Gyroscopic Investing

Xan wrote: It was far and away the most disturbingly violent movie I have ever seen.

Xan wrote: heh, actually yes, and fortunately it didn't steal my love of Beethoven.  But I do think Hunger Games is more violent.  Children breaking each other's necks?  No thanks.

Xan wrote: It was far and away the most disturbingly violent movie I have ever seen.  It was despicably awful.  Never going near it again.

jackh wrote: The point about the violence is well taken but I think the violence is central to the theme of the movie and I don't know how you could tell the story without it. I think they did the best job they could without being too gratuitous about it.

Simonjester wrote: i haven't seen the movie or read the book either, this review takes a interesting (if somewhat "out there") view of the underlying message http://vigilantcitizen.com/moviesandtv/the-hunger-games-a-glimpse-at-the-new-world-order/ is the movie desensitizing us to this kind of violent dystopian future?? ....or warning us against it???

MachineGhost wrote: I just watched it last night.  It seemed artifully edited not to be get an R-rating by avoidance of showcasing gorey and violent end results, but I can't help but feel it was all too mature even for a PG-13 rating.  Just because kid were the unwilling victims doesn't make it a kids movie.

Yet, I am left scratching my head why this kind of story, which is deeply disturbing on many levels, is hugely popular in an era of silly whimsical fantasies like Twilight and Harry Potter.  Did something change and the masses suddenly wake up overnight newly receptive to bleak, anti-government, dystopian stories?

Let's talk about propaganda.

I sometimes ask audiences to name the most relentless indoctrination campaign the world ever saw. Some mention Stalin or Hitler. Others cite some major religions... or Madison Avenue advertising. Come, raise your hands and tell us which campaign you think most thoroughly brainwashes your fellow citizens, here and now.

Inevitably, quite a few claim that today's mass media push conformity on a hapless, sheeplike population. It's a smug cliché -- since it implies that a select few have risen above to shrug off the conditioning. Is that how you see yourself? Yes?

I'll bet you cannot name, offhand, a single popular American film of the last forty years that actually preached conformity, or homogeneity, submission, or repression of the individual spirit. Go ahead, try.

That's a clue!

In fact, the most persistent and inarguably incessant propaganda campaign -- appearing in countless American movies, novels, myths and TV shows -- preaches quite the opposite message! A singular and unswerving theme so persistent and ubiquitous that most people hardly notice or mention it. And yet, when I say it aloud, you will nod your heads in instant recognition.

That theme is suspicion of authority -- often accompanied by its sidekick/partner: tolerance.

Indeed, try to come up with even one example of a recent film that you enjoyed in which the hero did not bond with the audience in the first ten minutes by resisting or sticking-it-to some authority figure! Rebels are always the heroes. Conformity is portrayed as worse than death. Even in war-flicks, irreverence for some pompous commander is a necessary trait. Often, the main character also presents some quirk, some eccentricity, that draws both ire from an oppressor and sympathy from the audience.

Oh, you do hear some messages of conformity and intolerance -- but these fill the mouths of moustache-twirling villains, clearly inviting us to rebel contrary to everything they say. Submission to gray tribal normality is portrayed as one of the most contemptible things an individual can do -- a message quite opposite to what was pushed in most other cultures.

This theme is so prevalent, and so obvious, that even though you can probably see where I am going with this -- and hate the inevitable conclusion -- you aren't going to dispute the core fact. You have to sit there and accept one of the most galling things that a bunch of dedicated individualists can ever realize -- that you were trained to be individualists by the most relentless campaign of public indoctrination in history, suckling your love of rebellion and eccentricity from a society that -- evidently, at some level -- wants you to be that way!

Bean wrote: Hunger Games is a watered down rip off of:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_Royale_(film)

Pointedstick wrote: This theme is so prevalent, and so obvious, that even though you can probably see where I am going with this -- and hate the inevitable conclusion -- you aren't going to dispute the core fact. You have to sit there and accept one of the most galling things that a bunch of dedicated individualists can ever realize -- that you were trained to be individualists by the most relentless campaign of public indoctrination in history, suckling your love of rebellion and eccentricity from a society that -- evidently, at some level -- wants you to be that way!