Watching Superman at the drive-in with Bento (below)
I took my dog to the drive-in, something he loves, and this got me thinking about the status of dogs in contemporary films. James Gunn's Superman is, among many things, the first live action film to depict Superman's dog Krypto. The dog features prominently in the film, in its advertisements, and in its afterlife in memes and. jokes online.
Bento at the Drive in
Krypto's presence has been central to both the film's marketing, he appeared in the first trailer, and in the film's memed afterlife. One scene features fairly prominently, at least in the memes, The scene in question is when Superman announces his decision to turn himself in to the Department of Justice. This is after the full recording of his parents' message has been leaked, revealing to the world that he was sent to dominate Earth not to save it. He tells Lois about his decision. It is important what he doesn't say, he does not tell her that he is turning himself in out of his respect for "the American way," or that he believes that no one is above the law, or any such lofty claims. He tells her that it is the best way for her to find his dog, Krypto, who was kidnapped by Lex Luthor.
To be clear about the context, this decision takes place in the midst of Superman's identity crisis. He is not sure who he is or what he represents at this point. So perhaps it makes sense that he just wants to find his dog, and not worry about his image or his place in the entire symbolic order. However, it is hard not to notice how his search for the dog works for us, for the audience. It is, in the parlance of our times, relatable, but which we could say something that is immediately intelligible and identifiable in a way that "the American way" is not, especially now. The immediate identification works in the film, a film that is balancing so many different narrative threads, billionaires, border conflicts, teams of meta-humans, robots, kaiju, and so on, so much so that a simple "boy looks for dog" story offers some grounding to the fantastic.
Or to take another example, I cannot help but think of John Wick, at least the first film. Formally the film could have used nearly anything to set of its orgy of gun fu, some Macguffin to get the plot in motion, and yet it picked a dog. That the motivation for the violence is so basic and wholesome is something that the characters in the film constantly question, and wonder about.
If I was writing more about the Wick films I would say something about the odd juxtaposition of the motivation of the first film, they killed his puppy, and the way that the latter films focus on a byzantine world of complicated rules and rituals. John Wick belongs in the odd sub-genre of genre films that mix in a little fantasy or science fiction world building at first only to have it build up in subsequent films. The first film is a revenge film, in which the world building, special hotel for assassins, gold coin based currency, etc., just hang as so many ornaments to its fundamental core. In that way it is like Mad Max, which added a little social collapse to a car flick, and the Purge films, which used a dystopian premise to fuel a basic home invasion horror film. In all three cases what started as a slight deviation, a little estrangement, from the world as we know it ultimately becoming its own universe.
I would situate this turn towards the dog in terms of three theoretical concepts. The first is from Jodi Dean, the decline of symbolic efficacy. This is especially the case with Superman, the ideals of justice, of the American way, just do not work like the used to, especially overseas. Hyperpolitics, to use Anton Jäger's term, means that any political subtext, Superman's immigrant status, or how the film represents government, lends itself to a proliferation of divisions between "woke" and its "MAGA" opposite. Saving a dog just plays better. It is immediate, to use Anna Kornbluh's term, "direct and literal.' It is free of subtext, or even text, just look at that cute doggy face. Saving a dog or avenging a dog as a motivation is something that does not need any narrative development. It is the kind of thing that could be communicated in one image. It is a meme made plot.
The dog also works beyond the film, in its meme afterlife. I have seen both the text above from Superman and the scene below repackaged and reformulated in so many different dog jokes. For example, the clip below with the added text, "Me at a party when I find out that the hosts have a dog." John Wick has also become the focus of memes and jokes, mainly by dog lovers, who would also kill anyone who hurts their dog.
I could talk about dogs and movies all day, but here is the point that all of this leads up to or illustrates. I think that we are living in an age of mediated immediacy, almost no one experiences art, politics, or anything without seeing how those things are discussed and memed online, but what mediates is essentially immediacy, opinions, affects, and gut reactions. With respect to the first part of the formulation, I would argue that what an opinion is has fundamentally changed. It used to be if you saw a film you might be aware of what the people you saw it with thought about it, and, if you took the time, you could read reviews and opinions of others, but those reviews would take the form of film reviews and essays, in other words they would be mediated through their own specific genres. Nowadays we are immediately confronted by a much more immediate mediation. First, through the omnipresent references to the review aggregator Rotten Tomatoes, which offers a simply number, and immediate quantification, that means we do not have to read reviews, and beyond that the way in which reactions are memed and tweeted, sometimes before the film has even premiered. The elevation of the trailer, and even the teaser of the trailer, as cultural events in themselves reveals this turn towards immediacy in culture. By all accounts the most recent Spider-Man film just started filming a few weeks ago, and has already released its first teaser trailer, consisting mainly of a reveal of the costume. Films are made or unmade through these immediate reactions, which are instantly spread around the world, it is no wonder that they are going to the dogs. turning towards motivations and plots which lend themselves towards more immediate responses and identifications.
This fall we are even getting our first horror movie filmed from a dog's point of view. I will let that play us out.
No comments:
Post a Comment