Leaning to the Left (but only kinda looking left)

To begin, I want to raise a question. Why is it that any time an anti-capitalist, anti-corporation, or anti-consumerist theme is being discussed, that it immediately gets referred to as ‘Marxist’? There are numerous ways of approaching of approaching such an issue, and many are not even remotely Marxist; environmentalism, conservationism, syndicalism, and anarchism all come to mind. Yet, Marx is resurrected from the grave once again for whatever reason, even though his ideas no longer full describe the type of capitalism today (Marx lived and wrote of the forming industrial capitalism of the 1800’s, whereas we live in a combination of corporate, financial, global and cultural capitalism, all of which have very unique features that Marx did not even begin to guess at.) Even the use of “bourgeois” is awkward, as it implies a dichotomy of classes, the upper-class (capitalist) and the lower-class (worker or proletariat). But, our society has a thriving middle class that is a mixture of capitalist businessmen and skilled workers. So, by referring to the bourgeois, the corresponding view is skewed with such bias that misses the bigger problems in today’s society is nearly inevitable. At best, you can receive a partial answer or interpretation by using the outdated Marxist lens to examine an issue. Really, all I want is for these authors to take their time in analyzing potentially leftist, progressive, or extremist concepts and themes. By not doing so, they are not only jumping to (usually) false conclusions, but also making it difficult for me to take them too seriously.

Take, for instance, Phillipa Gates’s article “The Man’s Film: Woo and the Pleasures of Male Melodrama”. Gates asserts, “That through moments of excess a ‘reading against the grain’ of the [film’s] text is possible, a reading that will reveal meanings opposite to those that are apparent at the surface of the text…these oppositional meanings are Marxist and/or feminist in reaction against the capitalist and/or patriarchal agenda of Western film and society.” (Gates, page 61).  However, Gates lines out an argument that Woo’s films are not feminist in this way. “The emphasis of the contradictions exposed in the films of the women’s genres are usually concerned with gender, family, and the role of women in a patriarchal society, whereas the contradictions exposed in Woo’s films are those which exist between society and the masculinity of the hero. In each film there is a juxtaposition of the apparent hypermasculinity at the surface of the text and the suggestions of vulnerability, emasculation, and homoeroticism revealed through moments of melodramatic excess.” (Gates, page 62) Without delving into whether or not I think that this “reading against the grain” methodology is legitimate or effective for displaying progressive ideals, I feel it is necessary to point out how a more careful examination of feminism in its present day form makes this argument a moot point. By examining masculinity and gender roles and then supposedly asserting a counter theme to what is currently found in society, you are still working within a feministic frame. Modern day feminism is all about fighting gender roles and showing how masculinity and femininity is an illusionary social construct that not only makes no sense, but is also detrimental to those who force themselves into these perceived gender paradigms. It may not be as overt and obvious to the viewer as feminist, but it is. Woo is indirectly a feminist film maker by showing how men can and must be feminine.

                Lisa Oldham Stores and Michael Hoover’s article “Whose Better Tomorrow” made a similar, yet still very different mistake by not thoroughly examining progressive concepts. They set up a basic framework of anti-capitalism themes that can be found in Woo’s films. However, Stores and Hoover don’t fully delve into the theme. Instead, they leave it at quoting Marx a few times after making parallel comparisons between movie characters and various capitalistic roles. As they said on pages 45 and 46, “Shing will be the vampire-capitalist, who ‘only lives by sucking living labour, and lives the more, the more labor it sucks.’ Ho and Mark represent loyal employees, the physical labor part of the operation, but also set apart from other triads.” If this was examined further, it would be apparent that roles found in capitalism is not so simple, and that the roles laid out here (and the roles that could potentially be derived by a closer examination of the film and of society) are not close to Marxism or many traditionally examined alternative economic theories. Although the film could easily be seen as a literal example of the corruption power of money and power (a viewpoint that is not necessarily anti-capitalist) or as a metaphor for the unseen violence inherent in capitalism and capitalist societies, the film could just as easily be viewed as the glorification of violence and capitalism. Without fully examining what kind of power relationships and capitalist assertions are being  made on a much more complex, theoretical level, it is difficult to know what the movie is arguing, if it is successfully arguing that message or theme,  and it the message or theme is really applicable in modern society, or if it is grossly outdated and flawed.