viz. - Mourning

Big Hero 6 and the Consolations of Violence

Scott Garbacz — Sun, 29 Mar 2015 18:31:50 +0000

Image screen-captured from Disney Movies Anywhere.

Last week, I discussed the ways Guardians of the Galaxy mixes a more-or-less serious story of grief and community formation with a gleefully irresponsible sense of violence and adventure. While I emphasized the way these two themes contrast with each other, in reality they work together in the cause of big-screen popcorn entertainment. The story of Quill’s quest to acknowledge and accept the death of his mother provides a certain emotional grounding to the story’s rather silly violence, while the gleeful immaturity of the overall narrative lessens the sting of its brush with seriousness. This week, I want to turn to the kids’ movie version of Guardians of the Galaxy: Big Hero 6. Both share not only their Marvel-produced heritage, but also an odd interest in fatherlessness, the psychological roots of violence, and the process of grief. The most surprising element of Big Hero 6, however, is how much more seriously it takes these issues than Guardians of the Galaxy; its handling of grief, mourning, and violence indeed open up more general critiques both of the superhero genre and of the desires that make it popular. (Obviously, spoilers follow.)

Big Hero 6 may not open with the death of a mother, but its protagonist (Hiro) begins the movie as an orphan, and soon watches as his brother (Daniel) perishes in an attempt to save a professor from a burning building. Orphanhood is of course standard fare in animated children’s movies, though generally a dead mother rather than a brother provides the ghostly presence animating the film. Yet Baymax, the film’s most iconic figure, stands as a constant reminder of Daniel’s absence. The kind-hearted, marshmallow-shaped medical robot carries Daniel’s spirit (or at least his last programming masterpiece) in its heart (or at least the data port located just to the left of center in Baymax’s upper chest), and the movie spends a great deal of time depicting Hiro’s ambivalent feelings towards his brother’s last, greatest scientific invention. If Guardians of the Galaxy deals with mourning only sporadically—primarily in the two scenes where its hero must grasp his dying mother’s hand—Big Hero 6 evokes Hiro’s recent loss every time Baymax appears on the screen. (Hiro’s young aunt, incidentally, survives as an enduring if frazzled maternal presence; her few scenes evoke images of an older and somewhat more settled version of Lilo and Stitch’s Nani, a character whose subversion of Disney romantic formulas has been discussed previously here.)

Image screen-captured from Disney Movies Anywhere.

The film follows much of the same plot structure of Guardians of the Galaxy. As Hiro goes through the process of mourning, he also meets his own team of eccentric, entertaining fellow potential superheroes at “Nerd School,” with whom Hiro shares both jokes and peril. Interestingly, Hiro’s supporting cast features more than a token minority presence; the film’s choice of voice actors, characters, and even the architecture of the fictional city of San Fransokyo reflects the world’s ever-increasing cultural hybridity, side-stepping obvious cultural stereotypes in ways that, for one critic at least “mark a genuine break from the past.” The characters are far from perfect; this may be the first Marvel-made movie to feature two female superheroes, but it still contrasts an absent-minded valley girl against the sort of two-dimensional “competent girl” stereotype that frustrated me in, say, The Lego Movie. Yet in comparison to most superhero movies these days, I was struck by how grounded these heroes seemed to be. They are written as characters who come from the sorts of places we encounter on earth, rather than the billionaire playboys, alien creatures, and historical relics that dominate the Marvel universe. The protagonists of Big Hero 6 seem formed by their worlds, rather than outsiders who work to shape everyone else’s destiny.

Image screen-captured from Disney Movies Anywhere.

More exceptional than the film’s cast, however, is its visual palate and its engagement with violence. Kid’s films have long played on the equation of maturity with bloodless (yet often lethal) violence. Last year alone, The Lego Movie (the year’s top grossing film of PG rating or below) featured a hero who blithely guns down police officers, Maleficient traded on its hero’s dark sorcery, and How To Train Your Dragon 2 taught its Viking hero that some men must be killed because they cannot be reasoned with. Each film, that is, ties the hero’s growth and maturity to his or her ability to change the world through violence. In such an environment, it is notable that Big Hero 6’s characters simply don’t kill anyone, and that Hiro’s companions are horrified at the thought of doing so.

Image screen-captured from Disney Movies Anywhere.

Baymax, in fact, stands as the visual incarnation of a form of power that is neither elegant nor violent. One early wordless joke features Baymax’s attempt to navigate a room; his vinyl body screeches awkwardly between a bed and a table, knocking off a series of books, as he tries to make his way towards Hiro. Hiro tries to make Baymax “cool” by teaching him a fistbump that ends in an explosive sound; Baymax echoes the motion and re-interprets the sound as a childlike “bwadaladaladala.” Even when Baymax helps the heroes to find the film’s villain, he does so as a result of his tendency towards nonviolence; he scans the villain instinctively, since he is “programmed to assess everyone’s healthcare needs.”

Image screen-captured from Disney Movies Anywhere.

In fact, Hiro’s enthusiasm for violence is arguably the film’s true villain. In pursuit of the man who stole his inventions and murdered his brother, Hiro adds secondary, martial functions to Baymax’s programming, and then removes his brother’s chip so as to enable Baymax to kill. While images of a Hulk-like Baymax attacking Hiro’s friends provide the hero-on-hero fights expected in a Marvel movie, they serve as a reminder of the film’s central concern with grief. Throughout the movie, Baymax insists that Daniel lives on, both in his programming and in Hiro’s heart. That Hiro must remove his brother's chip in order to enable his violence materializes the film’s argument about grief and rage. If Hiro is to truly accept his brother’s death, he must learn to desire something other than visceral revenge. Yet the scene also implies an argument about the superhero genre itself: the sort of violent spectacle audiences regularly seek in summer blockbusters may be itself unhealthy, an immediately-pleasing catharsis that masks our ability to deal with weightier matters of life (and death.) A rampaging, red-eyed Baymax is mere spectacle; the cuddly, soft, gentle-toned Baymax stands as a reminder of the reality of death, and the difficulty of mourning.

Image screen-captured from Disney Movies Anywhere.

The arguments embodied in Baymax are repeated in the film’s villian, a professor whose refusal to accept his daughter’s wrongful (apparent) death at the hands of an irresponsible corporate scientist leads to his own acts of megalomaniacal violence. In fitting Marvel fashion, Baymax’s semi-nonviolence is ultimately vindicated when the heroes are able to save the Professor’s daughter despite her father’s insanity. Yet the association between nonviolence and grief lingers.

Baymax is far from the first semi-pacifist comic book hero; Batman, for instance, is marked in most variations by his inability to kill. Yet Big Hero 6 is intriguing in linking such violence explicitly to the wrathful impulses of imperfect mourning. While films like Guardians of the Galaxy use their heroes’ experiences of mourning as a way of giving emotional heft to proceedings that otherwise might spiral into meaningless, unsympathetic violence, Big Hero 6 explores the potential that our desire for such movies may be inherently unproductive. In any case, it is notable that of last year’s two major Marvel movies, the one made explicitly for kids is less escapist, more grounded in visible human experience, and ultimately more thoughtful.

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Disney

superheroes

Marvel

Mourning

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Assholes Holding the Hand of the Dying: The Mixed Aesthetics of Guardian of the Galaxy

Scott Garbacz — Tue, 24 Mar 2015 20:08:58 +0000

Image screen-captured from DisneyMoviesAnywhere.com.

The opening scene of 2014’s zaniest megabudget blockbuster is remarkably drab. In strict opposition to the vibrantly colorful world (and equally colorful dialog) teased in the film’s trailers, this scene features no jokes, nothing shiny, no space-age vehicles or thrilling heroics. Instead, the desaturated images show a poorly-lit hospital whose green-and-brown color scheme testifies to the sheer ugliness of 1980’s medical aesthetics. Visually, the only bright spot is the halo-like pillow surrounding young Peter Quill’s mother where she lies in bed, devoid of hair and eyebrows, dying of cancer.

I’m not sure even Birdman pulls off an image this banal. Image screen-captured from DisneyMoviesAnywhere.com.

The brief scene is as one-note and dreary as the visuals; Quill’s mother describes his apparently deadbeat dad as “an angel” and asks Quill to take her hand. He doesn’t. She dies while he is still recoiling in horror. When Quill is left alone outside of her room, he flees from the hospital—where, in a moment of sheer artifice meant to contrast with all that went before, he is abducted by a beautiful starship.

The 1980’s:when spaceships were as beautiful as hospitals were ugly. Image screen-captured from DisneyMoviesAnywhere.com.

Quill’s mother serves double narrative duty. In the first place, she represents everything Quill will spend the rest of the movie fleeing: responsibility, personal connections, and most of all death in its many guises. Yet despite her human origins, Quill’s mother also serves as the first of the film’s many striking images of otherworldly beauty: even dying of cancer she exudes a certain peaceful luminosity. She thus foreshadows the sort of spectacle science fiction excels at: not the derring-do, pyrotechnics, and fast-cutting of action scenes (though there will be plenty of that), but the otherworldly beauty found in many of the film’s nooks and crannies, as well as the promise (however superficially made) that filmgoers might learn to love and cherish that which appears disconcertingly alien.

Image screen-captured from DisneyMoviesAnywhere.com.

The Disney-owned Marvel Studios is nothing if not a well-oiled machine for churning out clever-enough scripts that leave no narrative potential unused. So of course Quill’s mother makes a final appearance in the film. The story’s climax hinges upon an alien device of near infinite power, usable by Quill because of his arcane backstory. Yet as he does the expected save-the-universe thing, he participates in a vision where his mother appears in space, asking him once again to hold her hand.

Image screen-captured from DisneyMoviesAnywhere.com.

The illusory hand of his mother turns out to be the real-life hand of Gamorrah, the blue-skinned assassin who serves as Quill’s love interest. Quill’s inability to comfort his mother at her death—with all its implied irresponsibility and lack of commitment—thus finds its antithesis in his ability to connect with his comrades. Quill not only manages to hold his mother’s hand as she dies, but his gripping of Gamorrah’s hand hints that he might also be capable of future relationships more robust than his previous anonymous economic or sexual transactions. Indeed, the struggle to of the desire for human connection against a hard-won cynicism dominates each of the film's characters, imparting a human undertone to their operatic histories. Gamorrah’s adoptive father may be a nigh omnipotent being in love with death, but he is also an emotionally abusive father. Similarly, Rocket Raccoon may be an irresponsible raccoon with an unaccountable enthusiasm for blowing up planets, but the script repeatedly reminds its audience that he’s been wounded both by his origin as an abomination of science, and by the fact that his creator has abandoned him. In holding Gamorrah’s hand, Quill both accepts death and joins a newfound community. The hand-holding thus echoes the film's most memorable scene, where Groot explains "we are Groot" while sacrificing himself for the rest of the crew. Not just Quill, but Groot and by extension the entire crew must accept the reality of death—only then can they regain a sense of communal belonging.

Yup. Even this guy has mixed feelings about his origins. Image screen-captured from DisneyMoviesAnywhere.com.

Of course, no one buys Imax 3D tickets expecting to see a moral drama about accepting death; the film’s obvious interest in mourning jars fascinatingly with the movie’s primary pleasure: that of watching an animate tree and talking squirrel make lots of people very dead while cracking jokes. The majority of the film’s running time and production values are dedicated to a series of well-planned and quite entertaining fights, wisecracks, and implausible-yet-cool special effects. Like so many superhero movies, the film revels in ridiculous (if bloodless) violence, perpetrated by characters sympathetic enough to attract an audience but malicious enough to steal people’s prostheses, rob ancient historical sites, shoot at policemen, and incite prison riots. Unlike many superhero movies, the film draws attention to the imperfect morality of its heroes’ hijinks. Thus alongside Groot’s moving claim that “we are Groot,” the movie has a second moral. “I'm an asshole, but what I am not is a 100% dick.” Perhaps the film’s greatest fantasy, then, is not that a man might fly a spaceship through a beautiful and diverse galaxy, but rather that the simple act of not being a total dick is worthy of great praise.

Image screen-captured from DisneyMoviesAnywhere.com.

The two themes perhaps come together in the above image of Groot. Here we have a talking tree, presumably a gentle soul and certainly the team’s conscience (even if he is only capable of speaking four words). He grins disarmingly at the audience. He is also celebrating his ability to violently pummel dozens of faceless soldiers to death. It is the perfect summary of the film as a whole: gleefully irresponsible popcorn entertainment with an admixture of humane compassion and vulnerability. I also can’t help but think, somehow, that this offers a more honest glimpse than most films into the nature and culture that made it the year's top grossing film: a people capable of great violence, great thoughtlessness, and great irresponsibility, yet also capable of a surprising amount of empathy, warmth, and connection.

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Memes, Nostalgia, and Mourning: the Case of Leonard Nimoy

Scott Garbacz — Tue, 03 Mar 2015 23:43:02 +0000

Image credit: Motley News

Last Friday, Leonard Nimoy, the actor who played Spock in countless Star Trek episodes, movies, and cartoons, passed away. As with all celebrities, grief among his fans tends to be expressed in memes—simple visual icons collaboratively authored, passed on through social media, and anthologized in sites like Buzzfeed. These reactions testify to the wide array of meanings given to one celebrity, and bring up some interesting questions about the nature of nostalgia, mourning, and televised celebrities.

First there is Nimoy's own contribution, the last tweet made before he passed away:

Image credit: Twitter.

And, most appropriately, a Vulcan salute from the Final Frontier itself:

Image credit: The Huffington Post.

Other memes reposted by Nimoy’s fans were generally heartfelt, but not necessarily so somber. The Kermit image at the top of this article is one example, testifying to the role Spock played in countless childhoods. But then there's this combination of retro-cool and nerd-cool, where Nimoy takes up a pose reminiscent of Steve McQueen:

Image credit: Motley News.

Similarly, fans posted a recreation of an iconic Beatles album, with Spock being beamed up, presumably, to whatever best afterlife the reader imagines:

Image credit: Motley News.

Other reactions express a more aggressive form of nostalgia, such as this protest the Abrams’ reboot of Star Trek:

Image credit: Motley News.

Then, because this is the internet, we have the silly responses, such as the Canadian trend of defacing currency so that it bears a remarkable resemblance to the iconic Vulcan:

Image credit: Twitter.

Less visually oriented was the 1968 article “Spock: Teenage Outcast,” now re-circulating furiously as a Buzzfeed article, in which Leonard Nimoy took time to respond to a biracial teenage girl via an extended discussion of Spock’s fictional struggles with both Vulcan and human racism:

Image Credit: Buzzfeed. Of course.

But perhaps the most moving image of the weekend, at least to this lifelong fan of science fiction television, abandoned words altogether:

Image Source: Facebook.

The image is fascinating in its starkness. In the top frame, Bones (DeForest Kelley), Kirk (William Shatner), Spock, and Scotty (James Doohan) laugh and drink together. In the bottom frame, only Kirk is left. While the scene is drawn from early Star Trek, the message drives home just how much work time and death have done. Doohan, Kelley, and now Nimoy have passed away. The celluloid Kirk remains, looking the same as he always did (if not better, thanks to digital image remastering), yet somehow signifying an old age in which his friends are dead, and his glory years are behind him.

The image is foremost a reminder of the reality that even those who live long and prosper will inevitably watch as their friends precede them to the grave. Yet its use of only youthful faces also seems a commentary on the weird power of images to create the illusion of immortality. Kirk will always be, for those who have Amazon Prime accounts or DVDs of Star Trek, a captain in his mid 30’s, surrounded by an ever-young and ever-courageous crew, determined to boldly go where no man has gone before. Yet these actors, too, are human; Kirk’s companions, and soon Kirk himself, will survive on earth only as ghosts: recordings and memories. If adventures seem to promise an eternal voyage through the vastness of the universe, this image reminds us that such immortality is illusory. Even Spock dies—and so does every other human we know and love.

I am struck, in fact, by how often religion and nostalgia are twined together in so many of these these memes. Thoughts of the afterlife naturally tend to accompany death, but for a celebrity like Nimoy, known to generations of his fans through childhood exposure to Star Trek, the crisis is particularly poignant. Nimoy’s death is a challenge to our earliest intimations of immortality, marring childhood adventure with death, but it is also an opportunity to defy death and re-assert the eternal value of the many things Spock represented. Thus we imagine Nimoy in Heaven, beamed up, or glowing; or, simultaneously, we can argue that his spirit is immortally entwined with the civil rights movement, the quest to explore the cosmos, or other metanarratives. But I can’t get the last image out of my head—probably because it resonates so well with my own religious faith, and its ambiguous treatment of nostalgia. The history and rhetoric of Christianity is saturated with calls to remember our mortality, to know that earthly achievements are ultimately prey to the ravages of time and forgetfulness. “Dust you are,” as the Genesis narrative has it, “and to dust you shall return.” This phrase applies to celluloid demigods, it turns out, as well as to the rest of us.

Mostly, though, I am struck by the way that so many of these responses seem tied together in Nimoy’s last tweet: “A life is like a garden. Perfect moments can be had, but not preserved, except in memory. LLAP.” As much as our nostalgia tries to preserve the Edenic experience of staring at adventure stories in wide-eyed wonder, we can no more recreate our childhood than we can bring Nimoy back from the dead. All that is left is memory, recapitulation, inscription in the cultural consciousness: a process that, we hope, may provide a certain wisdom and help us to live long and prosper.

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