If you really want to understand the twist ending of Forbidden Planet, it's probably helpful to take a moment to discuss Freud.
Sigmund Freud (1859-1939) developed both a theory of personality (psychodynamic theory) that emphasized unconscious factors and a therapy (psychoanalytic therapy) for patients exhibiting abnormal behaviors. Freud suggested that our behaviors may be determined by irrational forces outside of conscious awareness. And his ideas, while most recently out of style, were very much in style in the 1950’s. And Forbidden Planet was only one of many films to jump on the bandwagon.
A core element to Freud’s theory is his perception of ‘consciousness.’ Consciousness is the term used to describe the level of awareness an individual has at any given time regarding any given event. The three levels are (1) the conscious (everything we are aware of at a given moment), (2) the preconscious (thoughts, feelings, memories, and wishes that can easily be brought to the conscious level), and (3) the unconscious (thoughts, feelings, memories, and wishes that are extremely difficult to bring to the conscious level and sometimes appear in disguised form in dreams).
For example, if someone was to ask you, “What are you eating right now?” you’d probably have a pretty good answer. “Why, I’m eating pizza. I know that because I’m doing it right this very minute. I’m thinking of it. The answer to your question currently resides in my ‘conscious’ mind.”
But what if someone were to ask you, “Say, what did you eat for lunch two weeks ago?” Well, you might have a little more difficulty coming up with an answer. “Um, let’s see. Last Wednesday I went home for lunch, I think. Yeah, because that was the day I had a dentist appointment…Okay, I remember now. It was pizza. Left over from the night before. Sorry it took so long to come up with an answer. It’s just that I didn’t know I’d need the information you were asking for, so I tucked it away in my preconscious mind. It was there, and I could access it, but it took me a few minutes.”
And what if someone were to ask you, “What did you have to eat the morning of your fifth birthday?” Why, you’d have no idea. “How should I know?” you’d say. “That was, like, years ago. Who knows that kind of information?” The answer, according to Freud, would be ‘everyone’ – it’s just locked away in your mind’s fruit cellar – i.e. the unconscious mind. Your conscious mind might not be able to find that info in all the boxes and chests you have down there collecting dust, but it doesn’t mean your unconscious mind still doesn’t hold a grudge against your mom for serving steamed vegetables on your five-year birthday. In fact, that’s one of the many reasons your mom bugs you so much today. Remember that room at the end of Raiders of the Lost Ark with all the crates? Those crates are all the things your mom ever did to embarrass or anger you.
And while your conscious mind might not even remember what those things were, your unconscious mind has them very well documented, and it takes each and every one of them very, very personally.
So we’ve got the conscious level, the preconscious level, and the unconscious level. Three levels. But we also have, according to Freud, three structures of the mind: the ego, the id, and the superego.
Id – The id represents the primitive, biological side of our personality. The id is extremely selfish and has no concern for the needs or desires of others or for the concerns of society. Think of the id as your “Incredible Hulk” or your “inner caveman.” Your id lurks solely in your unconscious mind. It’s tough and greedy and selfish.
Superego – The superego contains the conscience, that part of your mind that helps you determine right from wrong. The superego helps us aim for what is right, correct, and ideal; it motivates us to strive for morality and perfection. If your id is the devil on your right shoulder, then the superego is that little angle on your left. Unlike the id, the superego exists in all three levels of the mind – the conscious, preconscious, and unconscious.
Ego – The ego is the executive arm of the personality that seeks to resolve the continuing conflict between the id and superego by following the reality principal (a realistic plan for obtaining what the id wants while conforming to the restraint of the superego). The ego stands for “reason and good sense.” Again, if your id is a devil on your right shoulder, and the superego is an angle on your left, then your ego is your head, stuck right in the middle and listening to both sides. The ego exists only on the conscious and preconscious levels.
Let’s put it all together. You’re hungry. Your id says, “Dude, see that guy eating a sandwich? Take it. Just punch him in the face and take his sandwich. And eat it.” But your superego says, “No, we can’t. That would be wrong. In fact, we’re not even that hungry – at least, not as hungry as a starving kid in Africa. Say, let’s raise some money and send a sandwich to that kid!” And finally, your ego considers both sides of the argument and finally decides, “Okay, let’s compromise. I’ve got a few bucks in my wallet. Let’s buy a sandwich and eat it. And maybe this November we’ll give a few bucks to the canned food drive.”
So what does any of this have to do with Forbidden Planet? Well, the monster was a physical manifestation of Morbius’ id, that’s what.
So here’s the question of the day: What other movies have you that seen employ the same device? Are there any films you can think of in which the danger the characters face is, in fact, a manifestation of their own id, their own unconscious, greedy, selfish psyche? Keep in mind, we're not necessarily looking for films where the antagonist is the 'id' in the literal sense. Maybe it's just a character who behaves on his/her id more than his/her ego or superego. When fashioning your responses, consider not only science fiction films but also suspense, horror, fantasy, and even animated films.
Because I can only think of one line that basically describes what this is talking about, I'm going to talk about it. "You have become the very thing you swore to destroy" - Obi-wan-Kenobi. This is the closest I can relate to in movie wise and also because it was the first thing that popped into my head. Anyways, that line is said in the 3rd episode. When Obi is completely devastated that Anakin has turned to the dark side. We all remember in the prequels that Anakin is a very excited kid and always wanted to travel the Galaxy, in his process he becomes a Jedi. Well, he is a very arrogant Jedi he's always wanting to be on the offensive, but Obi is always telling him be patient and there are other ways to fight. Obi-wan is basically his Superego, always telling him to do what's right and take the good road. As we know Anakin is good friends with Chancellor Palpatine, who in fact is a Sith Lord, (sorry if I spoiled anything for anyone), and he's always trying to get Anakin in to doing things that he shouldn't be doing. He's Anakin's Id and he eventually turns Anakin into his own Id. Hence, where "until now you have become the very thing you swore to destroy." And in response, "Don't lecture me Obi-wan..." Anakin went from a good Jedi into some monster. Another example that shows the same device is The Dark Knight. In the movie you have Harvey Dent. Yes, he's a really good man he puts away crooks and scum into the dark cold jail cells that they deserve to be in. Until, the joker kills his fiance Rachel Dawes in a fiery explosion. Fortunately for him, or unfortunately, he has his life spared suffering only some burns. Then he he is met by a beautiful nurse, The Joker, and is told that "When I say that you and your girlfriend was nothing personal, you know that I'm telling the truth." And then The Joker gives Harvey Dent the push into Two-face by saying, "Introduce a little anarchy. Upset the established order, and everything becomes chaos. I'm an agent of chaos. Oh, and you know the thing about chaos? It's fair!" And then from that moment on Harvey Dent became the very thing he swore to destroy. I'm pretty sure there are many films out there that have this element/device used in it. These are just two of the probably many out there.
ReplyDeleteThe best example that I can think of where the character's a manifestation of their own id, is the play/movie/book Death of A Salesmen. In the story the character Willy Loman is a salesmen during the 50's and he's losing everything. He goes on these imagination trips where he has these flashbacks of his dead brother Ben. Ben is actually Willy's idol because he was really rich and left when Willy was 3. So he imagines Ben and eventually the talking with Ben (or believing he was) makes Willy kill himself in the end of the story. This shows that Willy's id took over and put him on this trips of his life that he makes the dialogue for everyone who is there. He is avoiding the ego or the superego and going to the extreme of the id.
ReplyDeleteCaleb - Two excellent examples. Nailed it. And I hadn't thought of either of these two. Darth Vader is very much the id, and if you look at The Return of the Jedi, you can see, with his battle with Luke, that this is what the entire battle is about. Vader keeps picking away at Luke, trying to unleath Luke's id - i.e. the dark side. The id is the dark side...Well done!
ReplyDeleteAnd as to Two face..again, you nailed it! The whole character, back to its inception in the comics, is a character whose personality is divided in two - the id and superego. What Harvey Dent is missing is the ego. That role is played by, of course, the coin. It's Harvey's only way of making decisions.
Ben - I've always approached Death of a Salesman with a Marxist point of view: rich vs. poor; haves vs. have nots; what you want vs. what we'll never get; the nature of success and failure. "A man is not a piece of fruit!" Now that you put it this way...well, wow. I haven't taught the play for several years. It is one of my favorites, though. And if I ever get to do it again, we're getting Freudian with Biff and Hap. Thanks.
ReplyDeleteThe use of this device seems to go back even farther than just Freud's theory because it was used in 'The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde', which was written long before Freud's theory. I think it goes along with the fact that everyone has good and evil within them, and sometimes they feel the need to prove to the world that they are good, so they unconciously need to make an alter ego to deal with the evil they hide. But there are so many films, many psychological thrillers that use this device of id, superego, and ego. As we talked about in class, 'Psycho' uses this device of id, superego and ego. The three levels of Norman Bates's house would represents the three levels of the his mind. The upstairs, would be his superego, where his mother lives. The ground floor would be Norman's ego, where he can function like a normal person, and the basement would be his id, where he hides his mother's corpse. Another example would be the movie 'Hide and Seek' with Robert De Niro and Dakota Fanning. In this movie De Niro's character suffers from a split personality disorder (which is revealed at the end of the movie). But throughout the main course of the movie, we only see De Niro's character at his superego level, where he tries to take care of his only daughter after his wife dies instead of working. After his wife dies of a supposed suicide, his daughter and him move out to a rural area. This is where his daughter (Dakota Fanning) makes an imaginary friend named "Charlie", De Niro doesn't think too much of it until "Charlie" turns out to be not so imaginary when he starts murdering their neighbors. At the end of the movie, De Niro realizes that he is Charlie. Charlie was his id, through Charlie he unconciously killed his wife after discovering her affair, and made it seem like a suicide. By the end his id takes over, and he completely becomes Charlie. Another movie that uses this device is Spiderman. In Spiderman, Willem Dafoe's character struggled with a split personality also. While he was Norman Osborn, he would be in his superego level, as he acted like his usual self. But with his Green Goblin identiy, his id, he would murder the board members to try and save his company. This movie shows how the id is part of the unconcious mind. After commiting murders, Norman would wake up somewhere and have no idea of all the crimes he commited. Both De Niro and Dafoe's character didn't display much of an ego level because they just went along with either their id or superego, there was no middle ground with them.
ReplyDeleteActually, Hide and Seek was one of the examples I was thinking of when I posted the question. (I just didn't think any of you had likely seen it.) I hadn't considered Osborn with his split personality. I wonder if using this split-personalilty device with characters such as Hyde, Osborn, Harvey Dent and even Darth Vader is a way for storytellers to make tghe audience, at least to some degree, sympathetic to the antagonist. It certainly did for Norman Bates.
ReplyDeleteI literally have not seen enough movies to be able to answer this question with confidence. I s'pose the only movie I can somewhat think of with this example would be Sweeney Todd. Mr. Sweeney Todd holds a grudge for 17 years against Judge Turpin because the Judge had sent Sweeney off far away so he could have his wife and child to himself. When Sweeney returns, he ends up acting on his ID to not reason with Turpin (ego) and to not forgive Turpin (superego) but rather, to all-out kill Turpin (ID).
ReplyDeleteI haven't seen Sweeney Todd, but that sounds about right
ReplyDeleteWell, I thought about this for a few days, and like Dakota, I haven't seen enough movies to have a answer I'm sure of. I was actually thinking of Hide and Seek as well: because Charlie is like the id of Emily's mind. David the father thinks that Emily is the cause of the series of violent acts, but she keeps telling him that Charlie (who is suppose to be imaginary) is doing them. I can also thing of Lord of the Rings and Gollum (Smeagol). This character sort of has a split personality. He remembers a life were he had friends and love but he also had a life in which he was slave to the Ring and then he only knew treachery and violence. When guiding the hobitts to their ultimate destination he has moments in which he is kind and helpful and others were a voice tells him to snatch the Ring and run off. He talks to himself (the good vs. the bad side of him- this split personality/ id) and has arguments with himself over things such as the Ring. This bad side of him, or his id tells him that the hobitts don't care about him and that he should steal the RIng and become powerful because the Ring was his before it was theirs.
ReplyDeleteThe Hulk and Frankenstein could be other examples because they, though full of anger and evil (id) have a good side too (superego). This is what I can think of. I'm sure there are many more with character that don't know they have a bad side (or society doesn't know).
The movie that really popped into my head when I thought of selfish behavior taking over someone's character and life would be Gran Torino. In the movie Gran Torino, Clint Eastwood in the beginning is simply a selfish racist that only acts on the impulse of his ID. He happens to live in a poorer and diverse part of the city and this only spurs on his racism more. In the movie, Clint's Id is represented in the beginning of the movie rather than the end in most of the movies other people have mentioned. Throughout the movie he develops various relationships with the people around him. All of these people being of a different race. This is a difficult task for him because he is strictly going against his ID. He realizes the crime all around him and then his Superego kicks in full gear. He begins to try to clean up the neighborhood and get rid of all the gangs, violence, and injustice. He ends up sacrificing his entire life to protect the kids in the neighborhood. I believe that even though this is not a great example of a character's ID taking over his personality throughout the movie, it proves the same point, just backwards. So overall, in Gran Torino Clint's Id is straightforwardly expressed in the beginning of the movie through his racist personality. But as the movie progresses, his superego blows his mind and completely turns his life around.
ReplyDeleteThis topic of the id and the superego really reminds me of a great movie known as American Psycho. In it, the protagonist, Patrick Bateman is the titular psycho. The crazy thing is though, the movie makes it challenging to discern what is happening that is real, and what is going on in his mind exclusively. To me, all of his murders appear as if they never happened simply because of the lack of realism. How can even a businessman afford an entire apartment complex all to himself? However, the movie does a very good job of showing us the constant conflict in his mind - imagine what a troubled and competitive man like him must have been thinking when he found out his best friend has a better apartment, suit, and business card than him! Also, I would like to give kudos to Caleb for pointing out the fact Two-Face's ego is his coin. Great observation!
ReplyDeleteOwen Moynihan
ReplyDeleteI do not feel that I have seen enough movies to properly answer the question but one that I do think might work would be Final Fantasy the Spirits Within. In the movie the bad general guy want to destroy the aliens by firing his ultimate weapon the Zeus Cannon. However the ruling council refuses. So in order to persuade them to his opinion he lowers a city's shields to let aliens in so it looks like they are becoming stronger. This kinda backfires because the city is destroyed however he achieves his goal and gets to fire the Zeus cannon. Once he has started firing he refuses to stop even when no damage is being done. He shoots the cannon so many times that destroys the cannon. He wanted to fire it so bad that he destroyed a city and then wanted it to work so much that he blew it up. He had no self control.
I'm suprised no one else brought this up, but Psycho can be used as a great example of the dangers of an unconsious ID. Norman unconsiously develops an alternate ID that overpowers his ego, as well as his superego. He is no longer able to decide what is right and what is wrong and he begins to unconsiously do horrible things to those around him. Since the ID is on the unconsions level, Norman is not aware of his actions. His ego struggles to reach out and expose the reality to Norman, but his ID does not allow him to. Norman created this ID when his mother neglected him for another man. All of his emotions from that time were stored in the unconsious side of his mind, thus creating a horrible ID that ended up controlling him. It is clear at the end of the movie how strong an ID can become when the psychatrist states, "He was never all Norman, but he was often only Mother".
ReplyDeleteAnother great example is...The Nutty Proffesor! The proffessor meets a pretty graduate and his selfish, greedy desires cause him to hate his self-image. This drives him to create a formula that soon becomes his vicious ID. It's actually quite similar to Forbidden Planet, but more Eddie Murphy-ish. At the end of the movie he has to battle his ID because the ID was destroying the relationships around him. He comes to his senses and realizes that he needs to include the emotions of those around him especially the girl he is in love with. Instead of thinking for himself, he defeats his ID and wins the girl. Woot Woot!
Wow. From Gran Torino to Hulk to Final Fantasy to The Nutty Professor. Very nice observations. I'm especially intrigued by The Nutty Professor. It hadn't occurred to me that this id vs. superego internal stuglle could be played for laughs. But now that you mention it, Sylwia, of course it can! Can anyone else think of any comedies? I'm sure there are some Will Ferrel comedies with this mechanism at work. Isn't this the entire premise of Step Brothers?
ReplyDeleteWell first off i just want to say that i'm not entirely sure about what the question is fully asking but when reading the question and other peoples responses the one movie that did come to mind would be "The Lord of the Rings". Specifically though i was thinking about Gollum and the struggle he has to go through in which the only actual conflict and enemy he has to overcome is himself. It is a continuos struggle between one side that is greedy and obsessed with the ring and another side that is his good hearted self that wants so much to go back to his normal life. In the end though he fails to overcome the enemy within and parishes trying to steal the ring. I felt like this in a way related to the question and served as an example of an internal struggle with superego identity.
ReplyDeleteBrandon Stark
ReplyDeleteI can't think of alot of movies that have this type of structure i've seen because i just learned about this. I didn't realize how alot of movies use the idea of id, ego and super ego. I've seen alot of movies in my life and it's hard thinking back to which movies used this idea. I'm just realizing how a story with this structure can make a movie amazing. I remeber we talked about Psycho in class. Its pretty intresting how they did that with Norman Bates. There are some great examples up here people put up. Darth vader, Harvey Dent and Willy Loman. I didn't relaize how they used that in those movies. It's incredible.
I don't know if I'm still following along the lines of the question but over the summer I went to this program in Cambridge, England. one of the classes i took was an English literary Villains course. I now that I think back, Shakespeare had a lot of villains that this theory applies to. A lot of Shakespeare's elderly men caused untold havoc yet they seem to be unable to grasp the villainy of their actions. These hoary and foolish patriarchs (think Leonato in "Much Ado About Nothing and Leontes in "The Winter's Tale) are a Shakespearean specialty, and he uses them to explore how fixed views of the world, particularly the place of women in it, need to be reconciled with new humanist impulses toward autonomy and empathy. The super-ego (ie, the cultural and political values at work) produces a monstrous patriarchal ego which is rendered obsolete when the values which faciliate that ego then move toward a more liberal vision of female identity. I don't know but could you be Freudian by looking at reverse Electra complexes (its a psychoanalytic theory)- the Electra Complex is mentioned in the movie Mona Lisa Smile. Detective Morgenstren claims that Sand Serif has an Electra Complex in the movie The Spirit. The Electra Complex just seems to relate to the psychodynamic theory because its another psychological view.
ReplyDeleteAlso I mention Frankenstein before (but now I'm adding) - there is Victor's desire to simulate life as a chance to effectively double of his own ego, in which the monster serves as a receptacle for all his hidden and subversive desires, that is to say, abominable strength, massive size, and others... Basically an extremely warped and excessive view of masculine identity which he possibly perceives as inadequate in himself.
I cant think of a movie right now but i once heard a twilight zone called Will The Real Martian Please Stand Up it was about a group of people who were afraid off every one around them because all these super natural things started to happen I agree that these types of storys are vary scary because none can trust anyone.
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