Don't Look Up

[Iliketurtles]

Watch it. 

 

Thank me later.

[Earl Grey]

Discuss it here later? Or just wink knowing we're part of a club who know the message?

[Iliketurtles]

Maybe use a spoiler tag?

 

Seriously though this is possibly better than Idiocracy and in the same vein.

 

 

[Earl Grey]

56 minutes ago, Iliketurtles said:

Maybe use a spoiler tag?

 

Seriously though this is possibly better than Idiocracy and in the same vein.

 

 

 

Okay, given a few people we know in common also love Idiocracy, then yes, I will give it a watch this weekend!

[Earl Grey]

Okay, so I watched it and here are a few thoughts:

 

1) Reminds me of the premise of the old Simpson's episode "Bart's Comet" and had the characters in the film manage to be dumber than the adults in South Park.

 

2) The movie is about as subtle as Axl Rose smashing his guitar on stage. Sure, the movie was preachy and the parallels to climate change were deliberate, but the execution left me with the impression that unlike Idiocracy, which I feel is better overall, this film is all head and no heart, whereas Idiocracy had a lot of heart because the message wasn't being hammered in as hard.

 

Another film, The Platform, had no subtlety whatsoever, and the problem with preaching is that the message potentially gets dismissed by the audience since the characters and plot don't seem real or relatable, which in turn makes them apathetic and hostile to the message.

 

3) Coincidentally, I wrote and published a short story with a similar premise around September of last year I think, but I tend to keep my writing reserved only for people I chat with privately here.

 

The film wasn't something I'd encourage people to watch as much as Idiocracy, though I wouldn't tell them to avoid it either.

 

Spoiler-heavy comments may follow in another post later.

Edited January 14, 2022 by Earl Grey

[doc benway]

I loved the film!

It's about time someone put something out mainstream to highlight our collective insanity.

I preferred the heavy-handedness of the film.

Not because I think it is an effective way to change anyone's mind or teach anyone a lesson, I no longer consider that achievable through media in our post-fact, social media age.

For me there was a feeling of - my God, what an outrageous and exaggerated nightmare these characters are living through! followed by a terrifying acknowledgment of - my God, what an outrageous and exaggerated nightmare WE are currently living through!!

I don't think subtlety would have been as effective, or entertaining, for me. 

I watched it a second time and appreciated the many subtle layers and adornments speckled throughout the film, none more entertaining for me than... 

*SPOILER ALERT*

Spoiler

... the president's tramp stamp seen just before she's eaten by the bronteroc...

 

[Cleansox]

First, I thought @Iliketurtleswas trying to save us all from an odontoid fracture. 😁 

[Iliketurtles]

8 hours ago, Earl Grey said:

Okay, so I watched it and here are a few thoughts:

 

1) Reminds me of the premise of the old Simpson's episode "Bart's Comet" and had the characters in the film manage to be dumber than the adults in South Park.

 

2) The movie is about as subtle as Axl Rose smashing his guitar on stage. Sure, the movie was preachy and the parallels to climate change were deliberate, but the execution left me with the impression that unlike Idiocracy, which I feel is better overall, this film is all head and no heart, whereas Idiocracy had a lot of heart because the message wasn't being hammered in as hard.

 

Another film, The Platform, had no subtlety whatsoever, and the problem with preaching is that the message potentially gets dismissed by the audience since the characters and plot don't seem real or relatable, which in turn makes them apathetic and hostile to the message.

 

3) Coincidentally, I wrote and published a short story with a similar premise around September of last year I think, but I tend to keep my writing reserved only for people I chat with privately here.

 

The film wasn't something I'd encourage people to watch as much as Idiocracy, though I wouldn't tell them to avoid it either.

 

Spoiler-heavy comments may follow in another post later.

 

 

We tend to look movies and culture through personal lenses. 

 

My lenses are colored by my life experiences. 

 

I really relate to this movie, and not so much in regards to climate change. 

 

The absurdity of showing people absolutely undeniable facts, and then somehow they manage to do herculean level mental gymnastics to deny them. 

 

That feeling of it being so surreal, thinking certainly they have to be trolling, but coming to the realization that no they really are just that mentally broken. 

 

So based on such life experiences this movie really hit home for me. 

 

Trying to be a Prometheus figure and being punished for it eternally is something I and the rest of my friends can really relate to.

 

 

[Iliketurtles]

4 hours ago, steve said:

I loved the film!

It's about time someone put something out mainstream to highlight our collective insanity.

I preferred the heavy-handedness of the film.

Not because I think it is an effective way to change anyone's mind or teach anyone a lesson, I no longer consider that achievable through media in our post-fact, social media age.

For me there was a feeling of - my God, what an outrageous and exaggerated nightmare these characters are living through! followed by a terrifying acknowledgment of - my God, what an outrageous and exaggerated nightmare WE are currently living through!!

I don't think subtlety would have been as effective, or entertaining, for me. 

I watched it a second time and appreciated the many subtle layers and adornments speckled throughout the film, none more entertaining for me than... 

*SPOILER ALERT*

  Reveal hidden contents

... the president's tramp stamp seen just before she's eaten by the bronteroc...

 

 

I really enjoyed all the fake social media platform names and companies, followed by how until right up the last moment we all cared about trivial nonsense and celeb gossip.  

 

Oh there is a second Easter egg at the very end of the film if you didn't see it. 

 

 

[Earl Grey]

5 hours ago, steve said:

I loved the film!

It's about time someone put something out mainstream to highlight our collective insanity.

I preferred the heavy-handedness of the film.

Not because I think it is an effective way to change anyone's mind or teach anyone a lesson, I no longer consider that achievable through media in our post-fact, social media age.

For me there was a feeling of - my God, what an outrageous and exaggerated nightmare these characters are living through! followed by a terrifying acknowledgment of - my God, what an outrageous and exaggerated nightmare WE are currently living through!!

I don't think subtlety would have been as effective, or entertaining, for me. 

 

I agree; in our time, particularly for western countries, subtlety may not be effective for conveying a message. Like I mentioned when referencing the film The Platform, there is a line saying that they can't be subtle with the symbol of the revolution towards the end.

 

In an age where people are shouting at each other, scrolling on to the next comment and making their own voice be heard, you have to give sound bites and be loud just to get people to notice you. Rarely will you have people sit and think after being exhausted by filtering. This film is a product of the current zeitgeist, and until we transition into a more reserved and reflective world, I don't see too many English-speaking films ready to embrace subtlety.

 

One criticism I will add is that this is more caricature of what everyone is going through, because in spite of my shared view that there is madness around us, there exists very human elements as well with

Spoiler

the varied responses to the end of the world from eating supper as a family to furious lovemaking, looting, drinking, and trying to escape,

 

which reminds me of the old British television movie Threads. There is a big difference, however, between sugarcoating and total nihilism and cynicism, which was what I felt a little too hyerbolic (and was likely the point) in Don't Look Up.

 

48 minutes ago, Iliketurtles said:

 

 

We tend to look movies and culture through personal lenses. 

 

My lenses are colored by my life experiences. 

 

I really relate to this movie, and not so much in regards to climate change. 

 

The absurdity of showing people absolutely undeniable facts, and then somehow they manage to do herculean level mental gymnastics to deny them. 

 

That feeling of it being so surreal, thinking certainly they have to be trolling, but coming to the realization that no they really are just that mentally broken. 

 

So based on such life experiences this movie really hit home for me. 

 

Trying to be a Prometheus figure and being punished for it eternally is something I and the rest of my friends can really relate to.

 

 

 

I believe that regardless of facts, personal values and priority take precedent, such as the obsession with toxic positivity and agreeableness, political ambition, business and money, and all-around selfishness get in the way of people thinking rationally, not to mention the fight or flight response when danger is abound. It's worth mentioning that all these values are contrary to Daoist values and virtues, such as avoiding ambition and embracing truth rather than sugarcoating something to sound more appealing to the ear.

 

I'll give a few examples regarding facts and danger with several increasingly stressful scenarios personally:

In the Peace Corps:

Spoiler

 

1) When I lived in Tanzania, my host family mother would go up and down daily to get buckets of water for bathing and cooking. We understood as Peace Corps Volunteers that there was a water shortage in our area, so I used only a half bucket to bathe myself once a day, and my host mother began rebuking me for not being sanitary, and that she gets two buckets so that I can have two showers a day, morning and evening. I told her that I was trying to conserve water so that everyone could use more and I don't need a whole bucket or two showers, and how she was already doing so much and didn't need to break her back each morning for me, but she got angrier and said that I am not clean and I need to use more water in order to bathe "properly".

 

Her values were focused on cleanliness and when my Kiswahili instructor explained to her the water shortage, the first thing she and her husband said that there would always be enough water and that they just want me to be clean. It was their way of showing they cared, and they understood me to be too shy and equally too stubborn to use all the water they brought for me, which I had intended to conserve so they could wash themselves and cook without having to make multiple trips up and down the hill for water.

 

 

Dogs
 

Spoiler

 

2) An ex-girlfriend's parents had dogs they never wanted, and left them in a cage day and night. When I introduced changes such as walking them and letting them run several times a day, the mother got infuriated because she hated how the dogs peeing in the grass of their back yard would "kill the grass" and that I was "spoiling" the dogs. If the dogs weren't caged, they were tied up all day--using leashes and collars I bought because they didn't think dogs were worth spending money on, even for food, where they'd just dump day-old rice into their bowls to eat until my ex and I started buying dog food when we concluded nobody cared about the dogs.

 

I could show literature from PETA to showing local government law and websites on proper care for dogs, and the mother said she has a friend who cages or ties up dogs all day and gives them rice and that it's normal and proper. Her response as well was that nobody lets goldfish out of the bowl to swim in a swimming pool, so why let dogs out? Her values were her garden, and even if urinating in grass actually doesn't kill grass, and the dogs were trained to leave her plants alone, she just hated dogs--and is how I ended up adopting one of my dogs after they ended up with an unplanned litter, and had I at the time lived in an adequate place, both dogs and their litter would have come to my home to have a happier life. Plants are more important to her than animals, and she thinks people like me spoil dogs with basic and proper care.

 

 

The Chinese Communist Party

 

Spoiler

3) I've lost friends over my activism against the CCP for their genocide of Uyghurs and Tibetans and various other issues like the BRI. It isn't even just mainland Chinese, it's conspiracy theorists like a Japanese friend who shows me very obvious shill videos from "white monkeys" who are paid by the CCP to say absurd things like how there is no genocide (let alone a war in Ba Sing Se) because they are criminals and it's just CIA propaganda, and we should stop meddling in other countries. Their view that the USA is all evil and everyone else is minding their own business gets in the way of facts, and of course, they attack the facts.

 

These examples are exactly what is happening with covid and climate change, and I won't go into those details because the movie as a metaphor was adequate enough, while covid is what is already happening around us and in this board too.

 

So facts mean very little to people if they don't align with their values, and one strong message about the film is that our priories are skewed. Look at the response to the pandemic and where we've come to a point that people are engaging in the current trending Ponzi scam, NFTs.

 

Trying to be a Prometheus figure or someone who returns to Plato's allegorical Cave will burst people's bubbles because humans as a species don't like change. There may be curiosity, but without security nets or familiarity, outsiders and new ideas makes them wary. Either it threatens their lives or their way of living, even if it could actually improve their lives, and even then, many don't want their lives "improved" because techies, colonialists, and missionaries seem more interested in their vision rather than the other people's values.

 

If you want people to embrace truth, especially your truth, facts won't change their mind. They will embrace it as theirs if you are one of them and make them feel like you are one of them rather than dismissing them. But we can't really spend too much time trying to pander to people like the news anchors catering to their audience and sponsors in a life-threatening situation, so sugarcoating ain't gonna do much if the ship is sinking, unless you show you do have a lifeboat and rations to get out and live.