May I recommend the Korean film "No Other Choice as a truly black comedy about the effects of downsizing and AI on a dedicated employee in a specialized business. Desperation and conformity evolve into rage fueled determination with both farcical and frightening results.
I did… didn’t really shop around for it… just mindlessly went to Amazon, which had a 30% off coupon (maybe for criterion discs thru 3/9?) so it ended up being roughly half list price
My husband and I actually went to a movie theater to see “Good Luck, Have Fun, Don’t Die”. We loved it. I grabbed three friends and watched it a second time. As we watched the credits a young employee came in with his dustpan. He leaned against the wall, phone in hand with a vacant stare. We noticed him and so did other moviegoers. What a perfect imitation of the art we had just seen.
No longer in Kansas, dystopia is making itself comfortable.
But while I can't define it, like Potter Stewart and porn, I know it when I see it. Just like James Donald's Major Clipton, who could be the poster boy for Operation Epic Fury and all that goes with it in the decadent and dystopian milieu of Donald Trump's 21st century America:
I'm pro AI, but you have to at least know what it can do and can't do well. Hegseth wants it to pick human targets? How about they let it plan the menu, do the shopping, and run the cafeteria kitchen for a week. Musk's robots can do the physical labor. I suspect some folks will be getting Arby's.
love this! definitely how we're all feeling. good fertile soil in how media has infected our politics and vice versa.
Brazil is a dark touchstone, with the walls filled with pipes no one understands... gave me chills when I saw it as a kid, "could it really get this bad??"
I regret to inform you that your David Foster Wallace reading has been debunked as "performative masculinity" by the same online forum that thinks you all should eat dog food for dinner and wear dungarees in the gym sauna while taking ivermectin. That's what real men do you see.
This article is clever, I really enjoyed it. I like the references and the way they are used here. Brazil is an underappreciated early masterpiece and Southland Tales doesn't get the credit it deserves. Interesting companion piece to Donnie Darko given the endings of both films have a character choosing a personal annihilation to deter one that is much worse. Wish fulfillment on the part of Richard Kelley perhaps.
I want to preface this by saying I know you’re joking. But the mid-2010s effort to recast DFW as the patron saint of the “lit bro” (an archetype that simply does not exist outside of op-ed pages) chapped my behind SO badly. Drove me bananas.
Once again, Robert Aldrich's Kiss Me, Deadly says it best: How civilized this earth used to be. But as the world becomes more primitive, its treasures become more fabulous. --Dr. G. E. Soberin
Crazy that my dad's favorite movie was Idiocracy (we watched it frequently in our teenage years) yet he is a trump loyalist. He is a plant sipping the Brawndo.
All of the references to movies and other genres reminded me that I am way past understanding America let alone the world. Doesn't bother me that I am out of it.
Sophie needs to save her money and invest it wisely, now. She should consider some hobbies or other interests she can pursue long term. Because very shortly no one will care about Sophie. Instead they'll be onto her "sister" -- her sister who's name is currently secret will be completely AI generated -- and yet it will be so good, you won't be able to tell. There will be big fights about this but in the end it will never be resolved -- the creators will love it though as it will just generate yet more traffic. And so someone will build a totally dedicated data-center to make this happen -- who knows maybe it'll suck down the energy of a nation state or something. But the math will work, that is the money flow. And maybe google and meta, and all the big "ai companies" will sell them just what it is that makes you tick since they will know this -- and your version will be so completely enticing you'll not be capable of saying "no" to it. and then...
And how could I forget the Cylons? I always felt they are an apt metaphor for MAGA, with their strict adherence to their one true god and intolerant, black & white view of the universe. And humans, on the hand, resemble liberal democracy advocates: struggling onward nobly for survival, deeply flawed, blessed with ingenuity and plagued with self-doubt at the same time.
I was a teenager when the horse's head showed up in the Hollywood director's bed (Godfather I), blowing my mind (and lots of others). The violence, gore, and desensitization have been rocketing dramatically upward in the decades since.
I'd like to add Judge Dreadd's setting: a megacity from Boston to DC full of citizens who have nothing to do and a basic income as automation has ended the need for humans to work. Oh, and an atomic wasteland to the west.
May I recommend the Korean film "No Other Choice as a truly black comedy about the effects of downsizing and AI on a dedicated employee in a specialized business. Desperation and conformity evolve into rage fueled determination with both farcical and frightening results.
I totally should’ve included it; the lights out factory is 100% where we’re headed. I liked it! https://www.thebulwark.com/p/no-other-choice-chair-company
Wow! Sonny, you make the end of the world and self-immolation of free will romp.
I think I have to re-watch Brazil now...
Great movie!
However many times Sonny has referred to Brazil over the last ~5 years, it was today’s post that finally compelled me to buy it so I could see it
You get the Criterion 4K?
I did… didn’t really shop around for it… just mindlessly went to Amazon, which had a 30% off coupon (maybe for criterion discs thru 3/9?) so it ended up being roughly half list price
NICE
My husband and I actually went to a movie theater to see “Good Luck, Have Fun, Don’t Die”. We loved it. I grabbed three friends and watched it a second time. As we watched the credits a young employee came in with his dustpan. He leaned against the wall, phone in hand with a vacant stare. We noticed him and so did other moviegoers. What a perfect imitation of the art we had just seen.
No longer in Kansas, dystopia is making itself comfortable.
That’s amazing, hahaha.
"I don’t even know what kind of madness this is."
Well, Sonny, I don't either, not exactly.
But while I can't define it, like Potter Stewart and porn, I know it when I see it. Just like James Donald's Major Clipton, who could be the poster boy for Operation Epic Fury and all that goes with it in the decadent and dystopian milieu of Donald Trump's 21st century America:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WAoBW3yjlvA
I'm pro AI, but you have to at least know what it can do and can't do well. Hegseth wants it to pick human targets? How about they let it plan the menu, do the shopping, and run the cafeteria kitchen for a week. Musk's robots can do the physical labor. I suspect some folks will be getting Arby's.
love this! definitely how we're all feeling. good fertile soil in how media has infected our politics and vice versa.
Brazil is a dark touchstone, with the walls filled with pipes no one understands... gave me chills when I saw it as a kid, "could it really get this bad??"
So much to chew on, but when I want to ponder dystopia, I watch "Network."
Also, I sometimes wonder if Wallace was influenced by Monty Python's killer joke. You know, someone saw two words and had to be hospitalized.
I regret to inform you that your David Foster Wallace reading has been debunked as "performative masculinity" by the same online forum that thinks you all should eat dog food for dinner and wear dungarees in the gym sauna while taking ivermectin. That's what real men do you see.
This article is clever, I really enjoyed it. I like the references and the way they are used here. Brazil is an underappreciated early masterpiece and Southland Tales doesn't get the credit it deserves. Interesting companion piece to Donnie Darko given the endings of both films have a character choosing a personal annihilation to deter one that is much worse. Wish fulfillment on the part of Richard Kelley perhaps.
I want to preface this by saying I know you’re joking. But the mid-2010s effort to recast DFW as the patron saint of the “lit bro” (an archetype that simply does not exist outside of op-ed pages) chapped my behind SO badly. Drove me bananas.
Once again, Robert Aldrich's Kiss Me, Deadly says it best: How civilized this earth used to be. But as the world becomes more primitive, its treasures become more fabulous. --Dr. G. E. Soberin
Crazy that my dad's favorite movie was Idiocracy (we watched it frequently in our teenage years) yet he is a trump loyalist. He is a plant sipping the Brawndo.
All of the references to movies and other genres reminded me that I am way past understanding America let alone the world. Doesn't bother me that I am out of it.
Sophie needs to save her money and invest it wisely, now. She should consider some hobbies or other interests she can pursue long term. Because very shortly no one will care about Sophie. Instead they'll be onto her "sister" -- her sister who's name is currently secret will be completely AI generated -- and yet it will be so good, you won't be able to tell. There will be big fights about this but in the end it will never be resolved -- the creators will love it though as it will just generate yet more traffic. And so someone will build a totally dedicated data-center to make this happen -- who knows maybe it'll suck down the energy of a nation state or something. But the math will work, that is the money flow. And maybe google and meta, and all the big "ai companies" will sell them just what it is that makes you tick since they will know this -- and your version will be so completely enticing you'll not be capable of saying "no" to it. and then...
And how could I forget the Cylons? I always felt they are an apt metaphor for MAGA, with their strict adherence to their one true god and intolerant, black & white view of the universe. And humans, on the hand, resemble liberal democracy advocates: struggling onward nobly for survival, deeply flawed, blessed with ingenuity and plagued with self-doubt at the same time.
I was a teenager when the horse's head showed up in the Hollywood director's bed (Godfather I), blowing my mind (and lots of others). The violence, gore, and desensitization have been rocketing dramatically upward in the decades since.
I'd like to add Judge Dreadd's setting: a megacity from Boston to DC full of citizens who have nothing to do and a basic income as automation has ended the need for humans to work. Oh, and an atomic wasteland to the west.