3 Popular Culture and Identity

1
(3) Popular Culture and Identity

• Fictional Realities

2
Outline

• Starting Questions
• Fictional Realities
• of Hollywood Film Industry (1) The Player
• of TV and fantasies (2) The Babysitter
• of artists creation and recreation (3) The
  Hat Act

3
Starting Questions

• What does Moebius strip mean?
• Self-awareness in the service of originality is
  creative, worthy of an auteur but
  self-reflexivity alone, without new vision or
  growth, soon becomes originality's inversion,
  self-parody (Sugg). Do you agree?

4
Starting Questions

• Please comment on the following statements (or
  turn them into questions)
• 1. We are walking commodities our identities are
  molded by the dressed we wear determined by the
  cars we drive or the cell phones we use.
• 2. TV watches us
• -- e.g. violent films lead to violent behavior
  in teenagers
• -- the sensationalism on TV news program appeals
  to and results in the audiences interest in and
  gossip over ?? news.
• -- The focus on and objectification of womens
  bodies in music videos lead to rape of women in
  real life.
• ? Are we the authors of our lives, or the
  players of social games?
• 3. Literature has eternal values because it
  teaches and delights us with its vision and fine
  aestheticism. Popular culture, on the other
  hand, is a passing phenomenon for entertainment.
  

5
The Player (1992) Introd

• Robert Altman director of MASH and Nashville
  
• Robert Altman Hollywood is about greed and
  making as much money as you can and trying to get
  rid of all the artists. Of course, they can't
  really get rid of us-... When Hollywood runs
  out of films to copy or make remakes of, they'll
  have to turn to writers, who are the people
  coming up with all the real films.
• Independents make films that start with their
  own artistic integrity. You have to do what you
  want. Nobody's going to agree with you. Hollywood
  will say, "Why should I make this picture? You
  have no evidence that this picture can produce
  money for our company. It doesn't fit into our
  computer. We have no template that fits over
  it."

6
QuestionsThe Player (1992)

• How is Hollywood films criticized in The Player?
  What else is parodied?
• Self-Reflexive Elements
• frame 1) The film is framed by a mystery (whos
  blackmailing Griffin?) and a murder of the
  writer. What may be the  purposes of having them
  in the plot?
• 2) beginning and ending their meanings?
• 3) any others?
• Griffin was deeply attracted to the writers wife
  at the first sight when he stood outside her
  house. Try to analyze this attraction.

7
Hollywood Film Industry

• Realistic, Cold and Competitive
• 50,000 stories ? 12 films
• Griffins manipulative cold
• Larry Levy -- tries to get rid of the writers
  (chap 9)
• Formula for success
• plot elements
• stars
• e.g. The script Bonnie reads
• The last film within the film

8
Hollywood Film Industry

• Power struggle
• G hated by a lot of writers
• Famous bankers son .
• Larry Levy Joel Levison ? Griffin plays along,
  tricking Levy by suggesting a bad idea to him.
• ? Levinsons office taken over by Griffin

9
Hollywood The Ice-Queen

• Satisfies Griffins voyeurism
• Chap 12 No experience of watching film does not
  like reading, deal with images and heros.
• Doesnt care about Kahanes death
• Doesnt care to know the truth If you dont
  suffer, maybe its not a crime after all.
• Griffins revelation ? in mud bath with a
  suspicious look.

10
Police Power and the Lack of Justice

• Chap 18 Detective Susan Avery not serious
  enough
• forgets the purpose of their summon
• imitating the film lines one of us, one of us
  
• Chap 21 the witness picks the police officer as
  suspect.

11
Self-Reflexive Elements

• Opening Sequence Action! referring to the
  beginning of this films shooting.
• An overview of the power structure, including
  those in power (Japanese visitors, executives),
  and those serving them (secretaries)
• the script writers pitching vs. those discussing
  image and camera.

12
Opening Sequence (2)

• Discussion of the scripts
• e.g. 1) The Graduate Part II, a dark, weird,
  funny'' sequel, he explains, with Mrs. Robinson
  as a paralysed stroke victim and Julia Roberts
  playing the new graduate.
• 2) a cynical, political thriller-comedy with a
  heart -- not unlike Ghost meets The Manchurian
  Candidate.''
• 3) a Goldie Goes to Africa
• Griffin inside the office (looking out when he
  gets a postcard).

13
Closing Sequence

• The film is the result? a Moebius strip.
• Happy ending with a twist
• Repetition of the lines in the film

14
Another Self-Reflexive Moment

• The murder of the writer Kahane by Griffin the
  producer
• The Bicycle Thief as an opposite to commercial
  film the protagonists job is to put on film
  posters (seemingly Hollywood films).
• The super-imposed voice-over from the next scene
  about the audiences being the real writer.

15
Self-Reflexive Elements

• the use of postcards, posters this is a world of
  films and film languages

16
Stars as Stars and Extras

• e.g. Julia Roberts, Anjelica Huston, Susan
  Sarandon, Bruce Willis, Cher, etc.. ?

17
Robert Coover

• Pricksongs Descants, --
• materials drawn from folklore, fairy tales, and
  Bible stories as well as from popular culture
• an innocent situation develops a dozen sinister
  possibilities
• called "cubist stories" (The Metafictional Muse,
  Larry McCaffery)
• Public Burning -- e electrocutions set in New
  York City's Times Square
• Later committed to hypertext ref. 1, 2

18
The Babysitterthe Definite

• Characters
• the babysitter the Tuckers (Harry and Dolly)
  the Tucker children (Jimmy, Bitsy, and the baby)
  the babysitter's boyfriend, Jack and Jack's
  friend, Mark
• Basic Actions
• -- babysitter arrives at the Tucker home,
• -- the Tuckers leave their home for a party
• -- Jack and Mark play pinball.

19
The BabysitterTime Line

• "740, ten minutes late," -- Mrs. Tucker calls
  out, "'The babysitter's here already'" (206).
  800-- the babysitter gives Bitsy a bath and the
  child escapes the tub (211).
• 830-- Jimmy's bath (219).
• 900, the babysitter in front of the television
  set (227).
• 1000 -- she dozes in front of the television,
  then "awakes with a start a babysitter? Did the
  announcer say something about a babysitter?"
  (238).
• (239) Worst possibilities the babysitter raped,
  children murdered, Dolly's husband leaving her, a
  corpse in the bathtub, and the house left a
  wreck.

20
The Multiple Perspectives

• 3rd person focuses on the babysitter 206-210 ?
  211 bath ? 212-13
• ?1) spank her! 216 ?
• 2) Jimmy, your turn 217
• 2-1 Jimmy says no, she takes a bath 224
• 2-2 grabbing him 222? 223,
• 2-3 watching TV together)? rejecting Jack 218 ?
  cleaning 218 ?
• answers phone call, rejecting Jack, playing with
  the kids 221, 223, 225, 229 phone the baby
  crying 233, 235 ? baby drowned 237
• Watches TV alone 231,
• Jimmy desires her and fights against her 207 ?
  209

21
The Multiple Sexual Fantasies

• Mr. Tucker goes back to check p.206, 209,214
  (Mark mentioned) fantasy 215 ? 217? 218 ? Harry
  drunk ? aspirin, or glasses 224,
• Jack gets Mark to help him (or not) 207, 208?
  210 ? 211? 213 ? 215 ? 219 ? 220 she wants it ?
  227 (leave) ? Mark and Jack in the bathroom 229
  
• TV 208 ? 209 (Dolly, too) 212, 213 (Bisty
  episode) TV and sexual fantasy (214) 225 TV
  and the love fantasy 228-29 234

22
Connecting through the Recurrent motifs and words

• -- the TV program being broadcast, 208 ? 209
• -- the telephone,
• -- the bathtub, 210, 216, 217 (reversed time),
  218 226 Mr. Tuckers bathtub fantasy 217 226,
  
• -- a pinball machine 208 ? 210 ? rape fantasy
  sexual orgy 216 225,
• -- He loves her. She loves him. p. 208-209
• -- What do you think of our babysitter? 209 210
  
• -- Oh, excuse me! I only wanted . . . 215,
  217,
• -- phone call 221, 223 ? Dolly gets the phone
  call 236
• -- "Get Dolly Tucker Back in Her Girdle" p. 210,
  211, 212 (baby? fat), 228 230, 234
• -- Hey! Whats going on here? 225, 226

23
The BabysitterPossible Readings

• -- All in the babysitters imagination
• -- Multiple possibilities played out in different
  characters fantasies (of the babysitters,
  Jimmys, Mr. Tuckers and Jacks, etc.)
• -- Like TV channels for the readers to choose
  from.

24
The Hat Act

• The magicians dilemma Failure of his script
  (e.g. hat stuck) repetition -- 1. repeated acts
  2. Use of stereotypical device (rabbit, lovely
  assistant)
• ? desperate attempts to satisfy/surprise the
  audience p. 241
• terror 1) head separated from the body p. 244
  248
• 3) assistants eating the hat sexual innuendo
  with the country boy 246
• Two large men fighting, one dead 250
• assistants body nude fragmented 254
• Where is the magic from? Ones own vision or
  desire to satisfy/shock the audience ?

25
References

• THE ROLE OF THE WRITER ,  By Sugg, Richard P.,
  Literature Film Quarterly, 00904260, January 1,
  1994, Vol. 22, Issue 1
• The Player An Interview with Robert Altman. By
  Richolson, Janice. Cineaste, Dec92, Vol. 19 Issue
  2/3, p61.