Essay Topic Idea

Is human nature essentially evil?  Is our goodness simply a practical curbing of the animalistic behavior that is more natural to our being?  How is goodness really represented in these texts?

Fight Club Quotation Free Write

The Narrator prefaces his account of Tyler forcing the Quicky-Mart attendant at gunpoint to follow his dreams with the statement, “On a long enough timeline, the survival rate for everyone drops to zero.” This brings up the frailty of human existence and the fact that everyone has a hourglass that will one day run out of sand, and that’s it, they will be dead, forevermore. Interestingly when people are presented with their demise their primal survival instinct is activated and they will avoid their death at all costs. This phenomenon is portrayed in the attendant’s willingness to follow Tyler’s instructions and work toward becoming a veterinarian in order to preserve his life, which Tyler has threatened to take away. Darwin is known for his studies and hypotheses on the survival of the fittest and the fight or flight response, which state that the most capable will survive and when one is confronted with a problem they will either combat it head on or flee, both of these are crucial in analyzing human survival behavior and evaluating Tyler’s theories. When Tyler confronts the attendant, the attendant chooses to flee rather than confront the crazy Tyler Durden, a calculated form of self-preservation that weighed his chances of survival against a man who is holding a gun and who talks to himself. In contrast the Narrator chooses to fight his boss when his job is threatened, and even goes so far as to beat himself up and frame his boss, to preserve his income. On the most basic level everyone is driven by self-preservation, an evolutionary trait generated to ensure the survival and continuation of the human race as a whole.

'Fight Club', ‘Strangers on a Train’, and 'Jekyll and Hyde' Comparison Brainstorm

TEN SIMILARITIES	TEN DIFFERENCES
Both Jekyll and the Narrator feel repressed by their constraining society and see their alter-egos as a way to escape and be free	Tyler interacts with others and creates a following, while Hyde is a shut in and frightens others
Jekyll, the Narrator, and Guy try to clean up the messes their alter-egos make	Hyde is described as initially weaker than Jekyll and is physically deformed / unattractive, while Tyler is stringer than the Narrator and more attractive
Tyler, Hyde, and Bruno represent the id, the Narrator, Jekyll, and Guy represent the ego, and there is a lack of a superego present	Jekyll is aware of his transformations into Hyde from the beginning, but the Narrator believes Tyler is a completely different person and is unaware it is his alter-ego
Both Jekyll and the Narrator are pulled / distracted from their occupation by the thrill of their alter-ego	Bruno and Guy are different people, while Jekyll and Hyde and the Narrator and Tyler are the same person
Hyde, Tyler, and Bruno are capable of deathly violence	Guy is able to pin everything on Bruno and get everything he wanted, while the Narrator and Jekyll are held responsible for their alter-ego’s actions
Both Jekyll and the Narrators accidental transformations are connected to them sleeping	Guy and the Narrator have romantic interests while Jekyll does not
All characters participate in illegal activity	Hyde leads to Jekyll’s death, while the Narrator is left still alive and Guy is left much better off
All ego characters have a lack of knowledge of what the id alter-egos are doing	Jekyll has a physical transformation, not only a mental one, when he become Hyde, whereas the Narrator just has a emotional transformation into Tyler
Hyde, Tyler, and Bruno don’t fit in to society’s norms, and act outside what is socially expectable	Guy wants to move up the social ladder (and Bruno already sits quite high on it) while Tyler wants to destroy it  (and the Narrator aids him in this destruction
All have occupations that cause them high stress and carry with them large societal expectations	Guy is focused on improving his future while the Narrator and Jekyll are focused on short term wish fulfillment

Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde, Strangers on a Train, and Fight Club Questions

Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde

(3) Jekyll is ultimately compelled to unlash Mr.. Hyde because of his curiosity of the duality of people and his thirst for scientific study into the two sides that he hypothesizes people are comprised of, one of total good, the other complete evil. Jekyll is compelled to continue his deadly game because of the freedom he feels as Hyde and the release he gets from letting his evil side, his deepest desires, his id, run free after it has been suppressed by his superego for all of his life.

(4) When Jekyll says that man is, “truly two,” and that, “in the agonized womb of consciousness, these polar twins should be continuously struggling,” he is explaining his hypothesis that all men have a complete good and a complete evil side and that they are in constant battle for control of the man. Jekyll’s struggle is in fact a human one between a man’s id, his deepest desires, and superego, what is socially acceptable; these two sides are mitigated by the mans ego, which is what he decides to do after weighing the costs and benefits of following each side.

(5) In the beginning Jekyll just views his transformation into Hyde as an escape but as he become more addicted to transforming, similar to someone becoming addicted to a drug, he looses control of his transformations and his feelings in his relationship with Hyde become more negative. After Hyde kills a man Jekyll tries to give up the transforming but finds he is an addict to the release Hyde provides for him, and as Jekyll looses control Hyde takes over and becomes stronger off of Jekyll’s growing weakness.

(6) 1. (Page 44) “The evil side of my nature, to which I had now transferred the stamping efficacy, was less robust and less developed than the good which I had deposed. Again, in the course of my life, which had been, after all, nine-tenths a life of effort, virtue and control, it had been much less exercised and much less exhausted.” à It shows how Hyde began weak from lack of use but was also less tired and worn out than Jekyll’s proper side, his superego, which had been running full power all of his life.

2. (Page 49) “Instantly the spirit of hell awoke in me and raged. With a transport of glee, I mauled the unresisting bode, tasting delight for very blow; and it was not till wearied had begin to succeed that I suddenly, in the top of my delirium, struck through the heart by a cold thrill of terror.” à It shows how once Hyde’s id was able to gain power and strength over time and take Jekyll over fully and consume him, allowing him to carry out his innermost evil desires with no mercy or conscience.

Fight Club

(1) Tyler represents the Freudian category of consciousness called id, while the speaker represents the ego, and there is a lack of a superego represented. Tyler represents the id because he is the narrator’s desires running wild without a superego to balance it out, while the narrator represents the ego because he is not all good as a super ego would be, rather he tries to reign in the id and compromise with the unseen superego.

(2) We should see Tyler as more of a negative manifestation of Jack’s unconscious mind because although he allows Jack to fulfill his deepest desires and be free it is at the expense of the well being of others. Tyler lives by id alone and has no superego to reign him in, only the unsuccessful ego of Jack to attempt reason, so he runs wild and convinces others to carry out actions that benefit him rather than the larger population, based on his personal views on how society is corrupt and what should be changed or fixed about it.

(3) Because by the end of the movie Jack realizes that he is also Tyler he is in his way to becoming a whole or well balanced person, but he still has a lot of work to do. He tries to remedy the damage he has done as Tyler comes to the epiphany that it was in fact him who carried out these acts. The significance of Jack and Marla ending up together at the end of the movie is that he cites her as the person who started ignited his Tyler flame, because when she forced him out of support groups he turned to Tyler as a way to release himself and become a different person.

(4) 1. Job Inequality: Tyler rebels against this by making all of those who participate in fight club nameless, making them all equal despite what they do and who they are in the real world

2. Monetary Inequality: Tyler rebels against this by wiping all of the banks clean at the end of the movie by blowing up their main buildings

3.  Importance of Possessions: Tyler rebels against this by blowing up Jack’s apartment, destroying all of his worldly possessions

Strangers on a Train

(1) By the end of the film Guy gets everything he wants, Bruno solves all of his problems, and he is ultimately better off. Guy no longer has to deal with his wife and her refusal to divorce him due to a fake pregnancy, leaving him able to now marry Anne and successfully use her to climb the social ladder setting him up to become a politician in the future.  Bruno also fully clears him of any blame in his wife’s murder by dying with his lighter in his hand, which acts as the smoking gun that allows the police to close the case and pin the murder on Bruno.    

(2) Bruno is the manifestation of Guy’s inner id because he doe all of the things Guy wishes he could do but his superego and ego prevent him from doing. An example of things that Bruno might do to fulfill Guy’s innermost desires is killing his old wife so that he can marry his new one without having to deal with getting a divorce from his wife who is pregnant with another man’s baby but threatens to claim it is his to keep him married to her and to keep his fame and fortune. Although Bruno represent Guy’s id, Guy does not represent the ego but rather the superego, which is why he is able to come to terms with the murder and not disclose his involvement to the police and instead simply reap the benefits of Bruno, his id.

(3) You could say that there is a love triangle between Anne, Guy, and Bruno in the film, (where Anne and Guy mutually love each other, Anne a little more than Guy, and Bruno’s love for Guy is unreturned), but in fact it is much more complicated than that. It can be shown that Anne loves Guy, from her attempts to get Bruno’s mom to stop Bruno from getting Guy into trouble, that Guy loves Anne, because he wants to divorce his wife to marry her (it should be noted that he might also love her more for her status as the daughter of a politician seeing as he wants to be a politician), and Bruno loves Guy, because he shows a unnatural and heightened obsession with Guy and over exaggerated their relationship in addition to his flamboyant tendencies such as having his mom give him a manicure which is supposed to point to him being gay. But this triangle leaves out the fact that Anne’s sister loves Guy and that Guy’s wife loves Guy for his fame.

(6) This movie is about Bruno’s ability to help guy climb higher on the social ladder because he gets rid of Bruno’s old wife which frees him up to marry Anne, who’s father is a Senator, which allows him to further his social status which he hopes will help him become a politician one day.  

Film Noir! Scary Shadows! Questions

1.    According to Schraeder, is Film noir actually a genre?  Explain your answer.

a.    According to Schraeder, film noir is not a genre because it is not defined by conventions of conflict and settings but rather it can be defined by subtle qualities of mood and tone.

2.    Identify two themes (content and ideas) that are often explored in classic film noir movies. 

a.    Passion for the Past and Present + Fear of the Future: Film noir heroes dread to look ahead, instead they try to survive by the day, and if unsuccessful at that, they retreat to the past. Film noir emphasizes nostalgia, loss, insecurity, and lack of clear priorities.

3.    What stylistic characteristics are prevalent within classic noir movies?  List at least 3 characteristics. 

a.    The majority of scenes are lit for night.

b.    Oblique and vertical lines are preferred to horizontal.

c.     The actors and setting are often giving equal lighting emphasis.

d.    Compositional tension is preferred to physical action.

e.    There seems to be almost Freudian attachment to water.

f.      There is a love of romantic narration.

g.    A complex chronological order is frequently used to reinforce the feelings of hopelessness and lost time.

4.    During what period of American history did film noir begin to gain notoriety?  What years are often said to define the classic noir period?

a.    During the period of American history known as the forties film noir began to gain notoriety.  The years that are often said to define the classic noir period are 1941 to 1953.

5.    What are the major phases of the classic noir movie era?

a.    1^st Phase (1941 – 1946): The Wartime Period

                                               i.     Phase of the private eye, the lone wolf, the lady in the lake, etc.

b.    2^nd Phase (1945 – 1949): The Postwar Realistic Period       

                                               i.     Focused on the problems of police routine, political corruption, and crime in the streets.

c.     3^rd Phase (1949 – 1953): Period of Psychotic Action and Sternal Action and Suicidal and Suicidal Impulse

                                               i.     The noir hero, seemingly under the weight of despair, started to go crazy.

6.    What is expressionism?  How is film noir fairly described as an “expressionist” genre? 

a.    Expressionism, with its German influence, relies on artificial studio lighting, which seems incompatible with postwar realism, and its harsh unadorned exteriors.
b.    Film noir is fairly described as an “expressionist” genre because its ability to weld seemingly contradictory elements into s uniform style makes it a unique quality of film noir.