Watch Movie Mon Oncle and Analyze it

Write an essay on any cultural phenomenon/artifact/song/movie, analyzing its inherent contradictions (its overdeterminations)—E.g. How does a song (music) and its lyrics evince these contradictions (e.g. St. Vincent’s Digital Witness offers counter-hegemonic critiques of capitalist conformity in thoughts and actions: use value (use semiotic associations). But St. Vincent’s music and the performer herself operate within capitalism; her music, video, and person exist/are reduced to exchange value, commodities sold at a price. The commodification operates across the board: St. Vincent is not the qualitative, real person/performer, but an image for consumption [e.g. fashion, beauty products, conventional notions of beauty for purchase; a related example is Florence from Florence and the Machine. A recent NYT’s Style page featured a photo with Karl Lagerfeld holding Florence’s hand as they walk down a fashion runway. [you could use both the song and its music video].

RE: Above=> E.G. Use of FIS (“free indirect discourse”—Song Lyrics moving from 1st Person (“I”) to 3rd Person (“S/He”) and back Creates Moral Ambiguity (i.e. blame, right vs wrong, truth) => E.G. Foster the People’s Pumped up Kids (uses both “I” and “he”)

Alternatively, you could analyze how a mainstream film’s form and content (they cannot be separated) illustrate a particular capitalist stage, and determine enjoyment or lack thereof. You could also do this with an unconventional film that disobeys current filmic trends (e.g. contemporary Hollywood films have exponentially more cuts—cutting from scene/action to another scene/action—than older films [e.g. 1970s]; this is intimately related to how multinational corporations [they took studio ownership in the late 1970s and early 1980s] want to fill as many seats as possible [maximize profit]. Thus, they take few risks and produce the same movies over and over and over (Transformers 1, 2, 3….). They produce insipid but crowd pleasing romantic comedies that prove equally banal and repetitive (e.g. Love Actually). All these movies amount to producing and reproducing same distracting Pablum that doesn’t invite thought or contemplation, but pointless action and happy endings (romantic comedies), as well supporting hegemonic ideology.

A good starting point would be to ask yourself why you do or do not like a movie . For example, one student saw Revenant and hated it. As Hollywood has taught us to crave action and maximum cuts—to move the diegetic (story and plot) forward—when a film like The Revenant imposes a long take (e.g. a lengthy still shot of an inhospitable mountainside, with wind blowing snow, etc.), we get bored. The film’s long take invites contemplation, not action. But this formal element (a lengthy shot) is intimately tied to the film’s meaning (nature as cold and brutal “other,” and life a suffering –DiCaprio does not die at the end [his breathing continues into the credits], and that is the existential curse of humanity. Again, form and content can’t be separated.

The above will allow you to investigate how multinational corporations have taken over movie studios, which has resulted in fundamental changes in HOW MOST MAINSTREAM HOLLYWOOD MOVIES HAVE CHANGED: BOTH IN STRUCTURE (PLOTTING, # OF CUTS, ETC.) AS WELL AS CONTENT (STORY): Remember, Structure and Story/Narrative are Inseparable => Structure makes Meaning/Story as much as Story’s/Narrative Meaning makes Structure!

CITY, AUTHORITARIAN MODERNISM, AUTHORITARIAN MODERNIST PLANNING, MON ONCLE :

--USE SCOTT’S SEEING LIKE A STATE: Look at Authoritarian modernism and modernist planning as oppressive top down vision wherein cities are not designed for people, but capitalist efficiency—unhealthy. Includes designer/architects like Le Corbusier See BB posting of Scott. Other posted resources: “Get Out of My Kitchen,” etc.

--Related: Combine Jacobs, Scott, Harvey to do the same. Note: Jacobs makes significant use of Philadelphia [e.g. Ben Franklin Parkway (Monumentalism); great for auto efficiency and monuments, but better not go there at night, or you will be mugged] => Ignores how city needs mixed use for safety and community.

Topic I choose:

Watch Movie Mon Oncle and Analyze it: Make use of the above to look at the film, as the uncle moves from the old city of Paris (friendly, mixed use, qualities matter) to the new city Paris (totally efficient, unfriendly, no mixed use, purely quantitative --$$$ and ###).

Here are two writing ideas about this movie, consider them if u need.

1.) While discussing Jacques Tati’s Mon Oncle, we noted that one can analyze the film’s representation of high modernism from numerous perspectives (e.g. its critique of interior and industrial design, as well as its indictment of fashion and architecture). Tati’s critique centers on the differences between the old and new (modern) cities. Architecture, interior spaces, technological design and fashion are very different in each city. The old city offers large communal spaces (e.g. the market), but it also emphasizes community in so called “private” spaces (e.g. the design of Hulot’s apartment building forces him to encounter fellow apartment dwellers and communally negotiate space). Moreover, the old city’s attitude toward work invites interaction among citizens. While the modern/new city stresses efficient and speedy work, the old city has a much slower pace, with workers frequently interrupting work to converse with one another. In this sense the old city is a less alienating place than the modern/new city; the new city demands conformity and rigid working conditions (e.g. uniforms, spaces and technology designed for efficient production, not for the people working in those places).

This is also reflected in differences between the old city’s interiors and industrial designs, which are less technologically developed than the new city’s (e.g. open air market [vs. the modern/new city’s chain supermarkets], crafted furniture [vs. the modern city’s mass produced plastic furniture, which far from ergonomical]], bicycles and horse driven carts for transport [vs. the modern/new city’s alienating automobile transport, which impedes communal interaction], manually operated doors [vs. the new/modern city’s automatic doors and technologized garage doors], simple culinary appliances [vs. the new/modern city’s highly technologized kitchen appliances], simpler grooming technologies [vs. the new/modern city’s highly efficient motorized technologies -e.g. noisy motorized razors which facilitate speeding shaving but prevent human communication]).

Fashion also reflects social differences between the new/modern city and the old city. To reflect the less individualistic and narcissistic old city, Tati costumes his old city residents in traditional garb (e.g. berets ) and simple clothing (e.g. Hulot wears the same raincoat throughout the film). On the other hand, the new/modern city’s fashions reflect a more individualistic/narcissistic commodity culture–namely, a culture focused on individual commodity production and consumption. Here, Mon Oncle offers characters obsessively pursing fashion as a social status marker. The Arpel’s female neighbor dresses in the latest high priced fashions, regardless how ridiculous and impractical such garments appear (e.g. Msr. Arpel mistakes her for a rug salesman when she appears at his security gate wearing the latest fashionable cape [?]) Msr. Arpel wears specialized leisure wear for his afternoon party. His wife wears the latest puffy dresses. In terms of design, Msr. Arpel buys the latest fashionable car, regardless of its obvious flaws (e.g. the sticky rear door). His wife frantically turns on her fashionable fish fountain before guests enter their gated home. (Of course, such behaviors only extend to worthy class competitors; at one point in the film, Mrs. Arpel hears the doorbell and rushes to activate her sacred spitting fish, but quickly turns it off when she finds that the visitor is only a delivery man.)

Tati’s film offers a number of essay possibilities. One could, for instance, analyze some of the ways Mon Oncle critiques modern design and its social ramifications (as above). Here, you could do a more general analysis, looking at a variety of design issues (e.g. interior design within the Arpel home, fashion design, industrial design), or you could perform an in depth analysis of one aspect (e.g. industrial design analysis of Arpel’s kitchen, era/time specific fashion elements, the Arpel home and its modernist architecture, era/time specific graphic elements). In either case (i.e. the general or more focused analysis), you will want to research and contextualize your subject matter. That is you will need to explain why the design is the way it is at this particular time (i.e. 1950s). The assignment thus involves design, but design which is socially and historically contextualized.

2.) Related to the above, use Jane Jacobs (as summarized by Scott in Seeing Like a State) in conjunction with one or more of the aforementioned sources, to compare and contrast Tati’s representation of old and new Paris. Tati quite clearly favors old Paris as more livable and humane, and thus matching Jacobs’ vision. This is borne out time and again within the film, as Tati contrasts the harsh, modern built and social environments of new Paris with the comforting and more livable old city environments. This essay requires a pretty straightforward research process; namely, examine Mon Oncle’s old and new cities according to Jacobs’ criteria for healthy and unhealthy cities. So, for instance, you could look at her comments regarding sidewalk use (e.g. set modern Paris’ lack of sidewalks or no sidewalk use against old Paris’ frequent and lively sidewalk/sidewalk use. You could investigate this sidewalk issue according to Jacobs’ main and sub-point (e.g. old Paris: eyes on the sidewalk for safety, child playing on sidewalks and streets, sidewalks transporting people to different places/sidewalks actually used) e.g. Study diversity of use in old city vs. singular use in new city (e.g. old Paris: diversity of use -restaurants, various shops, market, residence all in same locale vs. new Paris: every use separated out from every other use (e.g. residence not located in the same place as shops, grocery, etc.)).

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