Thoughts on the role of art and music in "Alien Covenant"

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Zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz
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Thoughts on the role of art and music in "Alien Covenant"

Post by Zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz »

WARNING: SPOILERS!

I saw recently the film "Alien Covenant". I am a big fan of the "Alien" films and I think that this one may have been the best one yet. The director Ridley Scott is brilliant for having so many intricacies in this film. Such as this, which I may not have noticed had I not recently seen two things: The first is Slavoj Zizek's film "The Pervert's Guide to Ideology" (a lot of the films I mention in this post, he brought up in this film). The second is a YouTube playlist about the Ten Commandments created by the conservative YouTube channel PragerUniversity.

In this playlist, Dennis Prager tells us about the second commandment (this is according to Jewish tradition, in Christian tradition, it is the first commandment): "You shall have no other Gods before me." He explains that this commandment is relevant in the case of those who worship money, those who worship love, etc. But what this post is focusing on is when he says it is relevant to those who worship art. This is what he says:

"Take art. Many of the cruelest humans in history loved beautiful music and art. But, as a music lover, I learned early in life the sad fact that great music can be used to inspire people to follow evil just as much as it can be used to inspire people to do good. The great Hollywood director Stanley Kubrick vividly made this point in his classic 1971 film, A Clockwork Orange. In it, men rape and murder while classical music plays in the background."

In Alien Covenant, the villain is the android David. What fascinates me the most about him is that he is inspired by art and music so much. He takes his name from Michelangelo's sculpture, David. He loves the music of Wagner, and he plays it at the end when he has his final victory. He also loves great literature and he quotes to the good android Walter from Ozymandias, attributing it to Byron. However, Walter points something out. It was not Byron who wrote Ozymandias, but Shelley. As he puts it "One wrong note ruins the whole symphony."

The part of the film where Walter says those words mirrors in Charlie Chaplin's classic film The Great Dictator, where he satirizes Hitler and fascism. In it, there is a scene where the character he plays named Adenoid Hynkel (who is the parody of Hitler) is dancing with a globe. Wagner's Lohegrin Overture is playing in the background (specifically chosen by Chaplin, as he knew it was one of Hitler's favourites). The globe eventually bursts, symbolizing how Hitler will come to a sticky end, as he did in 1945. Similarly, when Walter says to David "One wrong note ruins the whole symphony" it shows that David will come to a sticky end. Although he is victorious at the end of the film, it is clear to me because of what Walter said that he will eventually meet his downfall.

Returning to the Great Dictator, at the end of the film, Chaplin's other character, the Jewish barber has been mistaken for Hynkel and so he is forced to give a speech. In it, he calls for universal brotherhood and democracy. It is a brilliant speech and if you haven't already seen it, I encourage you to watch it as soon as possible. In this speech, Wagner's Lohegrin Overture plays, the same music as when Hynkel was dancing with the globe! Zizek interprets this pessimistically, as being that the outcome of the Jewish barber's humanist worldview may become the same as Hitler's. However, to me, it exemplifies what Dennis Prager says: "Great music can be used to inspire people to follow evil just as much as it can be used to inspire people to do good".

Nowhere is this more clearer than in the real Nazi Germany. Hitler loved music and art. He was a talented artist himself. Like David, he adored the music of Wagner. In Nazi public events, Beethoven's "Ode to Joy" (interestingly enough, the same music that plays in A Clockwork Orange) was performed. And in the film The Eternal Jew, part of it focuses on great works of art (that the Jews are supposedly trying to destroy). In this section of the film, beautiful paintings such as Michelangelo's Creation of Adam are shown on the screen, while Bach's Toccata plays in the background. I can not express enough how sick to my stomach I feel when I view that part of the film, that such wonderful art and music could have been used to inspire such an evil regime.

What is the clear truth is that classical music and art is always inspirational. However, whether you are inspired to do good because of them or evil depends on your own predisposition. My final point is this: Just as classical music and art can be used to inspire, modern music and art can be used to pacify and sedate. It is very rare that I agree with alt-right YouTuber Paul Joseph Watson on anything, but he is absolutely correct in his video "The Truth About Popular Music", where he exposes how the music industry of today deliberates chooses the most simplistic music, both in regards to rhythm and in lyrics. As a result, all the music of today sounds the same. But why is this? Because the capitalists at the top do not want us to experience the profundity of such music like that of Vivaldi, Bach, Beethoven, Mozart, Tchaikovsky and Chopin. They want us to be anesthetized so that we become apathetic to their wicked schemes of corporate welfare and corporate warfare. In the same way that the Nazis wanted to inspire the German people to support the Third Reich by perverting beautiful music, the capitalists want to numb us into a false sense of security and happiness with their own decadent music. As the old saying goes: Those who do not learn from the past are condemned to repeat it!
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DarlBundren
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Re: Thoughts on the role of art and music in "Alien Covenant"

Post by DarlBundren »

Zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz wrote:Great music can be used to inspire people to follow evil just as much as it can be used to inspire people to do good.
Most of the time, liking or disliking a work of art is not a matter of rationality. You might try to explain to me why Bach's Ich ruf zu dir herr Jesus Christ is such a beautiful musical composition, but that would only be a description of why you may find it enjoyable. It's like stating that pineapple is not that bad on pizza because the sweetness of the pineapple suppresses the bitterness of the tomato. It might be true, but in the end all it matters is whether you find it delicious or not.

However, sometimes there could be some reasons to, rationally, like a work of art because of the ideas it expresses. This is hardly the case when it comes to music, though. A lot of artists think that music is the ultimate artistic medium because the form and the content match each other. If you are interested in the history of art you can easily see why it is such a fascinating idea. But, this peculiarity is precisely the reason why, as you said, music is so manipulative and so easily manipulated. If music is no more rational than pizza, it shouldn't be surprising that so many people have been able to exploit it for their own narrative.

Zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz wrote:Just as classical music and art can be used to inspire, modern music and art can be used to pacify and sedate.
Maybe this is the ironic part of your post, but I don't think this is true at all. This kind of argument has been made countless of times throughout history. For one thing, today is far easier to access to good art, whereas in the past it was only available to rich, educated men. Also, don't forget that what is considered to be elegant or not is often a matter of culture. Today, for example, novels are mostly considered to be high-brow art, but in the past they were 'women's stuff'.
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Re: Thoughts on the role of art and music in "Alien Covenant"

Post by DarlBundren »

By the way, I have not watched Alien Covenant, but Chaplin is great. Have you watched any of his other films?
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