MovieChat Forums > Equilibrium (2002) Discussion > A lot of emotion for a world with no emo...

A lot of emotion for a world with no emotion


There were many examples of anger, fear, amusement, worry, etc...They all should have acted like Data from Star Trek TNG.

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It's comical the amount of retards like the thread starter come to this forum to say the same stupid and false *beep*

The movie never claimed the society had no emotion. The movie claimed the society was taking a drug called "Prozium" to eradicate the extremes of emotion. It never said that emotion itself was forbidden. It said the drug was to be taken to keep emotion in check, at an "Equilibrium" so-to-speak.

Why don't you watch the movie before coming and asking stupid *beep* questions like this.

And as for characters showing extreme emotion like Father, that's obviously because he wasn't on the dose, as he said at the end of the film. Along with other government elite members like Brandt.

Why ask such a foolish question when the movie CLEARLY states the concept without having to ask the board?

Fear is not an emotion either, you try and attack a spider and he runs off, that is "FEAR," you really think that tiny simplistic organism has emotions? FOH.

I'll add on. The only characters in the film to show emotion were those who were NOT taking the drug.

Preston, Preston's wife and children. Father, Brandt and Father's trench-coat henchmen, Partridge, the school teacher etc.

A bright light can hollow the deepest of nothingness.

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Hey everybody I think we have found a fan boy here. Fan boy alert!! Fan boy alert!! It really seems like the entire time you were writing this, your blood pressure must have been off the charts and your heart beat was at least 150 BPM.

Just to be clear, every single character shows many different emotions throughout the entire film, whether they were on the drug or not. You just have to know what to look for. Like I said before, to convey the message they were trying to get across, the director should have had them all act like Data from Star Trek TNG. It would have been a much better movie.

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He's not a fanboy, and his arguments show it. You're simply too dumb to understand. I think this movie is too difficult for you. You're better off with cartoons, kiddo!

I shall be known from now on as the Black Vegetable

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I think you need a little Prozium. One of the biggest overreactions I've seen in a while.

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No need for insults.

If they wish to simply have equilibrium in their emotions then why are the arts and literature banned? Even paintings is supposed to evoke extreme emotions? Even Vulcans who eradicate themselves of feeling and embrace logic still appreciate the arts like music, paintings, literature, etc. If they all took the drug, what harm could these art pieces have?

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Every book and painting works against the brain wash of father (not only emotionally but also rationally) and against the emotional stabilizer too. These objects are important for the underground movement. Burning them is just part of fighting them.

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"Fear is not an emotion either, you try and attack a spider and he runs off, that is "FEAR," you really think that tiny simplistic organism has emotions? "

You sure display a lot of emotion.

First of all, what is fear, if not an emotion? It's ego-based unnatural, but powerful vibration attached to people for multiple reasons - some of which are pragmatic here on the physical plane, but others are karmic and cultivative (spiritually speaking).

Fear is very much an emotion.

Also, why would an 'organism's physical size dictate what they can or cannot feel? You're not making any sense. Also, why shouldn't it have basic instincts, like all animals?

Also also, why compare humans to a spider anyway? If a spider can't 'fear', then you assume that dogs can't feel fear, either? That's just so false, I would shake my head if I considered stupidity of this magnitude to be worthy of the energy I'd have to spend to do it.

Nothing bright about your 'light' here..

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OP came here for attention because clearly he didn't watch the movie :D

Come prove me wrong.

Cite EXAMPLES from scenes where an individual on the drug showed EXTREME emotion.

Otherwise admit defeat.

A bright light can hollow the deepest of nothingness.

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As soon as he stops taking the drug he appears to start appreciating small emotional reactions for the first time, such as when he takes his glove off and runs his hand along the banister.

That doesn't fit with your 'extreme emotions' theory?

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A theory? The movie says so itself dumb *beep*

And since when did someone caressing a stair-rail constitute as being a subtle emotion? You're dumb as *beep*

A bright light can hollow the deepest of nothingness.

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The number of people who think the drug was supposed to eliminate all emotion, and not just make people more docile, is way too high.

Secondly, nearly evey speaking role in the movie was OFF the drug.

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Or at the very least, like the Vulcans in Star Trek. People with emotion who suppress it.

But I agree, both the new Father and the new partner expressed various types of emotions: envy, jealousy, anger, fear, arrogance, bemusement, etc in public, for everyone to see.

The Father is supposed to Feel, however, how did people not notice it? Preston for example is supposed to have an ability to recognize emotion, emotion he missed in his wife perhaps because he was too close to her, but was able to detect it in his best friend. So why would he not notice it in the Father?

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Well to be fair, they do say in the film that Prozium only clips the highs and lows of emotion, not all emotion.

However, I do agree that for an emotionally-limited people, it did occasionally get a little crazy. I always laugh at the scene where Taye Diggs is like, "I'm not feeling! He's the only who's feeling!!!" There's certainly a lot of emotion there for someone who isn't getting the feels.

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I imagine a more Japanese type of person or a Vulcan when I think of controlled emotions with limitations on the highs and lows of the spectrum. But some here like the new partner exhibited extreme emotions like your example or whenever he sneers with pride over Preston.

Also the burning and banning of the arts and literature seems to be a very extreme emotional decision to me.

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Yeah, I dunno, if everyone really showed almost no emotion, I have to wonder what that would do to the movie. Like, would the movie end up feeling dull because of it?

As for the burning of arts and literature, I think that's a clear reference to Fahrenheit 451 as well as the Nazi book burnings. Ideas can be dangerous and can be a threat to the Powers That Be.

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I'm not sure what Fahrenhight 451 is but I am familiar with NAZIs or Communist burnings but these were all done based on their extreme views of their ideologies. An ideology still rooted in beings riddled by extreme emotions. I can understand certain films & literature or even music being banned (art that evokes an extreme emotional state) or destroyed but all of it? Even the Mona Lisa?

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I think they felt like all art could evoke an emotional response in someone--possibly an extreme one--so it had to go.

As for Fahrenheit 451, oh man, it's one of the best books ever written. You really gotta check it out.

It's set in a dystopian American future and the main character is a fireman . . . he doesn't put out fires, rather it's his job to go around and burn books wherever they are found. Eventually he begins to think differently and to recognize the totalitarian ways of the government and he joins the resistance.

Sound familiar? Yeah, Equilibrium borrows from it HEAVILY.

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Thank you for the recommendation, I have to seek it out!

What about the gold frame of the mirror though? How could that evoke extreme emotions?

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I interpreted it as the idea of beauty evoking emotion. Have you ever seen something so beautiful, so finely crafted, that it nearly brought tears to your eyes?

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When I look at myself in the mirror? LOL, I'm just joking.

But you can find beauty in anything then, nature, the sunset/sunrise (like in the film), seeing your kids for the first time, etc. And I would imagine that would evoke more emotion that some carved frame. And the people under the drug were still unaffected despite such beauty surrounding them, therefore the extreme banning of such crafts comes across as illogical, like it was an emotional decision.

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You may be looking at it too logically. I think that is the message that the filmmakers were trying to put across, regardless of what logical pitfalls there may be.

You really should read Fahrenheit 451. I think you'd be amazed by how extensively Equilibrium borrows from it. It's a fairly short, quick read, and very thought-provoking.

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I'll keep it in mind PM, I'm reading The Sheik now, the basis of one of Valentino's films. And since I'm on a Valentino binge, I need to get that out of my system first, lol!

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The point is: it was emotional too you. You were not on prozium and the movie was not made to keep you in a state of equilibrium.
For those who burnt the artworks, these meant nothing to them - as if you burn a piece of wood at your fireplace. They were just doing their job, following the law.

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I think they should have been like the Surrogates in the film of the same title.
Equilibrium is almost the perfect idiot test. Just sit someone down and put this dreck on. If they like it you have a confirmed idiot. The only flaw is forcing the non-moronic to sit through this ridiculous travesty of a film.

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That's always the problem when people 'act' - but then they're told 'no emotion'. How do you 'act' without emotion, when the whole 'acting' thing is based on being able to express all kinds of emotions and feelings?

I agree about the Data statement, that's the most perfect way to act emotionless, in my opinion.

Data can still function very well, he has aspirations and plans, dreams, even literal 'dreams' sometimes, fantasies, wishes, and almost yearnings, too.

But he has no feel. And yet, he's not catatonic, like some people have suggested emotional people would be. Look, you can still get bored, when you have no 'feel'.

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Taye Diggs character the most. His first lines he was *pleased* then chuckled and at the end he laughs shows anger etc

I don't think he understood what his character was about

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