They Live (1988)

[King Green]

BTW the arcade and me are doing fine but that hell-troll of a councilwoman is still in the world of the living and wants to conquer limbo when she is near dead, Fμ©k!!! Not only she is going to be dead but what else we are going have to pay an entrance fee to enter the land-of-disbelief, the one place the Allmighty can see but not interact due being entirely made by mankind.

[PerrySimm]

First came to this film without much knowledge of Roddy Piper, but the background detail just makes the film that much more meaningful and significant. A great review of a great film, as relevant today as ever.

[Formless One]

I wonder if this movie inspired the present paranoia where everything anybody doesn't like is an evil master plan of someone's intricate design. And that anyone who isn't paranoid is "in on it".

Ha! As if. Just look up McCarthyism and all the other conspiracy theories caused by America's fear of communism in the 50's and 60's. The classic Twilight Zone episode "The Monsters Are Due on Maple Street" wasn't just some fever dream of Rod Serling, it was inspired by his observations of the very same behavior and mentality in his time that you are describing in ours. There are a lot of reasons for it, and a lot of classic Twilight Zone stories explore some of them, not just Maple Street.

[FaxModem1]

I think that was the one problem Carpenter tried to put in the film, Socialist control ÷ Role Support + Economic Counter-Development × ? = They Live.

For me and many others who knew well of the 40s and 90s political-socio marinal(personal US Senator term for media-extract) that our current economy like this is mainly due to the massacre of the middle class that was innocently slaughtered by the rich and blamed on the poor for needing too much work. Chuck has a good eye for this issue in the film and an almost right answer, but we still need that middle class to properly distribute the work/socio-pay problem.
Me, I'm a small working class civvie in ny that tries to maintain a 1982 arcade that was close to shutdown by one of Manhattan's most hated councilwoman that wanted to create a minor clinic for exotic pets that required 3-8 years approval because these "pets" were in fact smuggled from Mexico and NKorea to sabotage nyc's heath-economy. Being paid 40$ every hour to walk people's dogs and cats and other petsitting wants. Maintaining that arcade almost literally took my life when that councilwoman tried to shut it down by force the moment she had a fucking warrent, even though I could have paid 900$ to stave off the demolition, she tried to rip apart a breaker switch I was almost repairing by buying 80's old equipment at a local storage-auction.(I was fortunate that I came at the last moment before nyc raised the auction-age bar). Now, the middle class solution/neglection, the "filter" of this would be incredibly valued due the chaotic change to not society but media-economy.

Look at china 450 years ago when they were commanded by local lords to expedition to newer land and conquered "lesser" civilizations for the demand value of exotic and common materials, no one knew what the lord demanded common materials for but the exotics were easy to understand. If you would have to increase the exotic value of let's say platinum you would have to make more common value of lesser valued exotics like gold. Hell, your fat-box tv has 4-onces of gold in the circuitry but selling that would get you to buy small fries at White Castle.

That's the reason why American isn't dying but in fact evolving, but with rushed treatment and blind reading from multiple country trade. If the country what's to grow they have to build their own values by not extorting but in fact re-valuing products to the same country(i.e. Buying iron for 4million dollars and reselling leftover iron for 6million dollars).

Middle class will not be revived in this country's predicament but can if fact use the rich class to filter the poor class of work periods while in fact rotating media-currency to help support socio-economic filtration, in the words of tribal chief Walking-Hourse "Walk, talk, time, all require work, all boys speak. No work for racing a death-line." I know this fact due to a inhuman studies of human nature and oral-tradition. Plus we're drinking buddies, not always with alcohol though?

This was a ramble, I'll give it that. Could you please dumb it down for us by what you mean? Make it more concise.

Because what I'm reading here is:
1. You own an arcade.
2. You've had problems with local city council.
3. The middle class is going away, and that's a good thing in your opinion because reasons.

That's all I took from what you wrote.

[FaxModem1]

I'd call myself a John Carpenter fan, but there are actually John Carpenter fans who are much more in love with his work than I am. For me it's like 4 really great movies, and then some "lesser Carpenter," and then a few bits of trash.

"They Live" is what I think of as a lesser Carpenter film. There's some great dialogue, and memorable moments, and Rowdy Roddy Piper is fantastic in this role, but the story doesn't really capture me. Maybe it's because I'm very much pro-capitalism and the anti-capitalism message just doesn't connect.

To try and understand, why are you pro-capitalist? And related, do you care or not care about the losers in the system? Because capitalism is about competition, and there are losers in competitions, and this film shows what happens if said losers aren't cared about by the rest of society. They just add aliens instead of the wealthy elite as who runs things.

[Kendrakirai]

I wonder if this movie inspired the present paranoia where everything anybody doesn't like is an evil master plan of someone's intricate design. And that anyone who isn't paranoid is "in on it".

Ha! As if. Just look up McCarthyism and all the other conspiracy theories caused by America's fear of communism in the 50's and 60's. The classic Twilight Zone episode "The Monsters Are Due on Maple Street" wasn't just some fever dream of Rod Serling, it was inspired by his observations of the very same behavior and mentality in his time that you are describing in ours. There are a lot of reasons for it, and a lot of classic Twilight Zone stories explore some of them, not just Maple Street.

Just as an aside, I’ve actually been wondering if it might be possible to have Chuck look at the remake of that, where it’s a psychological test by the military, and the only house in the neighborhood that still had power was owned by a newly arrived middle eastern family - it was only spared because of an accidental oversight, with the house being on a different circuit. That’s the version I saw first, actually.

[King Green]

I think that was the one problem Carpenter tried to put in the film, Socialist control ÷ Role Support + Economic Counter-Development × ? = They Live.

For me and many others who knew well of the 40s and 90s political-socio marinal(personal US Senator term for media-extract) that our current economy like this is mainly due to the massacre of the middle class that was innocently slaughtered by the rich and blamed on the poor for needing too much work. Chuck has a good eye for this issue in the film and an almost right answer, but we still need that middle class to properly distribute the work/socio-pay problem.
Me, I'm a small working class civvie in ny that tries to maintain a 1982 arcade that was close to shutdown by one of Manhattan's most hated councilwoman that wanted to create a minor clinic for exotic pets that required 3-8 years approval because these "pets" were in fact smuggled from Mexico and NKorea to sabotage nyc's heath-economy. Being paid 40$ every hour to walk people's dogs and cats and other petsitting wants. Maintaining that arcade almost literally took my life when that councilwoman tried to shut it down by force the moment she had a fucking warrent, even though I could have paid 900$ to stave off the demolition, she tried to rip apart a breaker switch I was almost repairing by buying 80's old equipment at a local storage-auction.(I was fortunate that I came at the last moment before nyc raised the auction-age bar). Now, the middle class solution/neglection, the "filter" of this would be incredibly valued due the chaotic change to not society but media-economy.

Look at china 450 years ago when they were commanded by local lords to expedition to newer land and conquered "lesser" civilizations for the demand value of exotic and common materials, no one knew what the lord demanded common materials for but the exotics were easy to understand. If you would have to increase the exotic value of let's say platinum you would have to make more common value of lesser valued exotics like gold. Hell, your fat-box tv has 4-onces of gold in the circuitry but selling that would get you to buy small fries at White Castle.

That's the reason why American isn't dying but in fact evolving, but with rushed treatment and blind reading from multiple country trade. If the country what's to grow they have to build their own values by not extorting but in fact re-valuing products to the same country(i.e. Buying iron for 4million dollars and reselling leftover iron for 6million dollars).

Middle class will not be revived in this country's predicament but can if fact use the rich class to filter the poor class of work periods while in fact rotating media-currency to help support socio-economic filtration, in the words of tribal chief Walking-Hourse "Walk, talk, time, all require work, all boys speak. No work for racing a death-line." I know this fact due to a inhuman studies of human nature and oral-tradition. Plus we're drinking buddies, not always with alcohol though?

This was a ramble, I'll give it that. Could you please dumb it down for us by what you mean? Make it more concise.

Because what I'm reading here is:
1. You own an arcade.
2. You've had problems with local city council.
3. The middle class is going away, and that's a good thing in your opinion because reasons.

That's all I took from what you wrote.

1. I do own an arcade but its for trying to remind the people of New York of it own role of "it's" center of value rather than commercialize it for seeing "passion vs. greed" with greed almost mimicking the "American Dream" plan done in the late 19th century. The system isn't corrupt but running fast, much like Japan's modernizing themselves when they felt "outdated".
2. Only that particular councilwoman, everyone else in the nyc council sees me as the avarage joe.
3. Middle class was a good thing for the US for nearly 200 years before rapidly marketing "free" jobs for the "American Dream" and extorting that nations materials for the US's own values. Having a social/economic filter for the US was like having a leash for toddler's when the would wander aimlessly like the rich who's most ego aloud them to control what was their power while the poor got to get a strong grip to not let the "toddler's" out of reach. The middle class represents the leash trying to hold the strain of "power vs. control", or better believed in the film rich vs poor. Not system vs you, everyone is allowed equal amounts of control bbut power is something to be self-built, if you want to build your own exotic company like shoes for dogs and cats do so! But if you have to deal with common stores owned by big, senial, literal soul-eating mega-corps, they that is dealing with control. Control not of you but simply action-of-negotiation, or was it media reverse-psychology?

That's all I know much about media social-control, other stuff I said was clearly based on social and culture studies dating back to early writing equipment when man was writing with piss and blood for ink.

[hammerofglass]

Does anybody know what the background picture in the background video is?

[G-Man]

It is kind of sad that the film is a critique of Reaganism and it has been warped by racists as a warning about some sort of Jewish conspiracy, to the point that Carpenter himself had to tweet that, no, it's about yuppies and unrestrained capitalism.

Any theory that any cabal of people are parasitically controlling our culture can be paralleled to the film, whatever the original intent is. I don't know that anyone is saying that the movie was a warning about a Jewish conspiracy, but for someone who believes in a Jewish conspiracy, or a white conspiracy, or any sort of conspiracy, he can obviously explain his theory in terms of the events of the movie.

I don't think anyone who uses the term "red-pill" is saying that the Matrix movies were promoting the alt-right, but obviously anyone who believes that powerful forces are controlling the acceptable political discourse can use the term as a metaphor.

[Rocketboy1313]

I consider this to be my favorite John Carpenter movie.