The Powerful Units - Movie Review Example

? here) (Your here) (Type of assignment e.g. Test assignment) (Due Havoc Q.1A In an intimate relationship, the individual having higher income is naturally thought to be more powerful than the other. This individual, in most cases, is the male unit. Apart from the income level, the males are the powerful units in relationships because of their perceived authority. The man has been the conqueror throughout history and they are inclined to adopt a similar role in intimate relationships. Sometimes, people enter into a conjugal relationship for the sake of obtainment of the nationality of a certain country. In such cases, the immigrant is under the power of his/her spouse. Any of the individuals can become dependant on the other individual in any way. In such cases, the independent individual has a greater power dynamic. Power dynamic of an individual is also greater if he/she is more committed to the relationship than the other. Age also matters as the elder members of a relationship have more power dynamic. Therefore, the determinants of power dynamics make one individual dependant on his/her partner. Q.1B These dynamics can be translated into politics. It depends on the person having these dynamics. Like a colonizer, this person can manipulate his/her dynamic to draw the other individual deeper into his/her power. Male units can often be noted boasting about what they do for their family in front of them. The persistent reminder of dependence on her partner has a great psychological effect on the female unit. A colonizer wants to make himself needed and be envied of his power by the people of his colony. In intimate relationships, the dominant partner would not want his/her power to be envied by the other unit but the drive to assert the fact of one's being in power may cajole him to translate his/her dynamic to politics. Q.2 According to Bharati Mukherjee1, the colonizer intends to make itself superior to the people of his colony. He can subdue them with power but he also wants to be accepted as a superior being in their minds. Bharati Mukherjee envied for Jill's pinafore and had an image in her mind that the pinafore is not accessible for her. For a colonizer to have a successful government in its colony, it is of paramount importance that separate classes are created in the society. Every person should know his limits and never try to mingle with the people of upper, lower or a completely different class. America's invasion of Afghanistan took a little time but even now it cannot be said that their invasion was successful. It is because the Afghan society is a classless society. They have never craved for other people's possessions and envies are very less in such societies. No ghetto boundaries are created except the ones which have been their even before the invasion i.e. between Americans and Afghans. A colonizer attempts to create these classes so that the people of a particular class can feel inferior or superior to the other class hence making the rule easier. Q.3 Alison and her friends believe that Hector and his friends are very cool and do a lot of drugs whenever they want. Especially after their first encounter, Alison is very impressed with Hector's world and is drawn to him. She saw that he had a gun and a teen-ager has this image in his/her mind that it feels great to commit a crime, run away from the police and get away with everything. Alison and her friends were never exposed to Hector's world before and lived in their own ghetto boundary which was away from the South. Similarly, Hector and his friends had lived in their ghetto boundary of the South who did not had to do anything with Alison and her friends. Hector and his friends thought that Alison and her friends showed up repeatedly to quench their sexual craving when they were doing so to fit in Hector's world and mould their lifestyle accordingly. Both groups misunderstood other group's intentions. Hector had been very keen to know what Alison wanted but she was unable to explain it to him. Although she said it very clearly that she wanted to join his group, Hector was unable to understand it because he was in a completely different frame of mind due to his different upbringing. According to Bharati Mukherjee's essay, her sister, Ranu, "came back in tears" when she came to knew that she was required to photographed in the nude for her entrance in an American school. For many American girls, this would not strike as odd to be photographed like that because they live in a different society-- a different ghetto boundary. For Ranu, this was outrageous. Similarly, for Hector, Alison's friend's having sex with three men was exactly what she wanted but for Alison and her friend, it was unacceptable. Q.4 Beliefs and attitudes are greatly affected by what a person has been through in his/her life. We often see it in movies and it is probably drawn out of real life events that a serial killer had a really bad childhood which drew him go to such an extreme in his life. It seems unfair to label a person as a bigot without having a look at things from his point of view but it also does not mean that we should support their beliefs even when they are exaggerated. A child born in Iraq in the last decade is very unlikely to accept America as a benefactor. If he has seen his people getting killed, captured, tortured and humiliated by American soldiers, he is very likely to support the slogan Death to America. It would be almost impossible to change his beliefs and we would call him a bigot even when he would be having a legitimate reason to feel like this. He will continue to feel like this even when we brief him about what happened, why it happened and what his misconceptions are. Q.5 The relationship dimension plays an important role in an individual's having more or less power. In Havoc, Alison visits Hector repeatedly to get some solace in her life. She's neglected by her parents and feels lonely. In this respect, she is dependant on Hector to get away from her loneliness. Therefore, Hector has the power over Alison with respect to their relationship dimension. From another perspective, Alison has also got some power over Hector as, to some extent, she is aware that Hector has some craving for her. His friends mention this on occasions and also the fact that Alison did not present herself to Hector in this way. She had the power until she did not present herself to her and as Hector could not fulfill his craving, his disappointment was easily noticeable. Alison also had power over Hector with respect to race as she was a legal citizen of America and Hector was an immigrant who could not leave the South with freedom from inquisition. He also had some criminal record while Alison was free to move and do a lot of things freely. Alison was also financially well-balanced while Hector had to indulge in illegal activities to make a living. In this respect, Alison also had power over Hector as her words to the police could have got him in significant trouble. Alison was also not of the age of majority so she had extra protection from law than Hector. Despite most of the determinants of power being in favor of Alison, Hector had more power than Alison until the incident at the bar that seemed to have molded Alison's views for good. It is because Alison was dependant on Hector to get away from her loneliness a while Hector was, overall, well off without Alison's company. Endnotes 1. Bharati Mukherjee is Indian-born American writer. She is currently a professor in the department of English at the University of California, Berkeley. Works Cited 1. Mukherjee, Bharti. “The Road From Ballygunge.” Half and Half. Ed. Claudine Chiawei O’Hearn. New York City. Pantheon Books, 1998. 71-79. Print. 2. Havoc. Dir. Barbara Kopple. Perf. Anne Hathaway and Freddy Rodriguez.. New Line Cinema, 2005. Film. Read More