Meaning when the Author is Dead: Foucault on Gilliams Brazil (1985) - Essay Example

? Essay Plan: Controlling Meaning when the is Dead: Foucault on Gilliam’s Brazil (1985). 17 August Meaning is a contested concept in the production and consumption of films. This essay answers the question on who controls meaning and relates it to the idea that the author is dead. The main case study is Gilliam’s Brazil (1985). The primary theory to be used comes from Foucault, although beliefs and concepts from Saussure and Lacan are used in this essay too. Foucault (1991) explores the creation of the author, an exploration that reveals that because an author is hard to define and to describe, authors become products of their own discourses. This essay seeks to explain the process of controlling meaning, so as to reveal that since anyone can control meaning once they have consumed the text, a fixed meaning from a singular perspective becomes meaningless once a text is produced. The author is dead because whoever produces and interprets the text can provide meaning/s to it through complex interconnections among various intrapersonal and interpersonal relationships. The key historical debates on who controls meaning focus on the language that produces meaning in modern society, where scholars debate on the death of authors and the rise of textual interpretation from diverse perspectives. Saussure underscores that the signifier and the signified affect one another, which contrasts other linguists’ belief that people compose the signs without being affected by the signs they make. Jancovich (1995, p.127) underscores that Saussurian linguistics emphasises the dominance of language in shaping meaning and human identity. Lacan focuses more on how people find meaning when they shift from being “split and divided” into being whole once more (Jancovich 1995, p.134). People find meaning through overcoming what is lacking in them. Foucault (1991) suggests that the author is dead because writing (the text) has autonomy and the writer and death are related concepts. He further explores the difficulties in defining who an author is and what constitutes his/her work. He introduces the topic discourse analysis as a critical process of discovering the meaning of the text: “The relationship (or nonrelationship) with an author, and the different forms this relationship takes, constitute in a quite visible manner one of these discursive properties” (Foucault 1991, p.117). Discourses affect meaning, which means that meaning is fluid, not static. For him, culture impacts discourses too because discourses are heterogeneous products of cultural components (Foucault 1991, p.117). These debates and themes are important to the topic because they study how meaning is discovered and controlled. After discussing the context, the first point to be discussed is: the author is dead because directors are one of the significant factors that shape meaning in films. Directors have the power to choose what to add and what not to add in their films, which may or may not have meaning to the interpretation of the film. Directors can immerse themselves in any particular part of the film, and this immersion can affect their products. An example is how Gilliam immerses his dystopian belief in humanity through Brazil (1985). Gilliam admits that he is the kind of director who is not cautious in taking risks and his identity affects the form and content of his films (Derbyshire 2009, p.24). His immersion kills the author because he re-authors the written text. Orr (2000) explores poetry in cinema. He describes the immersion of directors in their film’s characters through “free indirect subjectivity” which means “it entails immersion of the filmmaker in the experience of the subject who possesses some clear affinity with the auteur” (Orr 2000, p.134). Gilliam connects to his film in a subjective way that impacts the meaning of his product. The beginning scene with the TV ad for designer-coloured ducts in Brazil, for instance, manifests Gilliam’s desire for satirising commercialism. Capitalism is attacked with the undermining of the economic system’s usefulness to people’s practical lives. Directors can, furthermore, follow certain rules and ideology that identify their work. Gilliam underscores that his plan is to not be ruled by rules of other people (Derbyshire 2009, p.24). Von Trier and Vinterberg (2002) give the example of the “vow of chastity.” The vow of chastity stresses the importance of realism, which basically designates almost all films as not following chastity at all. The text can be understood as a satire that nowadays, directors are not chaste in how they direct films because in reality, films are their subjective products too. The same goes for Gilliam who would rather reject lucrative offers, if he cannot control them entirely (Derbyshire 2009, p.24). In Brazil (1985), Gilliam would have been forced by a Hollywood producer to offer a happy ending, which significantly would have decreased the importance of the text to his own rules about being not ruled at all. Directors can use their ideology to interpret a written work or showcase the dominant ideology of the setting. Brazil (1985) shows the ideology of a text that runs away with varied meanings. Stam (2000) describes classical realism that ideology shapes. He cites Comolli and Narboni (1969) who defines ideology from the Althusserian framework: what the camera registers in fact is the vague, unformulated, untheorized, unthought-out world of the dominant ideology This includes every stage in the process of production: subject, 'styles,' forms, meanings, narrative traditions; all underline the general, ideological discourse (Comolli and Narboni in Screen Reader 1977 cited Stam 2000, p.140). Ideology is present in Brazil through the presence of various elements that can be connected to Saussurian concepts of the signifier and the signified. The narrative, for example, defies happy endings that are standard formulas of Hollywood cinema. When Sam Lowry (Jonathan Pryce) goes insane in the end, it symbolises the insanity that totalitarian states develop, insanity that comes from the absence of individual will and collective action. Lowry represents the culture of conformity that contributes to the loss of humanity. Foucault (1991, p.117) indicates the importance of culture in shaping discourses. Marxian discourse impacts Gilliam’s representation of lost humanity in Brazil. Aside from directors, the audience dictates meaning in films. Films are made to consider audience’s tastes and expectations. Prince (2010) describes the difference between the French/Dutch and Hollywood version of The Vanishing. The French/Dutch film was shown in theatres in 1988, followed by an American remake in 1993. Prince (2010) notes that the main differences between the two are that the American version had a more pronounced romantic angle, a happy ending, and standard horror characteristics: “These revisions reduced the uniquely disturbing psychological power of the original and made it, instead, into a more standard and formulaic horror film.” In Brazil, Gilliam does not strongly respond to what audiences want, and instead, he stays faithful to his own values and styles in making the film (Derbyshire 2009, p.24). Foucault can be used to underscore that the director’s perception of society can be part of the audience’s perceptions, if he can influence them to understand and appreciate the meaning of his film. The impact would be co-authorship of meaning with the audience through a dialectic process of production and consumption of the text. In addition, the audience can have ideology that affects their consumption of films. The ideology, in this case, comes from a formalist analysis of the film combined with personal thoughts. Mr. Kurtzmann (Ian Holm) can be argued as a worthless public manager because he cannot do anything without Lowry’s help. The student’s ideology believes that Mr. Kurtzmann satirises inept politicians- they know nothing and they produce nothing good. Jancovich (1995) defines ideology according to the meanings put by people on their beliefs and practices. The capitalist system that manifests bureaucracy can have significant negative effects on social structures (Jancovich 1995, p.129). Brazil shows how Kurtzmann’ employees are not dedicated to their jobs. They lack commitment and loyalty to their workplace. They underscore the division of the worker from their labour, a case of split identity in Lacanian terms. Thus, the audience impact how meaning is formed from films too. Essentially, these two points indicate that different groups interact with social, especially financial interests, to control meaning. Apart from directors and audiences, the whole macro and micro factors interact to produce meaning. Prince (2010) highlights the role of the Hollywood system in diluting the inventiveness of The Vanishing (1988). He notes the impact of Hollywood on foreign filmmakers whom they import to the U.S.: “Hollywood absorbs influences from overseas, and at the same time, transforms and domesticates those influences according to the perceived demands of the U.S. market” (Prince 2010, p.384). The financial system changes films, which Gilliam resists in Brazil. Furthermore, though Hollywood is a system that greatly impacts mainstream films, other cinematic conventions are present that can produce alternative, even counter-meanings that are usual to Hollywood film formulas. Speidel (2007) mentions art films and avant-garde films as alternatives to classical Hollywood narratives. Brazil can be considered as an art film because it does not conform to Hollywood’s standard specifications (Speidel 2007, p.62). The author is dead once more because producers and their financial system decide the fate of the film’s content and direction. Language controls meaning too. Language can be so powerful that it can kill authors when it provides meaning on its own. Characters in Brazil are trapped in a web of bureaucracy. Jill Layton (Kim Greist) cannot even save a man’s life because she lacks the right form. The film as primary text indicates how the system kills the author and controls the meaning of life for characters. Foucault (1991) describes writing that pertains to it, not the author. He stresses: “Referring only to itself, but without being restricted to the confines of its interiority, writing is identified with its own unfolded exteriority” (Foucault 1991, p.102). The forms in the movie that control people become the language of humanity’s soullessness. Jancovich (1995, p.127) stresses the implication of Saussurian linguistics: “Not only do they imply that language structures the ways in which one thinks, but also that one's very sense of identity (who one is) is a product of language.” Mrs. Ida Lowry (Katherine Helmond) and Barbara Hicks (Mrs. Terrain) are examples of people who have become so used to the oppressive system that even after a bomb ravages the restaurant they are in, they continue talking about superficial matters, such as their plastic surgery. When people have adopted the language of oppression, they become immune to the idea of liberation. Finally, meaning can also be seen as something contrived by different parties and factors that it can exist separate from authors. Lowry has created his own reality apart from the real reality because he has lost faith in what is true. Though some might say that the film has a sad ending, the student of this paper argues that he has his happy ending in his mind. He kills the author of his life, the government, by sacrificing his sanity that it seeks to control. Lowry gives a new meaning to independence and freedom through his imagined life. Foucault (1991, p.116) explores the space of discourse that defines authorship, and Lowry indicates that he can make his space that no other parties can control. Gilliam chooses a non-Hollywood ending for his dystopian world. Truffaut (1976, p.225) questions the label for French films that are called “Tradition of Quality.” He attacks the inability of films to properly define what is filmable or not when basing their stories on written text, where he criticises the unfaithfulness of filmmakers to both spirit and letter (Truffaut 1976, pp.227-228). He encourages debate on what meaning means to people who cannot find meaning in the meaning that authors intend to produce. Gilliam represents directors who cannot and will not be bent in defining the meaning of their films; they will fight for creative freedom in defining meaning in their text, preferring the audience over producers. The essay seeks to investigate the authorship of meaning, so as to reveal that since anyone can control meaning, to say that someone controls it becomes meaningless once a text is produced. Anyone can control meaning; hence, no one actually controls it, which basically kills the author of the text. Authors can only produce their works, but once it is out there in public, anyone can use it and interpret it for their own and/or their society’s/group’s needs. The author is dead because everyone else wants to re-create the story in their own views. Films are not end products, but a process of constant re-creating meaning with a collective authorship that puts the original author to death. BIBLIOGRAPHY Derbyshire, J., 2009. Making films is just a cheap version of being God. New Statesman, 138(4971), 24-25. Erickson, J., 1993. The ghost in the machine: Gilliam's postmodern response in Brazil to the Orwellian dystopia of Nineteen Eighty-Four. Utopian Studies, 4(2), 26-34. Foucault, M., 1991. What is an author? In: Rabinow, P. (ed). The Foucault reader: an introduction to Foucault’s thought. London: Penguin, 101-120. Jancovich, M., 1995. Screen theory. In: Hollows, J. and Jancovich, M . (eds.). Approaches to popular film. Manchester: Manchester University Press, 123-150. Nowell-Smith, G., 1996. Art cinema. In: The Oxford history of world cinema: the definitive history of cinema worldwide. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 567-575. Orr, J., 2000. A cinema of poetry. In: Orr, J. and Taxidou (eds.). Post-war cinema and modernity. Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press, 133-141. Prince, S., 2010. The vanishing. In: Movies and meanings: an introduction to film, 5th edn. Boston: Allyn & Bacon, 378-384. Propp, V., 1968. The functions of dramatis personae. In: Morphology of the folktale, 26-65. Austin, TX: University of Texas Press. Speidel, S., 2007. Film form and narrative. In: Nelmes, J. et al. (eds). Introduction to film studies, 4th edn. Abindon: Routledge, 60-89. Stam, R., 2000. The classic realist text. In: Film theory: an introduction. Malden: Blackwell, 140-145. Truffaut, F., 1976. A certain tendency of the French cinema. In: Nichols, B. (ed). Movies and methods (Vol.1). Berkeley, CA: University of California Press, 224-237. Von Trier, L. and Vinterberg, T., 2002. Dogme95- the vow of chastity. In: Fowler, C. (ed.). The European cinema reader. London: Routledge, 83-84 . Wheeler, B., 2005. Reality is what you can get away with: fantastic imaginings, rebellion and control in Terry Gilliam's Brazil. Critical Survey, 17(1), 95-108. Wollen, P., 1982. North by northwest: a morphological analysis. In: Readings and writings. London: Verso, 18-33. FILMOGRAPHY Brazil, 1985. Film. Directed by Terry Gilliam. United Kingdom: Embassy International Pictures. The Vanishing, 1988. Film. Directed by George Sluizer. France/Netherlands: Argos Films. The Vanishing, 1993. Film. Directed by George Sluizer. USA: Twentieth Century Fox Film Corporation. WEBOGRAPHY Critical Inquiry, 2013. Featured Author: Michel Foucault. Available from: http://criticalinquiry.uchicago.edu/featured_author_michel_foucault/ (Accessed 11 August 2013). Read More