IM: WHUSDJ
CURRENT SHOW
Word and Music
the film "independance day" is at once both a subtle jab at the audience and pompous declaration of conquest of the contemporary american mindspace by organizations who style themselves as existing in the public eye as the Other. it exists as a sort of print-out, the manifestation of the business practice of owning a perception in the sense of intellectual property (the phrase being the definition of a method of negatively monetizing creativity*) as well as in the sense of a completley fabricated reality on offer instead of more traditional (useful) products such as hammers or playstations. the credo of disaster capitalism is played out as naturally a drama between an unknowable and complete force, and the everyman assisted handily by the mechanisms of violent physical domination by those to whom the state grants such a right - airplanes and computers figuring prominently. in fact it's for such an event that the machine was built.
the alien other is complete, global, and devoid of the will to communicate. it excercises utter technological domination* over the globe in a series of fantastic scenes examining in detail the logical extension of military power - beams of light with utter destructive force. the portrayal of these weapons on a screen by the producers is the weapon itself, symbolizing the effect the moving images have upon the retina & the mind -- utter control of attention, of self, of moment. the massive space ships are in fact the air within the theater itself, the space between persons reduced to less than zero by utter domination of sound, of vision, of empathy by a mechanized and utterly effective Other. what other kind of experience can be meaningfully had in a darkened room full of explosion? few easily.
the sly nods to alien wierdos is of course the producers inferring they are aware of their role as warriors.
"you don't think they actually spend $30K on a hammer, do you?" no, of course not, of course the money was secretly being spent on a necessary post-disaster asset, rather than being mis-spent on no tangible benefit to the populace.
the image of a caravan of winnebagos onverging on bases in the desert mutes the fact that secret infowar research facilities are presented in this film as a well intentioned fore-thought rather than the embarassed silence of the oppressor, and global informational control as necessary to defend against the imaginary phantoms of disasterism rather than an end to itself. luckily, that's okay because the strong bond of brotherhood portrayed in resistance to external domination by the Other is helpful instruction on how to desire battlefield victories.
the humanity being exterminated in this film is the ultimate symbol, as it's the symbol of the humanity of the viewer being decimated both by this film, and the tide of violent paens to mechanized destruction gracing the silver screen. it is the symbol for the result of itself. this is a strange loop.
very effective use of rotating surveillance display as mainfestation of the physical response to the news of utter violence
* aside from the need to use cnn's satellites as a wristwatch.