticeable scale. According to Kauffman,“Terrorism is inside us all- not just individuals, but nations. As Nazis demonstrated, this means the State can readily become ruthless as those it pursues. Indeed, by the time of Baader-Meinhof’s trail, public perception had shifted drastically: people felt that the Federal Court had become as lawless as those it sought to punish- literally a terrorist.” (Kauffman, L 2010, p. 25) Thus, because their enemy was prepared to fight, they too needed to make their move. In addition, the fact that the Baader-Meinhof gang were ‘doers’ and felt the need to physically bring about change through extreme action makes them perfectly compatible to the action movie genre. Whether it is Die Hard’s John McClane or Taken’s Bryan Mills, lead characters in action films do not sit back and let the world pass them by. Thanks to the cultural myths that ‘actions speak louder than words’, that ‘talk is cheap’ and that one must ‘walk the walk’ if they are going to ‘talk the talk’, doers are likeable, ideal and culturally ingrained. Even if the person’s goals are wrong or harmful, there is still something very admirable about those who are not afraid to act out and practically go after what they want and believe in. Again however, this kind of character is an ideal and strongly associated with fiction thus the Baader-Meinhof gang’s representation as these kind of people is trivialised in the sense that it is all too familiar to made up people and their stories.

In conclusion, The Baader Meinhof Complex (Der Baader Meinhof Komplex) has often been criticised for its violent action movie form and rightfully so. While the film does in fact contain a lot of the history surrounding the Baader-Meinhof gang, from their inception to their deaths, there are too many genre components that distract from it. Being an action film, it is great for escapism and entertainment. If the viewer does not enter the film without researching the true story beforehand, the complicated narrative can be lost track of very quickly. The Baader Meinhof Complex in many ways is just like any other typical Hollywood action movie. It is familiar and approachable, making it easy to watch. However, because of its multitude of explosions, fanservice and cool, gutsy characters, the subject matter is pulled into the realm of fiction. Rather than turning the terrorists into heroes in the film, their villain status is played off, a status with it’s badness and unlimited freedom that can be even more appealing than the world’s most loved heroes. Viewers are able to revel in the havoc and have their most innate carnal desires sated by witnessing and feeling this extraordinary violence but any tone of memorial and remembrance is completely lacking. Like other action films, narrative becomes secondary to it’s style and effect. When dealing with a serious and important historical topic, especially that of terrorism, a dangerous crime practice which continues to proliferate today, it is essential that it is represented in an informative and above all, memorable fashion. Clearly, it has failed in doing so and simply offers to preoccupy the human mind with gratuitous and visceral violence.

References

Bordwell, D. & Thompson, K. (2011), Minding Movies: Observations on the Art, Craft, and Business of Filmmaking, The University of Chicago Press, Chicago, London

Danchev, A. (2009), ‘It’s All Fucked Up, or, The Non-Fiction Horror Movie: The Cinema and the War on Terror’, On Art and War and Terror, Edinburgh University Press, Edinburgh, United Kingdom

Kauffman, L. (2010), ‘The Wake of Terror: Don DeLillo’s “In The Ruins of The Future,” “Baader-Meinhof,” and Falling Man’, Terrorism, Media and the Ethics of Fiction, The Continuum International Publishing Group, New York, London

King. & McCaughey. (2001), Reel Knockouts: Violent Women in the Movies, University of Texas Press, Austin

Lehman, K. (2011), ‘Courting Danger: Single Women and Sexual Aggression in 1970s Film’, Those Girls: Single Women in Sixties and Seventies Popular Culture, University Press of Kansas, USA

Lichtenfeld, E. (2007), Action Speaks Louder, Wesleyan University Press, Middletown, Connecticut

Newitz, A. (1999), ‘Serial Killers, True Crime, and Economic Performance Anxiety’, Mythologies of Violence in Postmodern Media, Wayne State University Press, Detroit

Rich, R. (1993), ‘From Repressive Tolerance to Erotic Liberation: Girls in Uniform’, Gender and German Cinema: Feminist Interventions Volume II: German Film History/ German History On Film, Berg Publishers, Inc., Providence, Oxford

Rubin, M. (1999), ‘The Grayness of Darkness: The Honeymoon Killers and It’s Impact on Psychokiller Cinema’, Mythologies of Violence in Postmodern Media, Wayne State University Press, Detroit

Schechter, H. (2005), Savage Pastimes: A Cultural History of Violent Entertainment, St. Martin’s Press, New York

Taylor, T. (2015), Masters of the Shoot-’Em-Up: Conversations with Directors, Actors and Writers of Vintage Action Movies and Television Shows, McFarland & Company, Inc., Jefferson, North Carolina

Corrupting Modernity in Metropolis

Fritz Lang’s German expressionist science fiction film Metropolis 1927 conveys the catastrophic consequences of modernisation on the world. Rather than helping to improve the quality of people’s lives, technology and new ways of thinking are portrayed as having a dangerous corruptive power. As the God-like control over the city shifts silently from humans to the machines, dehumanisation occurs on all levels of society.

The harrowing effects of modernity are evident in the beginning of the film where the two classes are introduced. The film opens with a montage of turning cogs and machinery. The shots fade between each other and begin to overlap as the music crescendos. This emphasises their domination and visually expresses their suffocating power. The camera cuts to two clocks on the wall. The larger clock’s seconds hand ticks faster than normal, highlighting the forceful persistence of time in the modern world. The clock is an example of technology taking control. While it was originally an invention made for human use at their convenience, it acts almost like a drill sergeant for the workers as they must act according to the measured schedule down to the last second. When the hours hand reaches the 10th hour, the camera cuts to a mid shot of chimney like pipes that expel smoke. Outside, no sky or ground is visible as the background is completely filled with plain rectilinear skyscrapers, symbolising the domination of manmade goods over the natural world as well as its creators. While the “city is a symbol of modernisation” (Lloyd, J. (1991)), these modern developments are far from progressive for humans thus, the city of Metropolis becomes “…the ultimate expression of the idea that human society is being sucked into its own developments”(Trutman, J. (2005)). The camera cuts to a text frame reading ‘shift change’. The objectivity and abruptness of the words fit with the unthinking regimented workers displayed in the following scene. The next frame is divided in two by the thin wall separating the elevators. On the left are the finished workers and on the right are the workers about to assume labour. As the gates of the elevators rise simultaneously, the workers all remain in static lines. As the march, the men move at a slow pace and have their heads hung low, suggesting the work has drained their life energy. All dressed in the same black uniforms and using the same foot while walking, the workers appear to be identical “anonymous creatures of labour” (Eiser, L. (1997). As the two groups move past one another, even when viewed from different angles, they look like mirror images of one another, highlighting their lack of individuality. As they descend down to the city of the workers, their heads remain low. They travel past dark walls until they reach a space filled with tall plain rectangular buildings, lit by harsh fluorescent lights. The City of the Workers symbolises Hell, an Underground world separated from the Earth where its inhabitants must endure eternal hardship.

In sharp contrast to the Hell like workers world, ‘The Son’s Club’, the place where the thinker’s sons reside is portrayed as opulent and idealistic. In a text frame, it is introduced as a place that “[towered] high above… with its lecture halls and libraries, its theatres and stadiums”. The accumulation of resources makes it seem similar to a perfect high-end university. The first shot we see of it meets this expectation. The stadium is a wide-open space. The group of young men on the grounds move freely and enthusiastically, juxtaposing with the zombie-like workers. The sky that is visible at the top of the frame is the first appearance of the natural world in the film. Despite first impressions, this place is a prison just like the underground city. While the sky is visible above, it is grey and consumed by clouds, functioning as the calm before the storm. The majority of the frame is filled with manmade architecture that towers over the tiny figures in “…what Kracauer calls ‘The complete triumph of the ornamental [or monumental design] over the human’” (McElhaney, J. (2015)) A high concrete wall, topped with statues of athletic human forms enclose the sons. The statues are an expression of man’s desire to not replicate humanity but humanity’s idealised image of themselves. This foreshadows the making of the robot in order to serve super-human purposes. The building on the left side of the frame that joins with the wall is covered with many black windows, suggested that the young men are possibly under surveillance by an unseen jailer. The running race appears to be light-hearted and unorganised; they run at different paces, are shown with animated expressions while they run and a non-participant of the contest jokingly passes through the finish to claim victory. When they initially crouch down, in a mid shot, they form a rectilinear line. The camera on a diagonal shows the men facing towards the same direction in concentration. Despite the casual nature of the activity, there is a sense of uniformity and organisation similar to that of the workers. The fact that Freder, the son of Metropolis’ leader initiates the race suggests that while being apart from the adults, they are still under the control of the same leadership.

The Pleasure Garden depicts the morally corruptive and dangerous effects of modernity on the wealthy. In the opening shot of the garden, many women gather towards an older man in a suit. They each wear very elaborate and modern haute couture clothing highlighting the growing emphasis on materialism in the modernising world. The women’s faces are not at first visible and they emerge into the frame in response to the man clapping his hands, suggesting that modern fashion expectations are having a subordinating effect on women. In a midshot, we see the man directing them while they walk around with blank glazed expressions like dolls or high fashion models on a runway.

The stylistic, thick and twisted trees are reminiscent of modern avant garde art highlighting the artificial nature of the façade. The sky cannot be seen from the thick canopy of vines reinforcing the notion of the garden as a prison. Ironically, whilst plants are known to produce oxygen, the ones growing in the pleasure garden appear to suffocate the space, suggesting that the growing fascination with art and manmade imitations of nature leads to a lack of regard for natural beauty. Like the field, it has a quasi-utopic quality however, it is a space completely segregated from reality. In this scene, the edges of the frame are fringed with smoky clouds, giving it a dream-like quality. While the son’s appear wide awake, they have the same lack of consciousness as the workers with their head hung low and who seemingly sleep walking through their lives. With this unconsciousness comes a chilling unawareness of the truth as each class through their “…fragmentation and alienation…” (Lloyd, J. (1991)) are conditioned to believe their microcosmic environments are the world.

In the film, the powerful figure of the robot highlights the domination of modern manmade innovations over their human creators. As Rotwang introduces the robot, he calls her a recreation of his lost love Hel and asks, “Would you like to see her?” By referring to it as a living being and equalising it to a person of special emotional importance, Rotwang highlights humanity’s tendency to see image as reality; if it displays human-like qualities it should be regarded as living. Rather than wanting to create humans “in his image” as the Christian God did in the Bible, Rotwang creates the robot as a way to fulfil man’s desire to bringing to life their idea of the perfect person. In his declaration of creating “the man of the future, the Machine-Man”, he highlights that despite the robot’s human appearance, it will be without specific human faults such as emotion. Consequently, it could be used to fulfil tasks that satisfy the needs of modern society such as cost efficiency, accuracy and speed. In the process of making the robot, Rotwang lost his right arm. This functions as a symbol of “the destruction of humanity by its own technology”(Trutman, J. (2005)). In addition, it characterises “Rotwang, the Father of robots as half mechanical himself” a cyborg. In this respect, the inventor is dehumanised. While creating something to be like a human, ironically, the creator literally becomes more machine-like. The fact that his robot part was what made the creation calls into question whether power of mankind’s “technological future…escapes human control entirely” (McElhaney, J. (2015)) and had been in the hands of the machines all along.

In the film, ethics regarding robotics becomes a central concern. In the growingly technological modernising world, when the machines are matching and even exceeding human capabilities, the dangerous complications that could rise from creating artificial intelligence and granting them human form are explored. While the robot is a piece of technology, it seems to have a unique power because it has been given a human face. In the scene where the robot is given the likeness of Maria, the electricity bursts through the wires and flashes white against the dark room, functioning as the light of life. In a close up of the robot’s face, the lights flash until it magically appears as Maria. Her dark outlined eyes highlight that the robot has become the real Maria’s dark double or doppelgänger (double goer), which are “…considered as omens of bad luck or even signs of impending death…” (Holloway,A. (2014)) in folklore. Despite being dressed the same, later in Fredersen’s office; the robot is clearly Maria’s opposite. Her body language is suggestive and she winks and displays “The single eye, or the eye of Providence [which] originates in Egypt with the eye of Horus. In conspiracy theory lore, it represents allegiance to Satan and the Illuminati.”(Illuminatirex, (2014)) As well as being completely different from Maria, the robot behaves nothing like it did without a human likeness. The metal armored robot made slow careful movements and appeared to be completely obedient to her creator. This fact raises the question whether the process of bestowing a human form to the machine acted like a curse, inciting evil behaviour or whether the true will of all machines lays undetected until they are given the means to exercise it. While artificial intelligence and man creating manlike machines is an aspiration in modern technological development, this process involves humans going against natural and religious law by obtaining the god-like power to create life. For this, the punishing consequences could lead to their demise.

In Metropolis, the spread of modernisation through technical innovation runs parallel to the increase of oppression. While Rotwang intends to have the robot “…destroy Jon Fredersen- him and his city and his son”, it becomes a scapegoat figure for Fredersen to manipulate. While he uses the robot to ignite anarchy in the workers for the purpose of justifying his use of force against them, the robot also is framed to be the cause of all the issues caused by Metropolis’ leader and the oppressive world of the city he created. In the dimly lit lab, “The lighting is focused on the robot, causing its metallic surface to shimmer… a great deal of emphasis is placed on this fantastic artificial creation.”(Trutman, J. (2005)) The robot appears to be the perfect anthropomorphic embodiment of modern machine innovation however, the occult references surrounding it and the creation process leads viewers and the people in the film not to see it as the same sort of technology as the machine city is. In the scene where Rotwang is introducing the robot to Fredersen, above its head is an inverted pentagram. “If the upright pentagram represents healing, mathematical perfection and the five elements, the inverted pentagram stands for the corruption of those principles and black magic.” (Vigilant Citizen (2010)) In addition, the three figures form a pyramid of power. The robot’s chair is upon a platform, placing it higher than the two humans. This acts as a visual metaphor for the domination of the machine over the people that think themselves as its controller. In an occult sense, “the three sides of a triangle represent the number 3… a number of the divine, showing the union of male and female that create a third being. It’s the number of manifestation; to make something happen.”(Illuminati Watcher. (2015)) This phenomenon of a third being is evident in the robot. Externally, its body is armor-like, historically alluding to the masculine figure of the knight in shining armor while at the same time; it has a shapely feminine figure. Internally, it is “inwardly calculating like a man” (Sinclair, A. (1973)) but also possesses the knowledge of how to use feminine sexual cues to entice men. This feature emphasizes the robot as not a piece of technology but as a demonic entity for the purpose of destruction. The exterior of Rotwang’s lab resembles a dilapidated medieval cottage in order to “…add a bit of ‘medieval magic’ to this robot’s creation” (Jenkins, S (1981)). The sharp juxtaposition between the architectural style of the lab and the rest of the city works to characterize the robot not as another piece of powerful technology part of the city. Rather, it appears as an invading outside force, product of ancient, forbidden arts rather than of new scientific innovation.

By corrupting morality, modernity in the form of technology can have a dehumanising effect on society. In the dance scene, the robot performs a series of purposeful and constructed movements, each with a planned erotic appeal. Interestingly, her performance has the same effect on each male member of the audience. As they watch her, they all lean forward, stare and grab each other’s shoulders in disbelief. In a shot, many clips of the men’s eyes overlap and combine to form a ghostly collage. This use of synecdoche shows the men lose their human forms and reduce them to a sea of eyes. This acts as a visual metaphor for their lack of identity and power. When she is suspended on the podium, dressed like the Babylon and surrounded by the seven deadly sins, all of the men jump and reach up to her together. Their identical reactions suggest that the robot possesses knowledge of the computer like ‘programing’ of a human male. It warns the audience against becoming too fascinated with the technology that comes with modernization as it can indeed make humans more machine like. By displaying her as “the Great Harlot Babylon of the Book of Revelation” (Vigilant Citizen (2010)), Fredersen is again able to reinforce the connection between the robot and unholy destruction. In the ending, the robot is sacrificed and burned on a stake like a witch. The killing method highlights that she is an ancient dark magical force rather than modern world technology gone wrong. In this way, the city of Metropolis is exempt from demonization. The film “…opts in the end for class reconciliation rather than struggle” (Grant, B. (2013)). When the robot is gone, there is the illusion of peace. While the city is without the destructive robot, the oppressive circumstances enforced upon the workers still remains the same. In the scene where the hands and head are joined by the heart, a staged reconciliation takes place where “…the industrialist acknowledges the heart for the purpose of manipulating it.” (Sinclair, A. (1973)) The worker’s representative is one of Fredersen’s ex-spies and the great mediator is the impressionable son of Fredersen. The ideology makes Metropolis “…not just a German film. It is…all of official Germany as we know it and experience it everyday on our own hides.”(McGilligan, P. 1997)) The group of workers watching the exchange marched into place in their uniform lines like from the beginning of the film, highlighting the nothing has changed and how there are no improvements. The “anti-humanist anti-democratic perspective was…embelm[atic] for the tragic inadequacies of the Weimar Republic in the face of imminent fascism.” (Elsaesser, T. (2012)) The ending highlights that in the modernising world; technology can allow greater tyranny in the guise of progressive hope for the future as the seemingly defeated leader actually tightened their grip on power.

Therefore, Metropolis conveys the horrific consequences of modernisation on the world. As a result of technology and new ways of thinking, dehumanisation occurs on all levels of society, oppression becomes greater and machines continue to become a growing threat to humanity’s existence as they become the real controllers of society.

References

Books:

Eisner, L. (1977), Fritz Lang, Oxford University Press, New York

Elsaesser, T. (2012), Metropolis, Palgrave Macmillan, London

Grant, B. (2013), 100 Science Fiction Films, Palgrave Macmillan, London

Jenkins, S. (1981), Fritz Lang: The Image and the Look, British Film Institute, London

Lloyd, J. (1991), German Expressionism: Primitivism and Modernity, Yale University Press, New Haven & London

McElhaney, J. (2015), A Companion to Fritz Lang, John Wiley & Sons Ltd., West Sussex

McGilligan, P. (1997), Fritz Lang: The Nature of the Beast, St. Martin’s Press, New York

Neumann, D. (1996), Film Architecture: Set Designs from Metropolis to Blade Runner, Prestel, Munich & New York

Sinclair, A. (1973), Metropolis: A Film by Fritz Lang, Lorrimer Publishing Limited, Great Britain, Letchworth, Hertfordshire

Trutman, J. (2005), Fritz Lang’s Metropolis And Its Influence On the American Science Fiction Film: Blade Runner, Terminator I + II, Die Blane Eule, Germany

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Self Discovery and the Flow of Thought in To the Lighthouse

Virginia Woolf’s 1927 novel, To the Lighthouse is heavily concerned with the uniqueness of the individual’s human nature. Using the revolutionary modernist style of writing, the stream of consciousness; Woolf emphasises the complexity of perception and the importance for the even coexistence of masculinity and femininity in individual psyches and within relationships.

Despite their differences, all of the characters are tied together based on their common desire, to find meaning in their lives through finding and making sense of their place in the world. However, each character due to their varying attitudes and beliefs, each strive towards fulfilment introspectively, identifying with either male objectivity or female subjectivity. Due to the conflict between the approaches and uneven distribution of gendered power, the household becomes dysfunctional and frozen in time, disabling the characters to continue on their journey of life. Their experience becomes fluid, and their preverbal paths are far from being a linear. 

The main female characters in To the Lighthouse try to preserve time in order to find meaning in their lives. Mrs. Ramsay is described as being “still like a tree”. The simile emphasises her desire to stop the changes that come with time by becoming rooted to the ground like a plant, reluctant to move forward. This is also evident in the length of the first section: ‘The Window’ which is largely dominated by her psychological presence. This part stretches out one day so it lasts for close to half of the novel just as Mrs. Ramsay attempts to prolong the continuation of time. Using Victorian social convention, Mrs. Ramsay like an artist attempts to create a fixed moment of order and peace in order to gain fulfillment. Her dinner party is used in order to be “…like a ruby…the thing…made that endures.” The simile comparing the guests to an unchanging ruby highlights how Mrs. Ramsay tries to render her company into a beautiful inanimate object, unable to change or lose its splendor. Lily attempts to do a similar thing with her painting. Despite Lily’s assumption of the painting being overlooked; “…hung in the attics, she thought; it would be destroyed…” the painting is a way in which to control time, through manifesting past moments into an unchanging physical representation.

Mrs. Ramsay’s tendency to indulge her children’s fantasies with lies leads them to resent their father, and the family being heavily dominated by matriarchal power. This gender imbalance causes the household to become dysfunctional. As one would fear a beast, she fears her children becoming adults and metaphorically“…grow(ing) up into long-legged monsters”.  In order to assert power over the family, she attempts to shield the children from the inevitable truths, especially the certainty of death. Mrs. Ramsay wraps her green shawl around the pig’s skull and tells Cam “rhythmically…how it was like a mountain, a bird’s nest, a garden… (with)…little antelopes…everything lovely.” The fact that the shawl is green makes it a symbol of life. The cataloguing of similes comparing the skull to “everything lovely” highlights Mrs. Ramsay’s attempt to censor her children from the reality of death, represented by the skull. Her protectiveness of childhood innocence is indicative of Victorian female sensibility. In contrast, Mr. Ramsay always is truthful, at times making him appear cold-hearted and cruel. Mrs. Ramsay often lied to her children about going to the lighthouse: “‘Yes, of course, if it’s fine to-morrow.’” Her remark is seemingly a straightforward “yes” however is contradictory. She begins with a simple affirmative “yes”, that is then compounded with “of course” to highlight certainty, but then becomes conditional with reliance on the weather. Mr. Ramsay, being “incapable of untruth…” confirms “it won’t be fine”. His directness highlights his honesty, an essential quality to maintain familial peace.

Mrs. Ramsay’s tendency to conserve time through attempting to eternalise the youth of her children through lies abruptly ends with her death. The second section, ‘time passes’ condenses 10 years into around 20 pages, as if to compensate for Mrs. Ramsay’s abnormal prolonging of the single day in ‘the window’. Without her presence, the characters are all able to move forward in their lives and find a sense of meaning through seeing masculine and feminine qualities both need to be present in relationships in order to maintain balance. When Cam, James and Mr. Ramsay arrive at the lighthouse, he wonders: “So this is the Lighthouse, was it?” The rhetorical question highlights his surprise when the Lighthouse is an ordinary structure and nothing like the quasi-magical building he dreamed about as a child. However, he comes to a conclusion that “…the other was also the Lighthouse. For nothing was simply one thing.” Through James acknowledging both the objective and subjective experience, he realises both masculinity and femininity are of value and together they form a lens in which to see the truth. In Lily's painting, a tree is in the centre, extending the tree symbolism associated with Mrs. Ramsay. However, in order to achieve “her vision”, she drew “a line…in the centre” representing Mr. Ramsay who is tall and “lean as aknife.” This finishing touch emphasises Lily’s discovery of the importance of both the male and female in her personality and in society in order to achieve stability.

In conclusion, Virginia Woolf’s 1927 novel, To the Lighthouse is heavily concerned with the uniqueness of the individual’s human nature. Using the revolutionary modernist style of writing, the stream of consciousness; Woolf emphasises the complexity of perception.  Despite their differences, all of the characters are tied together based on their common desire, to find meaning in their lives through finding and making sense of their place in the world. However, each character due to their varying attitudes and beliefs, each strive towards fulfillment introspectively, identifying with either male objectivity or female subjectivity. The tension between the approaches makes their journey fluid, and far from being a linear experience. It is only through fusing of gendered views so that masculinity and femininity co-exist in a state of equilibrium that the characters find peace with themselves and others.