Our culture seems to have a deep-seated obsession with
zombies. This has been ongoing for almost all of my life, at least since the 70s, and
we can probably antedate it further, by referring to other popular works such
as “Invasion of the Body Snatchers” which, in its time, reflected perhaps a
fifties obsession with dissimulation and political disloyalty, and the
perception of the “hidden enemy” (the traitor).
We have seen this obsession extended to a catalogue of other
seemingly supernatural beings, a coterie comprised of vampires, werewolves, and
even a clinical arsenal of disorders that range from bi-polar disorder to
multiple personalities. There is an element of compulsion in all of them, for
there are appetites that must be satisfied, and these transformations allude in
a powerful way to a grammar of cause and effect. If we repress our needs, we
become unstable, and unleash a hidden monster that overwhelms the thin veneer
of society. As with the famous work by the Spanish painter Francisco Goya, the
sleep of reason unleashes monsters.
Earlier this year, we witnessed the release of the thriller “World
War Z”. It is based on a popular novel from 2006 written by Max Brooks, and as
adapted to film, it details a scenario which has not been seen very often in works
of this genre.
For the most part, to talk about zombies is to talk about
the coming apocalypse, the end of the world, one in which the epidemic only
catalyzes what was almost a fait accompli waiting to take shape, a judgment
rendered by the court of nature, so to speak. These movies typically comprise
narratives that concentrate on the experiences of bands of survivors who are
trying desperately to hang on. This is the case, for example, with Robert
Kirkman’s The Walking Dead, in which little attention is given to narrating the
earliest stages of this crisis, and in which instead we are left to deal with a
shattered world, one in which human relationships have become fundamentally
unmoored.
But in this film, we are treated to the scenario of these early
stages. We have, then, the inflection point, the point of no return, where a
seemingly normal world is transformed drastically, with all the dramatic
potential that this entails. One would have to say that this inflection point
has an essence all its own, a certain majestic quality like that present in
other disaster scenarios, those that are captured in a small but breathless way
in 24 hour television coverage that seems to thrive on this drama. It would
seem, then, that this zombie phenomenon is a natural outgrowth of current cultural
trends, and that we have more than just the usual cautionary tale that we have
seen so often in science fiction.
It is almost as if these movies allow us to visualize and
give expression to underlying anxieties that pervade our culture, and that are
stoked so expertly by political ideologues. Those on the right warn against the
dangers of unrestricted immigration, demonizing the poor and the ethnically
diverse. Those on the left rail against economic forces that seem to foreshadow
a breakdown of social cohesiveness, as well as against the dangers of a coming
environmental collapse. There are deep-seated fears that extend to many other
aspects, and it finds expression in the creation of a crisis mentality. Like the
tornado touching down on the plains, or the tsunami slowly approaching the
shoreline, or the raging fire that sweeps across our densely populated landscape,
these are forces almost impossible to resist. They thus have a majesty that seems all the more
compelling because of this, because they linger in our imagination. Such is the
scene with the protagonist Gerry Lane, played by Brad Pitt, who starts what
appears to be a normal day, but then, while caught in traffic in Manhattan, is
a witness to this sudden disaster that erupts in our midst.
This point of impact, of course, has many dramatic possibilities.
It has an alien element, one which bewilders and in a certain way incapacitates
us, for what else can a disaster do if not disable our psychological defenses
and freeze us, at least for the moment? How else to describe the poetic power
of waves upon waves of zombies careening down the streets, attacking everyone
in their wake, running with the agility and speed of Olympic athletes, and
turning everyone they bite into zombies in twelve seconds flat? It is a wave that
is dehumanizing but is also awe-inspiring, and we see it repeated in many
scenes in this film.
The situation becomes desperate in the blink of an eye, of
course, and suddenly, humanity is besieged. Who can put a stop to this wave of
deformed and utterly unstoppable humanity, where suddenly, zombies gain a
physical prowess that the humans who occupied those bodies never had? It has to
be metaphor for something else, for the unease produced by the perception of
transformations at work in humanity now.
I used to refer to the zombie genre as one offering parables
of the dangers of unbridled consumerism, but somehow, it seems to suggest
something even deeper. We feel as if we have lost control over our society, as
if we are in the grip of alienating economic and social institutions that
dehumanize us, that treat us as aggregates, that leave us with little sense of
autonomy. We are already zombies, culturally and psychologically speaking, and
that is why the zombie meets with the shock of familiarity.
In the film, we are treated to another spectacle in which
the good-looking but reluctant hero ventures out to look for answers. He is
forced to go out and confront these dangers, in the manner of the hero in
Joseph Campbell’s analysis, and what he finds, of course, is a series of clues
to a puzzle that must be pieced together. We have Sherlock Holmes in the guise
of a forty-something retired crisis inspector for the UN, and we as an audience
occupy the role of Watson, trying to anticipate the answer that will surely
become evident through the process of deductive reasoning. The film would then
purport, seemingly, to offer a narrative in which the rational would still
coexist with the irrational, a contradiction that is never really resolved, for
there is as ever a dreamlike quality to this film. (One thinks, for example, of
the way in which the zombies reenact the biblical destruction of Jericho’s
walls, where this time the action is transposed to the city of Jerusalem, in an
allusion that can’t fail to have a political undertone as well.)
In the meantime, the challenges become more severe. What I
am struck with is the observation that these zombies defy the laws of nature.
They bite only to infect, not to satisfy their appetite, and humans are
transformed into zombies in the space of seconds, almost an instant. It is as
if this potential for transformation were latent all the time, and an
overweight and mild-mannered programmer who never lifted a barbell is able, for
example, were suddenly able to run a forty-yard dash in record time, and to
coordinate his or her movements in an uncanny fashion such as not to impede the
movement of the wave, and to serve as the vanguard of destruction. Don’t
zombies have leg cramps that would disable them? Don’t they have metabolisms
that need to process energy in a sustained fashion, and don’t they have
post-adrenaline surge crashes?
Zombies are forces of nature, they are aggregates, they are
waves, and their destructive potential assumes the most efficient form of
expression. They are symbols, of course, for the loss of control.
Tension builds up, and as in any thriller, time is short.
Even the last survivors, confined to battle cruisers that wait uncertainly 200
miles off the coast (can zombies swim?) are doomed unless an answer is found soon.
And the answer arrives in a stunning insight that is withheld from the
spectators in a way designed to frustrate us further even as it is suggesting
in the knowing glance and the moment of epiphany that strikes Gerry as he
contemplate the spectacle of a planeload of passengers overtaken by the wave in
mid-flight. It is an epiphany that was all too common in other shows, such as
the recently concluded “House” on television, and yet, it is necessary to prime
the spectator for the prospect of a revelation.
It would seem that it isn’t only the Christian
fundamentalists who revel in the spectacle of the final apocalypse, and
earnestly proclaim and even welcome the proximity of the rapture. (Witness the
popularity of tele-evangelists such as Hal Lindsey, or the earnest affirmations
of reverend John Hagee.) Such is the case, as well, with scientists and with those
who would ordinarily be associated with a more secular outlook, who also, in
similar fashion, warn about the imminent destruction that will accompany global
warming, or the honeybee collapse, or escalating global contamination and the
many “signs” that accompany it. We believe in portents, and are all too ready
to project our fears by forming scenarios that reveal our own peculiar set of
biases. It seems that disaster has a satisfying emotional component associated
with it as well. It is the “I told you so” moment that affirms us even while doing nothing to delay our destruction.
There is in this film the promise of a temporary reprieve to
the threat of extinction. It is not quite the happy Hollywood ending, for it is
fragile, as fragile as the interrupted and at times distorted communication
between the investigator and his wife. Science and rationality will save us, but
at the same time it dooms us, and this film has all the earmarks of a prophetic
warning that we must curb our ways, take stock, and wake up. It is the secular
equivalent to the bible, of course, with demons taking the form of zombies, and
pathos evident in the fact that we have harbored these demons within us all
along.
The zombie apocalypse still threatens humanity at the end of the film, of course, and this state of affairs is still invested with great emotional (and ideological) weight. How long can we continue to rehash these scenarios before they become tired and repetitive? Will we still have zombie movies and the eternal trope of invasion, conquest and decay ten, twenty, or thirty more years down the line? What will take the place of zombies (which are part of a vocabulary of symbols, metaphors and narrative formulas for otherness), for our need to project our anxieties? I’m not so sure we will find new forms, because the old ones still resonate and the human condition seems to remain the same.
In the last half of the twentieth century we saw the rise of post-modernism. This took the form of parables of alienation, with narratives that had no clear center, no path discernible and no familiar turning points, where narrative formulas were jumbled and there was an overwhelming sense of isolation, confusion and distance. This dovetailed perfected with the rise of the internet, where we are all more alone than ever, each one in a private world, with seemingly reduced scope for collective action as we all withdrew into narcissistic reflection. (I can’t stand the prospect of seeing any more preening “selfie” shots on social media sites). This film takes a departure from this state of consciousness, because we see once again familiar formulas, evident in the outcast figure who redeems himself and saves humanity. The zombie plague isn’t over, but then, the real problem remains the same: that of building a cohesive society, one that is unified in purpose but flexible enough to embrace diversity without authoritarianism.
We’ve seen this before. We were seemingly unified in purpose in this country after the shock of the 911 attacks over ten years ago. In the end, we dropped the ball and returned to the same old imperialist formulas that got us into trouble to begin with, invading in this case the Middle East and settling for an approach of brawn over brains. We went into full biting mode, in other words, unconscious and irrational and savage beyond all measure.
The zombie: foot soldier of dying empires.
OGRomero © 2013
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