tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6320802302155582419.post4109505309625817228..comments2024-02-13T12:50:30.457-05:00Comments on Rants Within the Undead God: Comedy and Existential CosmicismBenjamin Cainhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00661999592897690031noreply@blogger.comBlogger5125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6320802302155582419.post-32854639767148484272012-09-02T16:51:48.271-04:002012-09-02T16:51:48.271-04:00I'd say it's more a synecdoche for superna...I'd say it's more a synecdoche for supernatural traditions rather than any sort of targeted attack. You can only squeeze so much into the 1960s midwest. I take "guru" in the broadest possible sense of someone who claims to know something about the meaning of life that you don't, where this alleged expertise comes from tradition, authority, revelation etc.<br /><br />I suppose I'm amplifying the cosmicist implications to highlight them for the purposes of discussion. I wouldn't want to put any dogmatic views or grand metaphysical theses in the mouths of the filmmakers. I think the pop song is good advice, but its utility comes from its banality. In addition to comically deflating this guru they've been building up for an hour and half, the positive, uplifting message for the kid is that if you have the ability to aesthetically respond to pop music, you already have access to all the wisdom you can possibly expect.Staircaseghostnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6320802302155582419.post-83598037359220158722012-08-29T13:59:52.324-04:002012-08-29T13:59:52.324-04:00Ah yes, now I remember. I wonder whether Marshak&#...Ah yes, now I remember. I wonder whether Marshak's advice to the son is out of place, though. What more advice did the kid need at that stage? I didn't see that scene as casting doubt on Marshak's sanity. All outsider gurus would seem strange from a mainstream perspective.<br /><br />Also, is this movie targeting all wisdom traditions or Judaism in particular? I suppose Judaism might be taken to represent them all, but Western and Eastern religions are pretty different. Frankly, my stereotype of the guru is of a Buddhist or Hindu monk, not a rabbi, and I say this coming from a Jewish background.Benjamin Cainhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/00661999592897690031noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6320802302155582419.post-92158179794917723522012-08-29T11:36:17.798-04:002012-08-29T11:36:17.798-04:00In classic faerie tale structure, there are three ...In classic faerie tale structure, there are three rabbis. The first is the Junior Rabbi with no life experience (basically, a grad student), and so comedy derives from the ridiculous image of this unmarried babyface kid attempting to dispense marital advice to a physics professor in his 40s.<br /><br />The second rabbi gives us the tale of the Goy's Teeth. That's one of the examples of the carrot of the uncanny -- an event that surely <i>seems</i> to point to a higher power... except... he's <i>just</i> out of reach, and not returning calls. All he has are bland platitudes about "helping others". (http://www.dailymotion.com/video/xkyy4l_goy-s-teeth-story-part-3_shortfilms) Rabbi #2 can't help either.<br /><br />He desperately seeks out Rabbi Marshak (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aQQsBjOrNMY), surrounded by the paraphernalia of moral, intellectual, and spiritual authority, and has the door closed on him. <br /><br />Finally, on the day of his Bar Mitzvah, it's his son who is permitted to drink wisdom straight from the firehose of this man who, in theory, is the closest to divinity in their earthly community. What does he know that the rest of us don't?<br /><br />He turns out to be a borderline senile man who quotes Jefferson Airplane and then tells him to "be a good boy". That's it. A millennia-old wisdom tradition can only, at its very, very best, rise to the level of profundity of a pop song that a stoner teen already had on his transistor radio all along.<br /><br />I read the tornado as manifesting the inhuman power of "the undead god", as you put it.Staircaseghostnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6320802302155582419.post-70117200084344207392012-08-29T08:52:51.102-04:002012-08-29T08:52:51.102-04:00Thanks for your thoughts. I have seen A Serious Ma...Thanks for your thoughts. I have seen A Serious Man. I think the ending's abruptness is effective. As I recall, there's a tornado and then the movie just ends. I take it the tornado symbolizes God's inhuman power. The movie's not fresh in my mind, though: what happens with the chief rabbi? Does he turn out to be a fraud or is his wisdom far beyond the main character's comprehension? I think the chief rabbi gives him very practical advice. But I wonder why you think the movie shows that the wisdom of the wise is laid low. I don't recall that, exactly.<br /><br />I suppose you're right about the social potential of existential humour. I'll be doing a blog soon on one of the classic existential cosmicist comedies, the Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy series. Benjamin Cainhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/00661999592897690031noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6320802302155582419.post-60043657538798046332012-08-28T20:55:58.010-04:002012-08-28T20:55:58.010-04:00This topic is fresh on my mind, having recently co...This topic is fresh on my mind, having recently come off my second viewing of the Coen Brothers' under-appreciated A Serious Man. In case you haven't seen it, I won't give the plot away except to say that they heighten the stakes of the unmasking of impersonal reality by constantly dangling the carrot of the uncanny in front of the protagonist (and by extension, the audience). His world is full of hints and rumors and innuendos which taunt him with the prospect of a providential universe, if only he knew where to look, or whom to ask -- only to see the wisdom of the wise laid low, their pretensions deflated.<br /><br />I suppose one other important function of existential comedy is as a psychic signalling mechanism. The writer/musician/artist lets others know that even though we are cosmically alone, we are not humanly alone. The atheist with no one in her social orbit who shares her insights is freed from paroxysms of self-doubt ("I am the only one I know who sees the world in this way. Could <i>I</i> be the one who is mistaken? Horribly, tragically mistaken, even insane?") and given evidence that staring into the abyss without illusion or mediation is an experience the human soul can survive, since others have clearly done so. Staircaseghostnoreply@blogger.com