From Dreams to Domination

:The Drastic Transformation of the Cinematic Universe as seen through Two Books Meant for Children 

 

Whatever goes into the process of deciding what to read next, one cannot argue that it is largely open to coincidence. Any number of things can influence a choice that seems so fundamentally simple, and so, I usually don't overthink it. 

The reason I mention this is because I recently read two books that were mediocre at best. But they struck up an interesting discourse when placed next to one another. Other than their target audience, the books did not resemble each other. Both were books meant for children, and both were discovered in the middle school library where I work. The genre and setting, however, were very different; even its orphan protagonists had little in common with one another beyond their own orphan-hood. 

And yet, at its imaginative core, both works offered a look at a young mind's relationship with the stagnant television. When placed opposite one another, they told the tale of the ever changing world seen inside the screen, which has descended down from its wondrous dreamland and been slowly transformed into a device of frightful domination.

 

The first of these books was The Invention of Hugo Cabret, which I am sorry to say was a grand disappointment. I remember being entranced by the film, and admit, I was likewise enchanted by the imaginative pieces within the book. 

It being so, I found it a horrid shame that the book was so poorly written. Indeed, I quickly realized that any magic the story holds is borrowed from its influences, namely, Georges Méliès, and even this was largely harmed by the awful writing. (I did not think this possible, but alas, it seems it was.)

 

I will not speak more of it here, only say I can at least credit the film version with introducing me to the first snippet of Trip to the Moon which I ever had the pleasure of seeing. I remember that I was immediately captivated, and, although I do not remember much else about the movie now, that image has never left me. 

I later wrote a short story inspired by it. Evidently, even just a few brief flashes of this early cinematic masterpiece seen through the lens of another film entirely was enough to influence my imagination (Read the short story here). 

 

The second book, which I have not quite yet completed, is none other than The Mysterious Benedict Society, which, while it started off wonderfully mysterious, has since become rather tedious. 

Indeed, nothing all that interesting might have come of reading these two books if I had not put these two stories in conversation with one another. 

 

 

I have already talked about the wonder that is the film world in The Invention of Hugo Cabret. Georges Méliès, the only character that was at all interesting in this narrative, is based off the real life visionary, illusionist, and film director by the same name. (For those of you who don't know him, look up Trip to the Moon on YouTube. You will not be disappointed.)
 

Méliès is rightfully credited with creating the stuff of dreams. As the book puts it, seeing one of his films was like dreaming in the middle of the day.

The Mysterious Benedict Society, though, has an entirely different take on cinema, or, as it was more recently called, television. In this book, television and even the radio are dangerous weapons used to send out hidden messages meant to control a nearly dimwitted society. 

The really strange part is that both views on film are true, in their own time and scope. While the cinema of the past awakes and entices the imagination, making dreamers of its audience, today's movies more often than not leave its audiences feeling uninspired, lackluster, and unsatisfied. 

 

 

 

While The Invention of Hugo Cabret acts as a sort of love letter to the works of Méliès, seeking to plant an adoration for classic cinema in its child audience, The Mysterious Benedict Society reads like a warning which, at the very least, seeks to create a wariness towards television in its young readers.

 

When the protagonist of The Mysterious Benedict society is asked on one of the mysterious tests whether he likes watching television, he almost answers yes. But then, upon further consideration, he realizes he really doesn't enjoy watching television at all.

 

Part of the tragedy is that many modern films have indeed become something trite, even benumbing. But the greater misfortune is that most of us don't seem to mind it. Indeed, we often don't even think long enough about it to realize that perhaps we don't like watching television at all. We've merely been entertained enough by it not to mind it. After all, who thinks twice about something that lets them turn off their brain so effectively? 

This is not to say that all modern movies are bad. Indeed, some are quite fabulous. 

But one cannot forget that the same thing that used to nurse children into dreamers now harms their minds, leaving them feeling lackluster, forcing them to slowly lose interest in other activities. One quickly sees where the novel gets its ideas of a dimwitted, thoughtless society.  

 

It is easy to preach everything in moderation, and yes, likely too much television is part of the problem. But even so, many modern film makers have become lazy and money obsessed, pumping out films with so little heart in them, they feel plastic and unreal.

The same stuff that used to inspire dreams now spawns imaginative horrors like Neil Gaiman's Media, a godly being that commits mass menticide by speaking through the voice of your television. 

  

There is indeed some horror at the core of The Mysterious Benedict Societies and the cautionary story it tells about television's powers for evil. After all, the conspirators behind the mind control ploy use the voices of children to send out their secret messages. 

That is ultimately how society is turned: with children's voices repeating dangerous ideas, though they themselves know not where they come from. 

In the end, the only conclusion one can come to is that the cinematic universe was a far safer and more simple place when film merely awoke a desire to dream instead of these slow killing apparitions.