Great movie! **SPOILERS**
No, it wasn't the greatest thriller, mystery, action film, or even drama, but it exposed so much truth about the "rat f*@k", behind the scenes, that struggles so hard to sustain the illusion that masks the dark disgusting reality the power brokers never want you to wake up to. They need to maintain a servile, compliant, docile population who deludes themselves into believing that they are "free" and in charge, hence would never revolt. I'm surprised this film even got made.
Essentially, it's about a man who wakes up from the drug induced dream state he maintained in order to fool himself into believing that his life/lifestyle was worthwhile. That the public good, merit, morality, fairness, justice and rationality play no part at all in the flow of power and money. It's very naive to think it does. In our country alone, the 1% are living it up, 49% are doing slightly better than OK, and 50% are in hell.
The dirty little secret - a huge black market the rich and powerful use in so many ways, one of which is to ensure their control is absolute, that I won't mention here - is somewhat revealed.
"It’s just politics, Eli. We feel the images from that toy could influence Mr. Launer in his decision on whether to run."Anyway, he truly wakes up in "the big three" photo scene, where Eli (PR/publicist), Cary(Oscar winning actor) and Elliot (corporate power) are gathered together, representing the kind of trifecta necessary to sustain, and more importantly, mask this "rat f*@k" that runs our world. In that scene, Eli backs out, leaving the actor and the corporatist, demonstrating that he fully understands he's complicit in bringing about very thing he fought against when he was young, naive and idealistic. It's very telling when, he's in the men's room, and he hears Cary thank, "the man who put it all together...a guy who believes in the history of the coalition and a very silent guy. A guy who knows how to make things happen," and he starts to gag.
He sums it up when Michael, the naive young actor enters, claims Cary's a god, and Eli responds, "God of death. Cary," and goes on to say,
"You know, the worst thing in this world, Michael, is to know too much. You want to try and stay naive. It's much better."If you know anything about politics and power, you know that blackmail is often used to keep politicians, actors - the puppets used to put a happy face on "rat f*@k" - in their place. And these quotes further enlighten the viewer to this sad reality.
When Cary says to Elliot,
"That's the name of the game. You told it like it was, and now ya gonna do it like it's gotta be. That's why we're here, isn't it?"and then to Eli, he says,
"This is just another rat f*k,"and Eli says to Cary,
"You're such an actor. Someone turns on the camera, you just got to perform...,"and Cary responds, after telling him he's in big trouble,
"....there are people moving around this thing I don't even know about."referring, of course to the real power brokers who manipulate the strings of the puppets.
And of course, "The Cat in the Hat" comment. share