[ SECRET POST #2493 ]

[case]

⌈ Secret Post #2493 ⌋

Warning: Some secrets are NOT worksafe and may contain SPOILERS.

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Notes:

Secrets Left to Post: 01 pages, 019 secrets from Secret Submission Post #356.
Secrets Not Posted: [ 0 - broken links ], [ 0 - not!secrets ], [ 0 - not!fandom ], [ 0 - too big ], [ 0 - repeat ].
Current Secret Submissions Post: here.
Suggestions, comments, and concerns should go here.

Comments

[seventh_seal]

They ruined the credibility of the movie for me with the overblown child trauma - I mean, doesn't NASA do psychological screenings of people before it sends them to do super important and super expensive jobs? Girl was depressed.

I thought the movie was full of heavy-handed religion allusions. Russian module had an orthodox icon above the switchboard, Chinese had Buddha or something and there was apparently some action figure from a cartoon in the American one (which may very well be true in reality, but the film emphasized it with the camera shot). So although they are in space because science, there's still an overtone of supernatural godly power that watches over them. And sure enough, the protagonist says something along the lines- wonder if I should pray except no one taught me how. Teach your scientists to pray, for god's sake, America!

da

[(Anonymous)]

There was that one poor woman... Stalking isn't exactly an example of mental health.

[(Anonymous)]

Personally, I thought those touches were to show that astronauts, despite the extraordinary nature of their work, are still just people, with people-like quirks. The American shuttle had a figure of Marvin the Martian, which is hilariously apt and isn't a religious icon by any stretch. The Russian space station had an orthodox icon and some blue alien doll thing. And the figurine in the Chinese station wasn't the Buddha but the Chinese deity Budai -- and anyway, Chinese "religious" icons don't really work the same way Christian ones do. You'd see various deities littered around people's homes and workplaces for reasons like luck, wealth, education, decoration, etc. but they're not a measurement of piety as such.

Really, even Ryan's inability to pray at the moment of her impending death doesn't strike me as her wanting to rediscover God or something. She did rediscover faith in herself, somehow, so the overall theme of triumph of the human spirit yadda yadda was intact. No divine miracle a la Signs here, though probably just as many improbable coincidences.

And I mean, Cuaron isn't a guy who shies away from religious themes, so if you thought this was bad you probably think Children of Men was a modern day nativity story. But in this movie, the spirituality is found more in the chilling, austere beauty of space and the view of the Earth in contrast to the perils of the situation. (Doesn't the Clooney character say something to this effect right before, you know?) It reinforces the idea that to these characters, science is the highest faith they subscribe to, hence the spiritual tone. At the end of the movie, Bullock's character does indeed take a "leap of faith", but it's based on physics and the desire to live rather than putting yourself in the hand of a higher power.

[seventh_seal]

Just to clarify -- I never meant to suggest I considered Marvin the Martian a religious figure, on the other hand, what I meant was that they contrasted him with the Russian and Chinese religious figures.

Otherwise thanks for a stimulating comment which makes me consider the movie in a different light.

[(Anonymous)]

I see. Well, I doubt Cuaron meant to imply that the godless, irreligious Americans brought this disaster on themselves by being so damn godless and irreligious. Maybe he meant to say that American pop culture is so deeply ingrained that its icons are now as ubiquitous as Chinese deities are to the Chinese. Which is probably true, if not a particularly spiritual statement.

[(Anonymous)]

Religion performs the function of ordering the world and making it fit for human habitation. It tames the orderless, it takes the terrifying majesty and vastness of nature and turns it into something comprehensible, it provides an answer to the questions and the terror which arise in us in response to our recognition of the fundamental conditions of our mortal existence and the limits of our perceptions and our lives. In other words the religion is something which performs a human function, and in the modern irreligious society this role is filled by something other than the divine - by pop culture, by aliens, by spirits, by cartoons of Martians.

[(Anonymous)]

AYRT

Actually, while I do agree with you that Cuaron might have meant to make a spiritual statement in the film, I don't think Marvin the Martian is part of that. It's in fact science that takes the place of men's desire for something bigger. It fits everything you described. The danger of the catastrophe is a scientific trial by fire, because the scientific quest like the spiritual quest for truth is also fraught with danger.

[(Anonymous)]

I agree. I thought the inclusion of the religious figures showed that the astronauts weren't just nameless people in space suits. We had a glimpse of their lives through the items they had aboard. The deity figures, the Marvin the Martian toy, the false teeth, the family photo, the table-tennis paddles, etc.

And I don't know if I agree with the film pushing the idea of a Godly power watching over any of the characters, since...well...most of the characters died. In fact, the only survivor was the (presumably non-religious) astronaut who'd never prayed in her life. It could even be argued that it was science that won over spirituality in the end, because Ryan used all of her scientific knowledge to overcome the natural (Godly?) forces that killed her crew and almost killed her multiple times. Heck, she went up against many natural forces throughout the film (space, lack of oxygen, water, fire, gravity, etc.)