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Hbomberguy posted:I agree, 'for all we know.' The film highlights Germany by naming the central object of the film in German and then says nothing else about it whatsoever. Their absence is palpable. You can justify it by saying Germany's not on the pacific rim, but neither is the UK and Stacker is, like, the head of the entire PPDC. I think you're making a mountain out of a molehill.
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Feb 3, 2014 02:24
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SuperMechagodzilla posted:Definitely yes to the first part, but it gets tricky after that. I've got the idea that these films reflect the death of the idealized hero-figure in American pop culture. It's no secret that Raleigh Beckett is an empty character--I've heard fans of Pacific Rim actually tout that as a positive thing. Mako (whom some fans call "the real hero of the film") is a passive character essentially led by the nose through the film to its denouement. Consider the actual failure of Batman's strong-handed approach and cynicism in The Dark Knight vs the heroism of one nameless convict*, Kal-El's inability to "save everyone" in Man of Steel, and the actual visceral contempt of the Abramstrek films for J.T. Kirk while celebrating their (much nastier) Spock, that Tom Cruise becomes a suicide bomber in Oblivion, while we exonerate ourselves in the new drone-and-waterboarding era in Zero Dark Thirty. *and that the film, hedging its bets, never says the Joker is wrong, only that one guy on that boat was able to foil his plan. The heroes of Pacific Rim are vigilantes or a para-military group, essentially funded by organized crime. In Independence Day, they are literally led by the President and a jocular Will Smith (who unlike the heroes of PR, has a libido). In ID4 the clown or Jar-Jar character nobly sacrifices himself and nobody of importance dies (repeated in, for instance, The Mummy), while PR practically bewails the doomed heroism of its pagan champions as they throw themselves at the Crack of Doom in a suicide run (but once Herc's son is dead, he's never mentioned again). I feel like I'm on the verge of a grand thesis here. We can't stomach another Blade or Neo*. We can't hold up a Kirk, Bond or Optimus Prime without sneering at them. In the current zeitgeist a hero like Smith's Captain Hiller who can knock out an armored giant with his right hook rings false to the point of being insulting. Both Pacific Rim and Battlefield L.A. devote an important amount of screentime to, essentially, gathering information on the enemy---Battlefield in the most bathetically gross way it can. We now only accept victories coated in blood (Herc's son, Tom Cruise, Batman's sacrifice of his identity). This isn't particularly controversial or insightful, but what interests me is the thought that Revenge of the Sith (2005) in some way might have been the bellwether or prognosticator of this shift. *Or Hellboy, for that matter Harime Nui fucked around with this message at 03:25 on Feb 3, 2014 |
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Feb 3, 2014 02:44
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Tezcatlipoca posted:I think you're making a mountain out of a molehill. I am not sorry for 'overthinking' the absence of a country for whom the central objects of the film are named.
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Feb 3, 2014 02:57
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quote:I am not sorry for 'overthinking' the absence of a country for whom the central objects of the film are named. To fight monsters, we created Germans.
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Feb 3, 2014 03:00
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Hbomberguy posted:I am not sorry for 'overthinking' the absence of a country for whom the central objects of the film are named. Calling your giant, monster fighting robots jaegers sounds cool. That's about as much importance as I place in jaeger. You are really reaching for this one. Why do you think Germany being absent is such a big deal just because jaeger is a German word?
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Feb 3, 2014 03:11
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This argument is further proof that only trained animeticians should be commenting upon the layers of meaning in das kulturästhetischfilm Pacific Rim
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Feb 3, 2014 03:16
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Hbomberguy posted:I am not sorry for 'overthinking' the absence of a country for whom the central objects of the film are named. I'm guessing they named them Jaegers because PR is partly an homage to anime, and anime uses a ton of German words (eg these), just because they sound cool. Piedmon Sama posted:I feel like I'm on the verge of a grand thesis here. lol
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Feb 3, 2014 03:17
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Clipperton posted:I'm guessing they named them Jaegers because PR is partly an homage to anime, and anime uses a ton of German words (eg these), just because they sound cool. So if I put a bunch of kanji and anime babes in my sig, that doesn't mean anything?
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Feb 3, 2014 03:36
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Clipperton posted:I'm guessing they named them Jaegers because PR is partly an homage to anime, and anime uses a ton of German words (eg these), just because they sound cool. Your "Gratuitous German" tvtropes page has no specific entry for Pacific Rim. Therefore, it is not gratuitous. Objectively.
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Feb 3, 2014 04:11
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I hate to see logic abused... No, it means the page is incomplete.
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Feb 3, 2014 05:52
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It was a joke! However, it's interesting that the article ALSO references Hellboy, a Del Toro movie, but no-one at all has yet thought to make mention of the central objects (that some posters have even referred to as characters!) of another of his films, one quite popular among Tropers if I recall. So, Del Toro is either a complete idiot for naming the central characters of his film in a language belonging to a country not involved in the conflict in any other noticeable way whatsoever for no reason (even though the guy has frequently and openly discussed fascism in his films (again! HELLBOY!)), or alternatively he is doing a thing. This is not even a big deal to me, Germany's absence is a minor bullet point in my reading of the film at the most. But come on! Do you have any respect for Guillermo Del Toro at all or do you really think he just chooses names that 'sound cool' with zero regard at all for their implicit meanings? What about Travis Beacham, the second writer? I thought you guys liked the film! If your answer is seriously the latter, then a further question: Why do German words 'sound cool' at all? Answer: Because they are foreign-sounding, and therefore exotic. Implicit meaning: The German language is regarded as a foreign in a film about the unity of the people of Earth. Hbomberguy fucked around with this message at 06:28 on Feb 3, 2014 |
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Feb 3, 2014 06:26
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If they chose the name just because it sounded cool, it makes me like the movie even more.
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Feb 3, 2014 06:44
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I think the more interesting thing here is how Hbomberguy is upset about Germany's exclusion but there isn't a word from him about Africa's exclusion.quote:Why do German words 'sound cool' at all? Answer: Because they are foreign-sounding, and therefore exotic. Implicit meaning: The German language is regarded as a foreign in a film about the unity of the people of Earth. I thought the point was different languages' words were used to further cement that it wasn't any one nation's problem. RBA Starblade fucked around with this message at 07:07 on Feb 3, 2014 |
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Feb 3, 2014 06:59
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RBA Starblade posted:I think the more interesting thing here is how Hbomberguy is upset about Germany's exclusion but there isn't a word from him about Africa or South America's exclusion. You raise a good question here. Why aren't I? Well, primarily because the giant robots aren't named in afrikaans, so their absence is less 'palpable', but there's still a good point in there. How we define 'everyone' and 'the world' and so on is an important thing to ask even outside the context of the film. I'm not 'upset' about Germany's exclusion at all. I'll restate it again, this is a minor point at the most. It is that the absence can be interpreted to mean something. It's quite simple really. Also while I was writing this post you edited out 'or South America'. What are you hiding? What don't you like about South America? Also why didn't you say 'or Brazil?' What don't you like about Brazil? (this is a joke to self-reflexively illustrate my point) quote:I thought the point was different languages' words were used to further cement that it wasn't any one nation's problem. It doesn't seem to be Germany's problem, though. If it was a Russian name, or Chinese, or Japanese, or the language of the place first hit by a kaiju (I think it was America?) We would not be having this conversation. Two writers chose Jaeger, and chose for Germany not to be involved. This 'means something,' however 'small.'
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Feb 3, 2014 07:14
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quote:Also while I was writing this post you edited out 'or South America'. What are you hiding? What don't you like about South America? Also why didn't you say 'or Brazil?' What don't you like about Brazil? (this is a joke to self-reflexively illustrate my point) Because I'm a dumb and missed that some countries in South America actually are on the Pacific Rim.  quote:It doesn't seem to be Germany's problem, though. How is "annihilation of humanity" and "global destabilization" not also Germany's problem? Also, and I looked, apparently Germans helped design and build the first Jaegers. RBA Starblade fucked around with this message at 07:43 on Feb 3, 2014 |
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Feb 3, 2014 07:27
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Africa's Jaeger would've had a really big pot belly and his only weapon would be female circumcision.
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Feb 3, 2014 11:59
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Tezcatlipoca posted:Calling your giant, monster fighting robots jaegers sounds cool. That's about as much importance as I place in jaeger. Your refusal to engage with a text is not evidence of an absence of meaning.
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Feb 3, 2014 12:16
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sassassin posted:Your refusal to engage with a text is not evidence of an absence of meaning. If anything, it's the opposite. But fer crying out loud, there is obvious meaning to Russia, China, the US and the British commonwealth uniting with Germany and Japan. In a film full of WWII imagery (Rosie the Riveter!). Gottlieb, in his long black coat, was not named that because Gottlieb is a cool name. They literally have the definitions of words pop up in the screen in order to explain to people that the meaning of words is important. The text explains that 'Jaeger' is a German word. Why do they explain it? Earlier in the thread, you goofballs were marveling at how the colour blue in the costumes and hairstyles was used to symbolize vulnerability. But now the words that someone wrote (formatted, chose a font for...) mean nothing. Come on.
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Feb 3, 2014 12:52
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WastedJoker posted:Africa's Jaeger would've had a really big pot belly and his only weapon would be female circumcision. Kenya's Jaeger: 
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Feb 3, 2014 13:51
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Piedmon Sama posted:The heroes of Pacific Rim are vigilantes or a para-military group, essentially funded by organized crime. In Independence Day, they are literally led by the President and a jocular Will Smith (who unlike the heroes of PR, has a libido). In ID4 the clown or Jar-Jar character nobly sacrifices himself and nobody of importance dies (repeated in, for instance, The Mummy), while PR practically bewails the doomed heroism of its pagan champions as they throw themselves at the Crack of Doom in a suicide run (but once Herc's son is dead, he's never mentioned again). Reading the blog posts on Infinitely Full of Hope on (capitalist) infantilisation reminded me of Pacific Rim, for some of the same reasons you pick up here. It maybe isn't a surprise that the film is 'supposed to' be enjoyed from the perspective of a child marvelling at the big monsters and robots (and they are huge, placing us at the viewpoint level of a small child looking up at them). The heroes of the film are glorified children. You mention here the lack of libido in the film, I think that's completely right and I don't think it's for the purpose of any sort of feminism or progressiveness that the protagonists embrace asexually at the end of the film. Any sort of adult sexuality in the film is replaced with these weird parent-child relationships, or is met with shock/disgust. There's Mako and Stacker in the more literal sense, but then also that relationship is just displaced onto Raleigh - she's shocked by seeing him undressing, but it's in this (fairly pathetic) little-girl way which never develops into anything else. When Mako isn't playing the adult-child to those two, she's in the position of a literal helpless child in her memories. Newt is the stereotypical capitalist man-child, a consumerist who enjoys the packaging of the kaiju into cute tattoos and toys. There's the Hansens, which if you think about it is kind of nightmarish - what kind of twisted oedipal complex is it that imagines a grown adult permanently attached to his father's psyche as a heroic figure, and isn't it hosed up somehow that the child sacrifices himself while the father lives? Even the kaiju's birth is 'virginal' (though everyone is still revolted even by that). The heroes are passive and child-like. They are subordinates, and there's no traditional rising to command by the hero - the commander dies at the end of the crisis, when there is no longer a need for him. Mako wants something, but will give it up if ordered to. Raleigh is so blank he's almost a depressive figure, a sort of heroic zombie, he doesn't particularly desire anything, least of all a woman. Newt wants something, but when he gets it, it's traumatic and he shrinks away from the resolution of it (the touching of the kaiju's 'tongue' - also a metaphorical sexual maturation.) The mature adults, Stacker and whats-his-face the capitalist bloke, do things and have motivations, but they aren't the protagonists, we aren't supposed to identify with them. The best the heroes get is taking on the same strong but simplistic motivation of the kaiju - destroy things. And even to do that they have to take on another identity, it requires the strength of two people and a fabricated larger-than-life form, to have this sad motive! It lends this weirdly profound patheticness to the film: two huge personality-less non-entities mashing up against each other like action figures, because they're being controlled by someone else. Pacific Rim: a film about fascist babies.
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Feb 3, 2014 14:55
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WastedJoker posted:Africa's Jaeger would've had a really big pot belly and his only weapon would be female circumcision. Which would probably make it the most effective Jaeger of all, what with all the Kaiju being (apparently) female.
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Feb 3, 2014 14:59
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Prism Mirror Lens posted:The heroes are passive and child-like. They are subordinates, and there's no traditional rising to command by the hero - the commander dies at the end of the crisis, when there is no longer a need for him. Mako wants something, but will give it up if ordered to. Raleigh is so blank he's almost a depressive figure, a sort of heroic zombie, he doesn't particularly desire anything, least of all a woman. Newt wants something, but when he gets it, it's traumatic and he shrinks away from the resolution of it (the touching of the kaiju's 'tongue' - also a metaphorical sexual maturation.) The mature adults, Stacker and whats-his-face the capitalist bloke, do things and have motivations, but they aren't the protagonists, we aren't supposed to identify with them. The best the heroes get is taking on the same strong but simplistic motivation of the kaiju - destroy things. Sounds just like Evangelion to me.
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Feb 3, 2014 15:02
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SuperMechagodzilla posted:They literally have the definitions of words pop up in the screen in order to explain to people that the meaning of words is important. The text explains that 'Jaeger' is a German word. Why do they explain it? Because most people associate jaeger with alcohol.
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Feb 3, 2014 16:30
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To fight monsters, we created Jaegerbombs.
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Feb 3, 2014 16:34
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RBA Starblade posted:To fight monsters, we created Jaegerbombs. The world was saved by a Jaegerbomb.
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Feb 3, 2014 16:36
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Tezcatlipoca posted:Because most people associate jaeger with alcohol. So Del Toro takes his time to explain what the robot is with a faux-dictionary because he has no faith in his audience, for no other ulterior reasons?
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Feb 3, 2014 16:42
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Kaiju Cage Match posted:The world was saved by a Jaegerbomb. This brings my reading of the movie to a whole new level.
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Feb 3, 2014 16:46
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Hbomberguy posted:So Del Toro takes his time to explain what the robot is with a faux-dictionary because he has no faith in his audience, for no other ulterior reasons? Yes, a brief line of text explaining what jaeger and kaiju actually mean so the audience isn't confused. If you don't think it was necessary then you give the general audience a lot more credit than they deserve. There may be a deeper meaning for using those names but I don't agree with the one you've come up with.
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Feb 3, 2014 16:50
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Tezcatlipoca posted:Yes, a brief line of text explaining what jaeger and kaiju actually mean so the audience isn't confused. If you don't think it was necessary then you give the general audience a lot more credit than they deserve. He could have easily chosen terms that didn't require explanation. But he didn't.
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Feb 3, 2014 16:54
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Tezcatlipoca posted:Yes, a brief line of text explaining what jaeger and kaiju actually mean so the audience isn't confused. If you don't think it was necessary then you give the general audience a lot more credit than they deserve. Dude what the hell is that in your AV. e: Kaiju Cage Match posted:The world was saved by a Jaegerbomb. That is so awesome. Clipperton fucked around with this message at 18:10 on Feb 3, 2014 |
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Feb 3, 2014 17:00
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Hbomberguy posted:So Del Toro takes his time to explain what the robot is with a faux-dictionary because he has no faith in his audience, for no other ulterior reasons? You don't think the word "jaeger" exists in German?
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Feb 3, 2014 17:07
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Hodgepodge posted:This brings my reading of the movie to a whole new level. Pacific Rim is all about booze, not 10,000 pages of fascist poo poo arguing.
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Feb 3, 2014 17:26
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I hate you people for making me go to the Pacific Rim wikipedia just to check that I'm not crazy and every single country with a giant robot is on the Pacific.
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Feb 3, 2014 17:55
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Kaiju Cage Match posted:Pacific Rim is all about booze, not 10,000 pages of fascist poo poo arguing. I agree, there's way more stuff worth talking about than the fascism aspect. However, posters keep bringing up the fascism stuff like everyone who interprets the film that way is super invested in it or whatever, but the opposite is what appears to be true - the people who keep bringing it up are the ones who think it's 'reading too much' or 'just a movie about fighting monsters' or whatever, usually by inventing a strawman version of the reading being presented in order to defend their (completely fine) facile enjoyment of a monster being punched in the face. If you really don't want to talk about fascism, don't talk about it. I obviously can't speak for others but I at least am more than happy to talk about other aspects of the film when they come up, and I don't for example interrupt people talking about robot toys to tell them the film is actively making fun of them for buying into the commoditisation of killing machines in real life, because that would be impolite and come off as petulant whining about people discussing aspects of a film in a film discussion thread. penismightier posted:I hate you people for making me go to the Pacific Rim wikipedia just to check that I'm not crazy and every single country with a giant robot is on the Pacific. Does every country on the Pacific have a giant robot?
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Feb 3, 2014 18:11
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Hbomberguy posted:Does every country on the Pacific have a giant robot? Go look yourself. But it's a drat good reason for Germany not to be present.
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Feb 3, 2014 18:21
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sassassin posted:He could have easily chosen terms that didn't require explanation. But he didn't. Thanks for pointing that out, I hadn't realized that before. Clipperton posted:Dude what the hell is that in your AV. Fat people.
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Feb 3, 2014 18:52
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Hbomberguy posted:If you really don't want to talk about fascism, don't talk about it. I obviously can't speak for others but I at least am more than happy to talk about other aspects of the film when they come up, and I don't for example interrupt people talking about robot toys to tell them the film is actively making fun of them for buying into the commoditisation of killing machines in real life, because that would be impolite and come off as petulant whining about people discussing aspects of a film in a film discussion thread. Guillermo Del Toro bought a second house just to keep his toys in, I don't think he's making fun of anyone for toychat. Tezcatlipoca posted:Fat people. That's not what's creepy about it.
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Feb 3, 2014 19:29
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Clipperton posted:Guillermo Del Toro bought a second house just to keep his toys in, I don't think he's making fun of anyone for toychat. Anyone who uses a second house to store their toys knows there is something very wrong with what they are doing.
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Feb 3, 2014 19:58
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penismightier posted:Go look yourself. But it's a drat good reason for Germany not to be present. ...but it is, nonetheless, present - along with Britain. Gottlieb and Stacker represent those nations.
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Feb 3, 2014 20:33
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Hbomberguy posted:Anyone who uses a second house to store their toys knows there is something very wrong with what they are doing. Wikipedia posted:In addition to the home in which he lives with his family, he owns a separate house exclusively to house his books, poster artwork and other belongings pertaining to his work, explaining, "As a kid, I dreamed of having a house with secret passages and a room where it rained 24 hours a day. The point of being over 40 is to fulfill the desires you've been harboring since you were 7." Doesn't sound like he's all that ashamed of it. There's also this: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nYoAIgjlvL4
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Feb 3, 2014 20:39
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