The East (Zal Batmanglij, 2013)

[Sonmi451]

I apologize if I seemed condescending, it's just that - as I said - this happens to be my field (not that my saying that should necessarily lend any special credence). I do wish you would peruse the wikipedia article I posted; libertarianism is not synonomous with capitalism, it is mostly synonomous with anarchism. I agree that American libertarianism is indeed synonomous with capitalism. I am simply trying to convey that elsewhere libertarianism is thought of quite differently (i.e. is not usually capitalist).

[Black Hat]

reading the film politically was useless

Considering the subject matter isn't this an indictment of the film in and of itself?

you are missing the point, which is that very kind of compartmentalization and dismissal is what's standing in the way of real change.

Can you elaborate on how the film made this point?

(ie either aligning it with your existent beliefs or ascribing it a set of beliefs)

For it seems to me that your own reading of the film falls right within these parameters.

You are asking things of this movie it has no interest in providing because it is going somewhere different than you want it to go. A film on the subtle and varied nuances of an anarchist collective could never arrive at the conclusion this film reaches-- and I think where the East does arrive is powerful and effective on its own inherent merits.

Spoiler

Here's what I'm missing in your posts, where exactly did the film go? You wrote "Marling isn't refuting the possibility of change, just the impossibility of the existing systems achieving it. The ending isn't a copout. It's a realization of the heretofore impossible. A miracle by any other name..." What on earth does even mean or is it just some flowery written bs to distract from the fact that the film struggled mightily down the stretch?

Spoiler

Lets not forget here that she probably doesn't do any of the things she did were it not for the fact that she fell in love with him.

I wouldn't call the ending a copout but it is one from fantasyland that in my view detracted from the very serious issues and conflicts that the film raised. In contrast to the rest of the film it didn't strike me as confident, it reeked of 'well we gotta do something now'.

[domino harvey]

Spoiler

By reading politically I mean filtering it through the ideological lens of either the left or the right (or any political party/affiliation), as in "The film is supporting a leftist viewpoint" or "Conservatives will find a lot to like here," &c. Perhaps I should have said "party politics." Though I'd argue that it should have been obvious what I meant given my repeated focus on the left and the right as represented and dismissed by the film, I'll concede my meaning wasn't entirely clear. The entire film is predicated on the idea that none of the existent systems for enacting change (the people --> corporations) / fostering "the right thing" (corporations --> the people) are working, and therefore new methods and systems must be fostered, as seen in the film's final moments as Marling is shown making independent appeals to humanity, freed from the accepted systems and methodologies of organizations, her soundless interactions with the agents intercut with headlines highlighting problems, progresses, and obstacles. It's a message of potential and one of optimism wisely absent from the rest of the picture

I don't think Marling "fell in love" with Skarsgard at all (in fact, in one of the wisely deleted alternative endings, Skarsgard makes it clear that he fell for her a lot harder than she did for him)-- certainly she was enamored with him but I think his reveal at the end of the final jam made her transition the feelings she directed at him towards what she thought he stood for versus what he actually does, which is petty revenge and instigation (and a reckless endangerment of those he perceives as societal enemies). The anarchist cell is poisoning innocents and forcing corporate spokespersons to humiliate themselves, but they even admit they have to space the jams out because before long another cell comes along to distract with more noise that never achieves anything. It's futility. The compartmentalization of the leftist anarchists, who want petty "wins" at all costs, is symbolic of the ideological blindness the filmmakers clearly see in factions on either side. Thus the solution being to work outside the affiliation of partyline-towing groups or systems

[Black Hat]

Spoiler

The entire film is predicated on the idea that none of the existent systems for enacting change (the people --> corporations) / fostering "the right thing" (corporations --> the people) are working, and therefore new methods and systems must be fostered, as seen in the film's final moments as Marling is shown making independent appeals to humanity, freed from the accepted systems and methodologies of organizations, her soundless interactions with the agents intercut with headlines highlighting problems, progresses, and obstacles. It's a message of potential and one of optimism wisely absent from the rest of the picture

Spoiler

I didn't find the film to be predicated on that at all and I'm not sure as to where that was made so overtly clear. As for the final moments it struck me as an act of desperation, motivated by fear and that to me was the common thread here between all the film's factions that finally boiled over with Sarah.

Spoiler

I don't think Marling "fell in love" with Skarsgard at all (in fact, in one of the wisely deleted alternative endings, Skarsgard makes it clear that he fell for her a lot harder than she did for him)-- certainly she was enamored with him but I think his reveal at the end of the final jam made her transition the feelings she directed at him towards what she thought he stood for versus what he actually does

Spoiler

Fair but whatever level feeling she has towards him is still partly responsible for influencing her decisions therefore can we really give her credit for her as you put it 'optimism'?

Spoiler

The compartmentalization of the leftist anarchists, who want petty "wins" at all costs, is symbolic of the ideological blindness the filmmakers clearly see in factions on either side. Thus the solution being to work outside the affiliation of partyline-towing groups or systems

Spoiler

I see now where you're coming from but I would argue that's a bit of a reach to say the least. I highly doubt the ideological blinders parallel you're drawing between massive corporations and a couple of young anarchists was intentional. If it was then it changes the entire tone of the film, proving beyond any doubt that the filmmakers were out of their depth.

[jindianajonz]

I can see a connection between anarchism and libertarianism- Anarchists want no government, whereas Libertarians (in the US sense) want as small a government as possible, really only enforcing the bare minimum requirements for a secure society.

When I was in high school, the explanation for libertarianism that I got was that it was the opposite of populism, similar to how liberal is the opposite of conservative. Libertarians are socially liberal and economically conservative, whereas populists (including what the US terms socialists, though I believe that phrase has a variety of nuanced meanings in different places) are socially conservative and economically liberal; i.e., maximum government intervention and control.

[colinr0380]

This film was entertaining but I also have to agree with warren oates and sonmi451 here. It all felt a little too glossy and wide-eyed about its subject matter, and seemed to defuse its "activism or terrorism?" subject matter by the way it set up its conflicts.

I'm not too harsh about the idea that most if not all of The East have come from privileged backgrounds (in fact when those elements started popping up I was excited, thinking of it being in the vein of a My Own Private Idaho/Henry IV, but it turned into more of a Last Days 'group of buds wandering around a crumbling mansion' film. It was also very reminiscent of that German film from a few years ago, The Edukators), but it didn't seem to push that idea into the most interesting area of that subject and actually confront the idea that you can only live that way coming from a certain lifestyle and in some ways 'slumming it'. That this kind of activism comes from a kind of upper-middle class-drawn, adolescent kind of lashing out which only has a short term effect, and the idea that Marling's character Susan is kind of the ultimate version of that idea, regularly flitting between two different worlds. But it just gets presented without anything really being done with it.

Similarly I loved the Patricia Clarkson character and her unemotional business practicality of not being in her job to bring these kids down (it is more of a symbiotic police and criminal relationship - if there were no crime, or threat of crime, there would be no need for their services) but to drum up clients through controlling the surveillance of which targets would be next. Using 'terrorism' for advancement of her protection services, but it didn't really push through to any more ideas than that, when I would have thought it would be interesting to see if Clarkson and her organisation would perhaps one day move from surveillance to possibly just cutting out the middle man and controlling the activist organisations outright, with the right offer made to them. I suppose that distance between the two groups lends a sense of plausible deniability though.

This actually helped me to be OK with that final over-done speech digging through the bins to prove to Clarkson that there is worth in what others throw away. I can't imagine that not having made Clarkson suspicious and the only thing I can imagine is that she knows that Marling's character will be back. In fact it seems that Marling has taken on Clarkson's 'managerial' position at the end of film, ostensibly because no-one else can be trusted to do the right thing with the contacts list other than her. She (problematically, though it is presented as a success) gets to keep a foot in both camps, which is presumably just what the company Clarkson works for wants (and the activists themselves, though they seem a step or two behind Clarkson's corporation and less thinking about the long game).

The film also hedges its bets a little by dealing purely with corporate surveillance and the rise of businesses that could infiltrate these groups (I'd be interested to know if they really exist or are just a construction for the purposes of the film), rather than having to deal with the idea of the infiltration of activist groups just being another facet of government surveillance of its populace. Instead the film wants the audience more to feel as if it is becoming a part of the gang, and wants them to dreamily gaze at Marling, Ellen Page and Skarsgård's soapy bottom. Well, I hadn't really needed much encouragement to have already been doing all of those things! (I do like the way that the potentially hackneyed love triangle was handled here though, with Marling rather than Skarsgård seemingly the central figure in that tug of war. Though it only helps to reinforce that Izzy has to be sacrificed in order to let the other two be together). It feels a little schematic at times though, with all of the joyful music, basking in nature and spin the bottle games. This is the new way of life we should be aiming for? It is only a step or two away from a Manson family or David Koresh cult-commune, even before we get to actually harming business-people rather than just teaching them a lesson and the literal baptism into the group that Sarah goes through.

I liked the 'intimate relationships in an activist organisation' spine of the story though, even if that too didn't really cut too deep into its subject matter either. Here in the UK there has been that recent expose on police officers who have been going undercover with green activist groups, even fathering children whilst undercover. A film using that real-life material as a backbone would be very interesting and would actually have to deal with a lot of issues that The East is managing to elide (government legitimised rather than simple corporate surveillance; double lives and the damage that brings; the corporate or government paranoia angle about what the hell groups of concerned citizens are banding together to do that would cause them to feel it necessary to undertake this kind of spying - a paranoia that The East suggests is an entirely legitimate one, and so on)

In terms of all of the parameters the film sets up I think that it works pretty well and constructs a very entertaining film from its material (the two hours passed very quickly and I think it is mostly down to the excellent performances and filmmaking that make it such an enjoyable, slick ride), but it has sort of pre-handicapped its material from the very start. It makes an interesting introduction to the area (I was interested enough that I would have liked to have seen a lot more in depth exploration of every aspect presented in the film) and I can understand introducing such boundaries or limitations to the story in some ways in order to shape the material or make it more manageable, but this is in no way a spiky, difficult, troubling film about its issues.