The movie Interstellar and it's propaganda
4 2015-10-10 by ravenously_red
If you haven't seen this movie yet, I'd say it might be worth a bit of your time. Putting aside your personal feelings about Christopher Nolan and his work, the film presents some interesting propaganda.
What propaganda? The film takes place in the future, somewhere in the United States. Food scarcity is an issue because of over farming. Global warming and all of it's effects are in full force.
There is a scene where a woman concedes that the moon landings were hoaxed in order to bankrupt the Soviet Union during the Cold War.
For those of you who have seen it, did this film strike you as odd?
41 comments
6 2ndlinesteps 2015-10-10
The Propaganda was deep. Just saw it today. Not to mention that Mars DOES NOT LOOK LIKE THAT AT ALL.
Yes, The film struck me as ODD.
4 Bgriff42 2015-10-10
The movie reminded me a bit of 2001 a space odyssey.
3 SlumberMachine 2015-10-10
Interstellar is probably one of my favorite movies of all time, heck I even did a remix of the song: https://soundcloud.com/slumbermachine/interstellar-numbers
I do agree that there is some subtle propaganda found within the movie:
5 Bgriff42 2015-10-10
The drone was actually supposed to have been made in China but they changed it to India so it wouldn't give the viewer the impression China was the new world power.
1 ravenously_red 2015-10-10
Yeah, I found the whole drone portion to be especially disturbing.
2 spatimouth01 2015-10-10
Also, I wouldn't be surprised if we did fake the moon landings as a way to make the USSR bleed out. Both the USA and Russia have been doing the same thing to each other for decades... hell maybe for 200 years.
1 BirdSkull 2015-10-10
After Batman Begins was a massive hit Nolan became the go to dude for propaganda.
I think interstellar was a total propaganda film but about way more then you've mentioned.
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1 blackbaze 2015-10-10
Agree totally.
The way capitalism works today(it wasnt always like this) we will suck earth's resources and there wont be left anything.
A hanfdul few know these two facts combined.
1 lilistj 2015-10-10
Aren't movies like interstellar and the martian propaganda movies to further the space program kind of like top gun was for recruiting?
1 ravenously_red 2015-10-10
There is a lot of media circulating that is begging the public to stroke NASAs dick. Interstellar is the one I encountered most recently. Apart from that, there was the hyped announcement of water on Mars (which is cool) where they made everyone wait in "suspense", Neil deGrasse Tyson wrote Cosmos: a space time odyssey which was basically a big plea for people to take interest and fund NASA...
A publicly funded, open, and continual exploration of space would be wonderful. The reality of that occurring is pretty bleak unless the public steps up and decides it's important.
I'm not a very passionate advocate of NASA because I'm a little cynical about the benefits being shared with the public. I think a lot of the discoveries and innovations slip under the radar of the public, or worse, are deliberately hidden. There is too much red tape and dogma in areas where the public's interest is most keen: SETI projects, cheaper/better technology creation, unregulated media, etc.
I'm saying all of this being fully aware of all the tech we've got out of publicly funded space research.
But the really cool innovations? Look to DARPA and the private sector -- oh and other first world countries. The private sector is doing just fine financing private rocket creations/launches. The government has a shitload of patents on tech that are classifier because of "National Security". Should it be a cause of concern that CERN isn't in America? We definitely aren't leaders or innovators in STEM fields anymore.
1 spatimouth01 2015-10-10
What makes my imagination go wild is the way in which the humans in the movie interact and show empathy toward the obvious AI walking lcd screens. Get ready for that dynamic to happen in your lifetime. Can you handle that?
1 ravenously_red 2015-10-10
As a woman who has felt empathy for a variety of both living and non-living entities (dolls and trees being two examples), you could say I've been preparing for it my whole life.
Humans are innately empathetic, so I'm not surprised we extend our empathy towards objects that interact with us. That said, I'm not about to argue for robot rights anytime soon... Lol
1 spatimouth01 2015-10-10
You haven't seen someone kicking their car when it breaks down on the side of the road. So, how will our culture deal with others treating human like "machines" like shit when they say or do things that anger someone else? Will we hold the real human accountable or his bad behavior? Or will we just allow it, because after all.... They're just robots.
My opinion: If a robot or machine resembles, in any way shape or form, a human, we should on principle respect it's function and purpose as if it was a human. If we don't, then we stand a chance of lowering it down to a slave status. History will repeat itself, and we will find ourselves, slowly shifting back to the "old ways" of allowing other humans to be enslaved. I think in the future, slavery, will absolutely be abolished, even in thought and in simple actions. The robots will be a constant reminder of why we should treat each other with human empathy.
1 ravenously_red 2015-10-10
Some would argue that placing humans on the same level as robots would be demeaning to humans.
In any case, we don't need robot empathy to enslave people. Most people are already slaves via economic control, i.e. Wage slaves.
But you gave me an idea for a short story, thank you.
-1 natavism 2015-10-10
I've only seen it once, and it was probably a year ago, so I might not be 100% on this, but I believe the scene toward the end where the daughter is somewhat adrift between the timelines is a lot like the Library of Babel. James Corbett has a Film and Literature in the New World Order podcast piece on this work too, available here.
There's also some pro-drone material toward the beginning iirc.
Also I hate to be the one to say it, but the moral is that gravity is magic, which flows into flat earth territory
5 SwordofGondor 2015-10-10
Ugh please tell me people don't still believe in flat earth. Seriously, send a weather balloon with a camera onboard space and see for yourself.
-5 natavism 2015-10-10
All the weather balloon footage I've seen including the Felix Baumgardner jump actually all indicate that the Earth is flat
Fisheye Lens:
The apparent curvature we see in these clips is caused by the shape of the camera's lens. This is proved when the horizon dips below the bulge in the lens and the Earth's curve bows the wrong way, as is demonstrated in the screencaps linked after each video.
High Altitude Weather Balloon With HD Camera
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EoRfHWoy5cI
http://i.imgur.com/XZw4no9.jpg
Weather Balloon Near Space GoPro
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9CjjbauSvBE
http://i.imgur.com/O7BuHpM.jpg
Weather Balloon DPS Space Flight iPhone Camera
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Hz1ipDYpAgQ
http://i.imgur.com/POE8Mtj.jpg
Toy Robot in Space! – HD balloon flight to 95,000ft
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZCAnLxRvNNc
http://i.imgur.com/dAGz592.jpg
Flat and level:
Not including stills from these, because the horizon remains constant - just take a look.
DogCam flies to the edge of space 110,000ft on a balloon!
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WwimocU0IIc
A Toy Train in Space
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XoMN-zg7r3M
Redbull Space Jump
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7f-K-XnHi9I
In the opening seconds, we see a flat and level horizon over what I assume is Felix's shoulder. The external shot uses a fisheye lens, as we can tell by the curvature present in the capsule that Felix is jumping from. Also features bonus tacky spinning globe animation if you watch the whole thing, which I do not endorse.
5 SwordofGondor 2015-10-10
Lol I'm surprised you put in the time for this comment, but every video source you show me ( including the beginning of Felix's video) seems to show curvature, "fish eye" lens or not. Even your stills are photos taken when the camera is at an angle that only shows earth's slight curve up. That toy robot video is actually perfect, it totally demonstrates earth's curve.
Do people still seriously believe in flat earth? You honestly think that if I boarded a plane and only travelled east, I'd never come back to where I started? Like have you never been on an airplane before? Basic physics? Ever been on a beach? What about all the videos of the ISS and it's live feed? Jesus christ.
2 DaneelR 2015-10-10
Flat Earth is a disinfo tactic used to paint conspiracy theorists as gullible idiots for believing in it. It's a smear campaign to ridicule other theories, like 911, Boston Bombing, JFK assassination, ISIS being created by CIA etc.
3 nonorat 2015-10-10
I disagree. I think it was started as an intellectual exercise in amusement (see Flat Earth Society). Unfortunately there are people literally that stupid and contrarian that they believed the joke. Not disinfo, just stupidity.
1 BillionaireBob 2015-10-10
No, they think you'll eventually make it back. But they think it's because you'll be fooled by GPS in the plane to slightly by turning left the whole time, like we live in a giant NASCAR race.
1 MidnightCladNoctis 2015-10-10
you are actually stupid if you think this is the truth. Go to your local airfield and pay to have someone take you up to 10 000 feet, you can see the curve of the earth even that high.
1 zkO 2015-10-10
Can you show us a photo of the curvature without sourcing NASA or a gopro fisheye lense? Genuinely curious
1 RedSnapperVeryTasty 2015-10-10
I'm dumber for having even looked at this post.
-1 [deleted] 2015-10-10
[deleted]
1 natavism 2015-10-10
Nope that's the movie
-3 Rockran 2015-10-10
Someones been playing around with a little time dilation.
-5 Rockran 2015-10-10
Nope, food scarcity is an issue because of The Blight - A plague.
I don't recall global warming being a plot device, let alone mentioned.
The moon landing part struct me as humorous, a kind of 'what has the world come to' joke.
But your point is lost given your summarisation of various points in the film are false.
4 Bgriff42 2015-10-10
The fact that they are growing okra indicates they are most likely dealing with global warming. And the fake moon landing portion was a jab at those of us who do not believe it occurred and is meant to show that if the critics of science were to run the world we would be left utterly hopeless which is complete bullshit. We would finally be free. So why don't you chill out. There's nothing wrong with the post.
1 sterreg 2015-10-10
How so?
3 Bgriff42 2015-10-10
It is among the most heat- and drought-tolerant vegetable species in the world and will tolerate soils with heavy clay and intermittent moisture, but frost can damage the pods.
1 ravenously_red 2015-10-10
Thank you for all your explaining! It saved me the work! :)
-3 Rockran 2015-10-10
Sounds like dustbowl, not global warming.
3 Bgriff42 2015-10-10
Around the world?
-3 Rockran 2015-10-10
If my memory isn't too shitty, they don't really go into much detail about what's going on throughout the rest of the world.
The dust storms seem localised.
So all we're told is that food is scarce thanks to the blight, shit's dusty as hell - But neither of those indicate global warming.
Farming okra could just be because shits dusty so not much else will grow.
4 Bgriff42 2015-10-10
The whole premise of the movie is getting off the planet so that does not sound very localized to me.
-2 Rockran 2015-10-10
Only the dust storms seem localised, the rest of the problems, worldwide.
Although 'localised' could mean spotted about here and there - Just not everywhere.
Ya dig?
5 Bgriff42 2015-10-10
The movie left it to the viewer to make a judgment call on what was happening and a majority of people are gonna think about global warming even if it was not directly inferred in the movie.
-3 Rockran 2015-10-10
That's true.
So if it's something left open to interpretation, why does the OP seem to suggest it's an active plot device?
I'll never know... That is, till he responds.
7 Bgriff42 2015-10-10
Because the movie was designed to make you think it
1 ravenously_red 2015-10-10
I believe the movie wanted you to infer that it was global warming or over farming that caused the dust storms. Read about the dust bowl that occurred in the thirties. Another user already mentioned they were only growing plants that did well in the heat/drought conditions.
Also, I'm a lady.
-3 Rockran 2015-10-10
Someones been playing around with a little time dilation.
1 natavism 2015-10-10
Nope that's the movie
1 sterreg 2015-10-10
How so?
3 Bgriff42 2015-10-10
Around the world?