pain6batch9
Chronic
- Aug 25, 2024
- 184
No, forget about the 2005 remake. I'm talking about the original 1976 version with Austin Stoker as Bishop. Hopefully you've all seen the film and if you haven't, you absolutely should because John Carpenter was a legend and this is one of his best films. In fact, you might want to watch it before you continue reading.
I was thinking today how this film is basically an image of what happens in my mind at any given time. My mind sometimes feels like it's under fire from an unknown band of attackers, laying siege to it's inner core the way the gang lays siege to the police precinct in the film. I could also complicate matters with the concept of an inner darkness in my mind, akin to the prisoners locked in the cells, who Bishop releases, although in the film they turn out to be handy. Maybe Bishop himself is my ego or something. Fighting desperately to protect himself and the other occupants of the building.
There are more examples of films like this. A hard core of characters under siege from some aggressors. And if my mind can't simplify the struggle in this way, as I use this analogy, to describe my mind being besieged not by an outside force but by itself, then the idea falls apart. Because I can't other myself the way Carpenter does to the gang in the film. Turns them into mindless zombie-like creatures to be killed at will by the defenders. What's going on inside my mind is too complicated to be shown like this.
So, I suppose we come to the place where there is no real comparison or easy simplification of the devices inside my head. I can't make myself understanding of it, or it of me, or make it less other, or me a better defender. I'll have to keep searching for the right thing. I guess, you might already have noticed, dear reader, the other flaw in this idea. The fact that Bishop is rescued at the end when the police finally show up and the siege is lifted. That might not happen in my head.
I was thinking today how this film is basically an image of what happens in my mind at any given time. My mind sometimes feels like it's under fire from an unknown band of attackers, laying siege to it's inner core the way the gang lays siege to the police precinct in the film. I could also complicate matters with the concept of an inner darkness in my mind, akin to the prisoners locked in the cells, who Bishop releases, although in the film they turn out to be handy. Maybe Bishop himself is my ego or something. Fighting desperately to protect himself and the other occupants of the building.
There are more examples of films like this. A hard core of characters under siege from some aggressors. And if my mind can't simplify the struggle in this way, as I use this analogy, to describe my mind being besieged not by an outside force but by itself, then the idea falls apart. Because I can't other myself the way Carpenter does to the gang in the film. Turns them into mindless zombie-like creatures to be killed at will by the defenders. What's going on inside my mind is too complicated to be shown like this.
So, I suppose we come to the place where there is no real comparison or easy simplification of the devices inside my head. I can't make myself understanding of it, or it of me, or make it less other, or me a better defender. I'll have to keep searching for the right thing. I guess, you might already have noticed, dear reader, the other flaw in this idea. The fact that Bishop is rescued at the end when the police finally show up and the siege is lifted. That might not happen in my head.
