The Pervert's Guide to Ideology

source: The Pervert's Guide to Ideology

source: The Pervert's Guide to Ideology

Love it! I tend to respect movies which consist of one or more rolling spoken expositions, and this one is a series of lectures on film products as more or less witting commentaries on ideology. Zizek works for me: He gets me to pay attention, and usually to have little "breakthrough(s) in grey room". Some are truly mind-blowing, the rest less so... but one of the great takeaways is to remind me of my own tendency to mine narrative products for ideological subtext. Zizek does what *I* do, tho arguably significantly better than I do; so he encourages me to do better. Some points of style: I noticed one commenter accused Zizek of speaking in "broken" English. Zizek's English is *not* broken. I know: I teach ESL. Zizek may very well speak English better than that commenter. Zizek does have a thick accent, but to me this is just a spur to pay closer attention. The spirit here is a wedding of thoughtful insight and just plain ol' FUN. Zizek is having *fun*, here. Enjoy the show *with* him!

A largely unfocused analysis of films across the history of motion pictures similar to the first. Screenplay...................................... 8 / 10 Visuals................................................ 8 Sound................................................... 5 Editing................................................ 5 Music....................................................... 5 Timeless Utility................................. 6 Total.................................................... 37 / 70 ~= 5.3 (rounded to 5) Verdict................................... Passable.

The accent is brave, hardly penetrable. Captions are really necessary. But the title of the movie says it all: it IS Slovenian humor at an abstract, high-brow level. The host mitigates the Freudian legacy as he perverts - in a decreasing order - (1) Marx (2) Walter Benjamin and the Frankfurt School at large (3) Lacan. His universalizing framework comes from Lacanian psychoanalysis, although he is as 'revealing' as Lacan. The greatest apparent influence on Zizek seems to be that of Roland Barthes's 'Mythologies'. As if he were kinda Roland The Hip Semiologist, Zizek analyzes everything from the perspective of the 'myth,' revealing at every opportunity a new approach, criticizing our surrounding, culturally globalized habitat, and insinuating what might be its intrinsic authenticity. The film is essentially an illustrated conference in the style of other mass culture analysts such as Jacob Bronowski, John Berger, Robert Hughes, Kenneth Clark. Zizek is not interested in the respective ideology of the filmmakers he quotes. He uses fragments of films as illustrative of real life processes and their 'myths', not specifically Nazism or Communism, but rather the way we all shape our lives and the universal themes that connect our 'mythological' subconscious needs.

This guide is also highly rated in comparison with the film guide. Although abstracted in more to the theory and the world of ideas, than to the movies again it introduces us to the field of film art by already well known manner. I dare say that the selection of movies here is better. Some movies and directors that were missed in the previous guide were caught up and the final result is quite satisfactory. The opposition, which this time Zizek introduces to us is between free choice and hidden orders, which implicitly enshrined in its variants. Making a kind of circular proof, starting from one place and returning again to the starting position, the modern philosopher has moved us a step forward in iconic films concerning the relationship of the nondescript subject and revealing over him multiple authorities. In this mental shift The Castle of Kafka was moved to Brazil, The Taxi Driver dispensed justice, Titanic was named the edge of the abyss, which does not divide the love of the two lovers, but rather immortalises it, attempts to live another life were made, possibly away from a career in the army and so on, and so forth. Slovenian humor on an abstract level. Mitigating the impact of Freud to raise that of Marx and Lacan. Reveals us the opportunity for a new way to watch every film, being critical of the surrounding habitat and to remain fully authentic. Ladies and gentle man - Zizek! http://vihrenmitevmovies.blogspot.com/

The documentary may have a point. But it's unwatchable because of the monologue, the horrible accent and the lack of incentives to watch it. I really wanted to watch this, but it's torture. He should have learned from other documentaries how to make one. It can't be just about filling the audiences head with tons of philosophical and political thoughts. If that would be the case, he should have written a paper. But as a documentary, this is a fail.

As a philosopher Slavoj Zizek has impressive credentials and ideas worth studying. In this movie however, he seems to present a skeptics point of view on his opinion and subject which can be dangerous. Many the counter facts presented are just plain incorrect. The arguments are presented as a "Don't believe them, believe this" structure which is unusually, I'd expect a offering of information rather being told what to believe. The movie is worth watching if you're willing to follow up with your own research to get better information and answers than presented in this movie. If not, then viewing this movie alone is dangerous and it stands as irresponsible product.

The hyperactive Slovenian philosopher Zizek uses extracts from movies to show to us how the things we believe in (our ideology) are created by the external society. He goes in the sublime message of several scene's of famous movies. Once again the sound of music is his favorite. The only question that must be raised is the chicken and egg problem. Do these messages make society or do the desires of society make these messages. With advertisements it is of course clear that the message brings the ideology of the maker has to be pushed to us, but with movies we can have more doubt. This is not addressed in this movie. Furthermore I question if movie is the right medium to bring the message of Zizik. I thought in many moments that the images of the movies distracted from the story he was telling, my mind went into the movie, not into Zizek's story. For personal use I recorded the sound and listening to that I was much more able to think about the messages of Zizek. But all in all a worthwhile evening

For those of you who saw: "The Perverts Guide to Cinema", the first answer you'll want is no, Slavoj Zizek's near-impenetrable accent and lisp has not improved. Occasionally, the film will throw sub- titles on the screen to assist in understanding Zizek's musings on the devotion humans have to various "isms" and how they related to very early (Hitler's "Triumph of the Will") and very recent (Nolan's equally unrealistic "The Dark Knight). Presumably one can turn on the closed captioning feature on their laptop and it would be a great help. Once you get past this communication hurdle you'll hear Zizek cover a fair amount of obvious ground - "The Triumph of the Will", "The Last Temptation of Christ" and "Full Metal Jacket" have clear and unambiguous agendas which their audiences came to see. More Trojan Horse offerings make for more interesting discussions. Kudos to Zizek for leading with and praising the wildly underrated "They Live" John Carpenter's condemnation of modern consumer society. In other cases, say "Titanic" his argument that it contains a coherent agenda seems stretched and in others - particularly Taxi Driver (which is a study of the decent into madness in an insane environment) - his contention of it being an ideological argument seems to miss the mark. In short, not as interesting as his review of the psychoanalytic elements of, particularly Hitchock, movies from the original "Perverts Guide" but of interest to the cinephile.