1.) Wreck-It-Ralph
“Don’t question your role in life”
The movie Wreck-It-Ralph takes place in the
world of a video game arcade. Apparently when all the customers leave for the
day, the characters leave their games and mingle with each other. One such
character is the titular Wreck-It-Ralph, who is the villain of a game called
Fix-It-Felix Jr., kind of like a Donkey Kong style game. Ralph destroys the
building and terrorizes the inhabitants and Felix has to fix everything and
defeat him. Now this game is supposed to be very old so Ralph has been a
villain for a long time. And he’s tired of it. So the story revolves around
Ralph going on various adventures and making new friends as he tries to prove
he is more than just a villain. But ultimately at the end of the movie, HE IS
JUST A VILLIAN. The entire movie where Ralph is trying to be more than who he
is gets completely negated. Ralph is a villain, he’ll always be a villain, his
entire game doesn’t work without him being the villain. Essentially this movie
has the complete opposite message of another Disney classic, Aladdin. In
Aladdin, Al is trying to get people to see that he is more than just a street
rat. If he were in Ralph’s movie, he’d still be a street rat by the end of it.
He’d just be a popular street rat.
2.) The
Wizard/Rainman “It’s okay to take advantage of the mentally disabled”
There seems to be a trend in Hollywood
(certainly in the 80s and 90s) where it is perfectly acceptable for people to
take advantage of the mentally handicapped. Particularly if you are related to
said mentally handicapped child. Both The Wizard and Rainman involve a man (or
boy in the case of the Wizard) going on an adventure where they drag along
their mentally handicapped yet genius savant brother/half-brother along where
said brother uses their unique handicap to the benefit of the nonhandicapped
brother. In Rainman it is winning big in Vegas. In The Wizard it is hustling at
video games and eventually win a national video game tournament. While both
films have the pair of brothers growing closer on their journey, it still starts
out with a brother using the unique impaired mind of their sibling for their
own gain. The only thing that makes this act forgivable is the eventual
resolution of the films, which the characters have no knowledge of at the
beginning of the film. For all intents and purposes, these people were content
to simply use their siblings for their own gain and possibly ditch them as soon
as they no longer became useful and were instead burdensome.
3.) Jobs
“You can be an asshole as long as you’re brilliant”
How accurate the film Jobs is as a
biography of the late Apple Computers founder and CEO Steve Jobs has been
debated by friends and critics of the man alike. But as far as the film is
concerned, the main message of the films seems to be that Steve Jobs was a bit
of a dick. But that didn’t matter, because he was such an artistic genius and
forward thinker, he could be a dick. He could screw over his friends and
destroy his company’s property, but as long as he spouted some words of wisdom,
all is forgiven. This is a terrible message simply because we now live in an
age where
4.) Ferris
Bueller’s Day Off “Skipping school is fine if you’re a person of privilige.”
Education is supposed to be the corner
stone to a bright future. Unless you’re rich and charming in which case don’t
bother with school and just enjoy life. That seems to be the ultimate message
of Ferris Bueller’s Day Off. Ferris has been blessed with caring parents, a hot
girlfriend, and the ability to just make everyone like him (except for his
principal and his sister, and even she likes him by the end of the film).
5.) Blade
Runner “You can kill sentient life forms as long as they’re not human.”
Humans have very little respect for things
that are not humans throughout the history of science fiction. Even the aliens
we do get along with usually have to look humanish or we consider them an
enemy. But the truth is humans really only trust other red blooded humans. No
movie shows this more than Blade Runner. Although I have never read Do Androids
Dream of Electric Sheep (the story the movie is based on) I doubt the story
strays much from the idea that artificially created life is not the same as
biologically birthed life. The Replicants in Blade Runner are so similar to
humans the only way to tell them apart from normal humans is to interrogate
them with a series of questions looking for emotions (something they lack due
to a lack of memories, or dreams, you know what watch the movie, I can’t
explain it all here). But despite being almost exactly like humans, you can hunt
a replicant down and kill it with very little social stigma. In fact that’s
what our main character, Decker, does for a living. He hunts down replicants.
And not delicately. One of the replicants he guns down in the middle of the
street. Now some of the replicants seem to be violent and should be killed, or
at the very least arrested, but the one he a kills in the street was working as
a stripper. She, as far as Decker knew, was just earning a living. But she’s
not human so that means her life is forfeit.
6.) The
Matrix “If they’re not with us, they’re against us”
The Matrix almost takes the Blade Runner
logic to a more violent extreme. In the world of the Matrix, all of humanity is
plugged into giant battery towers with their minds existing in a virtual world
(aka The Matrix). A small percentage of people have been unplugged from the
Matrix and are trying to fight the malicious programs (Agents) that are
oppressing the still plugged in citizenry. But here’s the thing, Morpheus
straight up says that anyone who is still plugged into the system is a
potential enemy. So even though the unplugged humans are trying to fight to
free their fellow humans (or not as demonstrated in this blog entry) they will
still gun down enemy humans by the dozens. Enemy humans who are completely
ignorant of this fight between unplugged human and programs. These unplugged
humans are killing the humans they are supposed to be fighting to save. It does
seem to imply a disturbing caste system that the unplugged humans’ lives are
more valuable than the plugged humans. Essentially if someone is not a member
of your particular group then they are fair game to murder.
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