Who the Heck Am I? And Who the Heck are You?
What teenager, or, for that matter, any person of any age, has not asked the question of who they are? Our identity is so fundamental to our lives that we constantly need to keep a check on our being. Psychologists have made reference to this in their construction of the different stages of life, and the forming and reforming of one’s identity is one of the most major aspects of personhood. After all, functioning in life seems incomplete if one does not know who does the functioning. Goals, fears, dreams, memories, and quirks all make up what a person considers to be themselves.
In the movie “Being John Malkovich,” the assumptions of identity are all thrown to pieces, metaphorically and literally. For example, people have the ability to leave their body, and transfer their piece of consciousness into the locus of another person’s brain. Through this process the observer’s body magically disappears for fifteen minutes, commenting on the idea that who we are is separate from our body. The ‘person’ then is implanted in to another person, namely John Malkovich. If this doesn’t seem bizarre, it should.
Many major philosophical ideas are called into question, but for the time being, the subjects of consciousness, metaphysics, and ethics are on the table. The main thread of understanding will revolve around the question of ‘who.’ What parts make up the ‘who’? What is the ‘who’ in totality? In what ethical ways should a ‘who’ behave?
A complete viewing of “Being John Malkovich” is required to interpret what direct Spike Jonze envisioned as the components of the ‘who’. While other topics could be discussed while only viewing ten minutes of the show, the comprehensive ideas behind the ‘who’ are only understood from the first moment to the last second of the film.
At first, the viewer thinks they are watching a normal world, with average people doing their everyday job, but events soon shift to show that the cosmos is not as it appears.
The main character Craig doesn't make enough money as a puppeteer and must get \"a real job\" in order to keep paying the bills. After reading the paper, Craig enters a building to find a floor that has ceilings that are too low, and where they are looking for a person that can file quite quickly. Getting the job, Craig soon discovers a portal that leads into the head of John Malkovich. The first time through, Craig looks out through John's eyes in the manner of binoculars. The sound of John eating his cereal is amplified in Craig's mind. This immediately brings up the question of what are the parts of the who.
The main character Craig doesn't make enough money as a puppeteer and must get \"a real job\" in order to keep paying the bills. After reading the paper, Craig enters a building to find a floor that has ceilings that are too low, and where they are looking for a person that can file quite quickly. Getting the job, Craig soon discovers a portal that leads into the head of John Malkovich. The first time through, Craig looks out through John's eyes in the manner of binoculars. The sound of John eating his cereal is amplified in Craig's mind. This immediately brings up the question of what are the parts of the ‘who’.
Through subsequent parts of the plot, the viewer uncovers that the director has a who in mind that is mostly Freudian. John's mind is made up of compartments. The ego is the conscious part of which Craig overtakes in the later part of the movie. John fights with his ego against the ego of Craig.
Furthermore, Lottle and Maxine take a journey through the subconscious Id of John, running through the memories of his past, and obviously the parts of him that he keeps somewhat suppressed. The episodes include being harassed in the locker room and other disturbing incidents. The final, fullest revelation of the constitution of the ‘who’ is presented in the finale. A group of old people have been using vessels like John to stay alive 'forever.' What type of life they live is hardly complete. The group of octogenarians subsist on the psychic energy of John, and become supposedly different parts of his personality, or something like that. The lead character of the elderly might possibly control the body. The manipulation issue is left open as the viewer does not come to comprehend if numerous people can remain individuals within another person. The question of what happens to the real John Malkovich is never even really brought up. The assumption is that he gets pushed down into the buttom of the chain of command.
The most ironic part of the movie is when Craig is completely trapped in the child of Lotte and Maxine, because Craig becomes a 'by product' of the love between his wife and his lover. Craig is now tormented with the possibility of having Maxine.
The major philosophical quandaries this brings up seem to intersect with the field of psychology quite heavily. What immediately comes to mind are the ideas of Plato/Socrates, who thought the soul was immortal, and lived on after death as a unique individual. The Greek culture represented their dead as independent shades walking around in Hades. Whether or not the who is fractured into pieces is an issue that demands more research. Theorists surmise that the brain/mind is one of the last frontiers of which man is trying to conquer. The hardest part of understanding this object is that it is the object trying to understand itself. Imagine a flower trying to understand what makes it a flower.
The next who question that logically follows is what is the ‘who’ as a composite. Throughout the movie, different people venture through a portal to enter into another's being. A major issue concerns what exactly does the traveling into another individual. This unit must be composed of a certain immaterial base, as the participant’s body is not present in the body of John. As evidenced by the movie, the unit seems to contain every aspect of a person that a person with a body has. Does that mean that a body is just a shell in which to house a unit of being? That is how it seems, but at the same time, when Craig stays in the body of John for an extended amount of time, Craig starts to take on aspects of Malkovich. Craig becomes arrogant, selfish, and confident in a way that he never was when he was in his 'own' body. Along this theme, the sexuality of the participants becomes blurred as the participants enter vessels of a different sex. As far as the viewer knows, Lotte is not interested in women until she is able to experience living as a physical man. Even in the real world, we have individuals that feel like they were born into the wrong sex body and that they owe it to themselves to change their sex. A certain experiment took place when identical male twins were born, but the circumcision of one went astray. The researchers decided that they would completely emasculate the boy and raise him as a girl to better understand human sexuality. At a certain age, the 'girl' realized that 'she' was not a girl and instead wanted to go back to being the male that they were supposed to have been. Thus there is some innate sense of sex within the brain that is independent of the body. How this all works out in the movie is quite elaborate.
The final ‘who’ question revolves around the rules of conduct of entering into someone else. Should a person even be allowed to do this? This act seems like trespassing in the worst way. Not only are you going on someone else’s property, but you are going right into that someone else. Stunningly, the characters don't seem to be much concerned with ethics, even to the point where they make money off of John even after John asks them to stop sending people into \"HIS HEAD.\"
The problem of the existence of the tunnel is brought into question. If it were wrong to use the tunnel, the tunnel should not exist. The very existence of the tunnel seems to say that this type of connection is neutral in morality. The state of reality is ‘just the way things are,’ neither moral or immoral.
Even more ethically volatile is the issue of remaining in someone else’s head for an indefinite amount of time. If it wasn’t bad enough when an intruder existed there for fifteen minutes, how much worse it is when a participant takes up residence.
The most pivotal ethical issue seems to surround the action of Craig controlling the body of John. This act violates what most humans hold sacred: freewill. Multiple religions teach that freewill is the universe’s or God’s gift to humankind. In the Christian and Judaic tradition, God was ‘forced’ to re-orchestrate all of human history to overcome the problems that arose from freewill. When the ‘first’ humans disobeyed God, God honored their choice, but also wanted to provide a way for the humans to get back to him; thus the process of redemption begins.
Hopefully the viewer will start practicing self control to be better prepared for any type of takeover assault, for the world seems to work best when each of us stays with who we were originally. Beings jumping around everywhere would cause intense chaos.
What teenager, or, for that matter, any person of any age, has not asked the question of who they are? Our identity is so fundamental to our lives that we constantly need to keep a check on our being. Psychologists have made reference to this in their construction of the different stages of life, and the forming and reforming of one’s identity is one of the most major aspects of personhood. After all, functioning in life seems incomplete if one does not know who does the functioning. Goals, fears, dreams, memories, and quirks all make up what a person considers to be themselves.
In the movie “Being John Malkovich,” the assumptions of identity are all thrown to pieces, metaphorically and literally. For example, people have the ability to leave their body, and transfer their piece of consciousness into the locus of another person’s brain. Through this process the observer’s body magically disappears for fifteen minutes, commenting on the idea that who we are is separate from our body. The ‘person’ then is implanted in to another person, namely John Malkovich. If this doesn’t seem bizarre, it should.
Many major philosophical ideas are called into question, but for the time being, the subjects of consciousness, metaphysics, and ethics are on the table. The main thread of understanding will revolve around the question of ‘who.’ What parts make up the ‘who’? What is the ‘who’ in totality? In what ethical ways should a ‘who’ behave?
A complete viewing of “Being John Malkovich” is required to interpret what direct Spike Jonze envisioned as the components of the ‘who’. While other topics could be discussed while only viewing ten minutes of the show, the comprehensive ideas behind the ‘who’ are only understood from the first moment to the last second of the film.
At first, the viewer thinks they are watching a normal world, with average people doing their everyday job, but events soon shift to show that the cosmos is not as it appears.
The main character Craig doesn't make enough money as a puppeteer and must get \"a real job\" in order to keep paying the bills. After reading the paper, Craig enters a building to find a floor that has ceilings that are too low, and where they are looking for a person that can file quite quickly. Getting the job, Craig soon discovers a portal that leads into the head of John Malkovich. The first time through, Craig looks out through John's eyes in the manner of binoculars. The sound of John eating his cereal is amplified in Craig's mind. This immediately brings up the question of what are the parts of the who.
The main character Craig doesn't make enough money as a puppeteer and must get \"a real job\" in order to keep paying the bills. After reading the paper, Craig enters a building to find a floor that has ceilings that are too low, and where they are looking for a person that can file quite quickly. Getting the job, Craig soon discovers a portal that leads into the head of John Malkovich. The first time through, Craig looks out through John's eyes in the manner of binoculars. The sound of John eating his cereal is amplified in Craig's mind. This immediately brings up the question of what are the parts of the ‘who’.
Through subsequent parts of the plot, the viewer uncovers that the director has a who in mind that is mostly Freudian. John's mind is made up of compartments. The ego is the conscious part of which Craig overtakes in the later part of the movie. John fights with his ego against the ego of Craig.
Furthermore, Lottle and Maxine take a journey through the subconscious Id of John, running through the memories of his past, and obviously the parts of him that he keeps somewhat suppressed. The episodes include being harassed in the locker room and other disturbing incidents. The final, fullest revelation of the constitution of the ‘who’ is presented in the finale. A group of old people have been using vessels like John to stay alive 'forever.' What type of life they live is hardly complete. The group of octogenarians subsist on the psychic energy of John, and become supposedly different parts of his personality, or something like that. The lead character of the elderly might possibly control the body. The manipulation issue is left open as the viewer does not come to comprehend if numerous people can remain individuals within another person. The question of what happens to the real John Malkovich is never even really brought up. The assumption is that he gets pushed down into the buttom of the chain of command.
The most ironic part of the movie is when Craig is completely trapped in the child of Lotte and Maxine, because Craig becomes a 'by product' of the love between his wife and his lover. Craig is now tormented with the possibility of having Maxine.
The major philosophical quandaries this brings up seem to intersect with the field of psychology quite heavily. What immediately comes to mind are the ideas of Plato/Socrates, who thought the soul was immortal, and lived on after death as a unique individual. The Greek culture represented their dead as independent shades walking around in Hades. Whether or not the who is fractured into pieces is an issue that demands more research. Theorists surmise that the brain/mind is one of the last frontiers of which man is trying to conquer. The hardest part of understanding this object is that it is the object trying to understand itself. Imagine a flower trying to understand what makes it a flower.
The next who question that logically follows is what is the ‘who’ as a composite. Throughout the movie, different people venture through a portal to enter into another's being. A major issue concerns what exactly does the traveling into another individual. This unit must be composed of a certain immaterial base, as the participant’s body is not present in the body of John. As evidenced by the movie, the unit seems to contain every aspect of a person that a person with a body has. Does that mean that a body is just a shell in which to house a unit of being? That is how it seems, but at the same time, when Craig stays in the body of John for an extended amount of time, Craig starts to take on aspects of Malkovich. Craig becomes arrogant, selfish, and confident in a way that he never was when he was in his 'own' body. Along this theme, the sexuality of the participants becomes blurred as the participants enter vessels of a different sex. As far as the viewer knows, Lotte is not interested in women until she is able to experience living as a physical man. Even in the real world, we have individuals that feel like they were born into the wrong sex body and that they owe it to themselves to change their sex. A certain experiment took place when identical male twins were born, but the circumcision of one went astray. The researchers decided that they would completely emasculate the boy and raise him as a girl to better understand human sexuality. At a certain age, the 'girl' realized that 'she' was not a girl and instead wanted to go back to being the male that they were supposed to have been. Thus there is some innate sense of sex within the brain that is independent of the body. How this all works out in the movie is quite elaborate.
The final ‘who’ question revolves around the rules of conduct of entering into someone else. Should a person even be allowed to do this? This act seems like trespassing in the worst way. Not only are you going on someone else’s property, but you are going right into that someone else. Stunningly, the characters don't seem to be much concerned with ethics, even to the point where they make money off of John even after John asks them to stop sending people into \"HIS HEAD.\"
The problem of the existence of the tunnel is brought into question. If it were wrong to use the tunnel, the tunnel should not exist. The very existence of the tunnel seems to say that this type of connection is neutral in morality. The state of reality is ‘just the way things are,’ neither moral or immoral.
Even more ethically volatile is the issue of remaining in someone else’s head for an indefinite amount of time. If it wasn’t bad enough when an intruder existed there for fifteen minutes, how much worse it is when a participant takes up residence.
The most pivotal ethical issue seems to surround the action of Craig controlling the body of John. This act violates what most humans hold sacred: freewill. Multiple religions teach that freewill is the universe’s or God’s gift to humankind. In the Christian and Judaic tradition, God was ‘forced’ to re-orchestrate all of human history to overcome the problems that arose from freewill. When the ‘first’ humans disobeyed God, God honored their choice, but also wanted to provide a way for the humans to get back to him; thus the process of redemption begins.
Hopefully the viewer will start practicing self control to be better prepared for any type of takeover assault, for the world seems to work best when each of us stays with who we were originally. Beings jumping around everywhere would cause intense chaos.
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