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Woke Before Woke, No Joke.
a year ago
Star Wars: The Sugar Coated Poison Pill
All right. So it’s lots of fun. I loved it- hokey to the nth degree, making fun of Flash Gordon, old-style science fiction and, of course, itself. “Don’t take us seriously,” said the Star Wars masterminds. “Enjoy, enjoy.”
So I did. But it seems to me that Star Wars carries several disguised warnings, time bombs about the climate of our times, satisfactions hidden beneath the very conventions that are being made fun of. They make me very uneasy.
Conventions are the very essence of the danger of the piece and, little doubt, of the sequels that are to come in high gear from the same mill. If you know about the ‘convention’ of the science fiction alien, monstrous insect-animal mixture of gorilla with a heart, then the send-up is hilarious. But if you don’t know what a ‘convention’ is, then a lady in white who calls one “a shaggy carpet” (or words to that effect) is releasing all that you ever wanted to say about those who are unlike you, whom you didn’t try to understand. And the exaggeration of the types of aliens in the bar in Star Wars is a laugh riot, like n----rs in tuxedoes or bantus in business suits.
“But don’t take use seriously,” say the makers, who have taken themselves very seriously in promoting this vehicle so millions will see the mass destruction, militarism, black and white morality and racism in action. “It’s all in fun.” But we do see these things, gentlemen, and no matter how hokey the script, there are bodies in there, and beings being called carpets and medals being pinned on killers and chilling moral simplifications.
If Star Wars is indicative of films to come, then I am frightened. The excuse of escapism cannot cover the psychological power of models of violence, particularly violence disguised in technology where you don’t touch those bloody corpses. And the excuse of the “send-up” should not wash with us either, for most people do not intellectualize a film like Star Wars, and many of us who do intellectualize it are covering an inner gratification we do not care to face. MIRV and B-1 bombers are the outcome of the attitudes of a film like Star Wars, and if the film is seen by audiences expecting to see it, it will add its grains of hate to the mountain of “public feeling” where demagogues later dig for support of violence and moral simplicity.
These implications of Star Wars are worth a moment of nasty thought, even as one recommends it for its easy pleasures.
-Peter Brigg, Guelph, Ontario, Canada, published as a LOC in 1977 after the release of Star Wars. Quoted from a clipping found in a late friend’s files, source of publication unknown.
All right. So it’s lots of fun. I loved it- hokey to the nth degree, making fun of Flash Gordon, old-style science fiction and, of course, itself. “Don’t take us seriously,” said the Star Wars masterminds. “Enjoy, enjoy.”
So I did. But it seems to me that Star Wars carries several disguised warnings, time bombs about the climate of our times, satisfactions hidden beneath the very conventions that are being made fun of. They make me very uneasy.
Conventions are the very essence of the danger of the piece and, little doubt, of the sequels that are to come in high gear from the same mill. If you know about the ‘convention’ of the science fiction alien, monstrous insect-animal mixture of gorilla with a heart, then the send-up is hilarious. But if you don’t know what a ‘convention’ is, then a lady in white who calls one “a shaggy carpet” (or words to that effect) is releasing all that you ever wanted to say about those who are unlike you, whom you didn’t try to understand. And the exaggeration of the types of aliens in the bar in Star Wars is a laugh riot, like n----rs in tuxedoes or bantus in business suits.
“But don’t take use seriously,” say the makers, who have taken themselves very seriously in promoting this vehicle so millions will see the mass destruction, militarism, black and white morality and racism in action. “It’s all in fun.” But we do see these things, gentlemen, and no matter how hokey the script, there are bodies in there, and beings being called carpets and medals being pinned on killers and chilling moral simplifications.
If Star Wars is indicative of films to come, then I am frightened. The excuse of escapism cannot cover the psychological power of models of violence, particularly violence disguised in technology where you don’t touch those bloody corpses. And the excuse of the “send-up” should not wash with us either, for most people do not intellectualize a film like Star Wars, and many of us who do intellectualize it are covering an inner gratification we do not care to face. MIRV and B-1 bombers are the outcome of the attitudes of a film like Star Wars, and if the film is seen by audiences expecting to see it, it will add its grains of hate to the mountain of “public feeling” where demagogues later dig for support of violence and moral simplicity.
These implications of Star Wars are worth a moment of nasty thought, even as one recommends it for its easy pleasures.
-Peter Brigg, Guelph, Ontario, Canada, published as a LOC in 1977 after the release of Star Wars. Quoted from a clipping found in a late friend’s files, source of publication unknown.
What old films do show is acceptable attitudes from their day. Old films should be seen as historical artifacts, not judged for the era that they were created in.
Which is a point that a lot of people have forgotten, or aren't old enough to remember to begin with. The Sci-Fi genre, in the early-to-mid-70s, was all about Serious Issues And Drama, dominated by movies about dystopian nightmares, populated by amoral and relentlessly cynical characters with questionable motives, with pessimistic narratives about how the future was gonna suck and we were all gonna die in some horrible apocalypse, or be enslaved by the giant supercomputers, or whatever.
And then along comes this weird little B-movie called Star Wars...
So are these messages present? Well... eh. The mass destruction/militarism are in the premise, black and white morality is not always uncalled for (should there have been any moral dilemma about blowing up the Death Star?), and the cited examples of racism have suspiciously bespoke excuses (Leia was privileged and sheltered and eventually warmed up to Chewbacca (how much, though?); gasp, a movie with aliens has weird aliens! (I can't remember how heightened it was)). Guess my comment amounts to *shrug*
Or peopel that grab them and milk them for what it's worth like Isaac Arthur on Youtube, plus apply knowledge of physics to it.
That is both vastly optimistic and hopeful , yet it's not sugarcoating. It just shows how positive things can be.
And occasionally what can go wrong - and how.