Playing With Ironies

After the shocking and deplorable murder by Nathan Leopold and Richard Loeb of a young boy in 1924, it is not surprising that famed director Alfred Hitchcock would be attracted to this controversial material as the subject of his next cinematic endeavor. Hitchcock’s Rope, originally a Broadway play written by Patrick Hamilton and based on the Leopold and Loeb murder case, follows the events of one evening in the lives of Brandon Shaw and Philip Morgan after they have murdered David Kentley, a mutual friend, in order to prove themselves members of an intellectually superior faction of society. Brandon and Phillip’s former housemaster, Rupert Cadell, who had previously condoned the theory of murder by intellectual superiors, grows more suspicious that his hosts have committed a heinous crime. Hitchcock tactfully maneuvers through the story, weaving his world-renowned tactics for suspense with a gripping moral core.

Besides its obvious message concerning the ramifications of committing murder itself, Hamilton also addresses the fallacious ideals of the Nietzschean philosophy of a societal “superman” or Übermensch. In his work Thus Spoke Zarathustra, Nietzsche delineates his concept of a futuristic and superior individual who transcends the moral laws that govern society by creating his own moral and judicial concepts by which he dictates his own actions. In the film, Brandon echoes this morally relativistic philosophy when he explains that the “supermen” or the superior beings “are those men of intellectual and cultural superiority that they are above the traditional moral concepts. Good and evil, right and wrong were invented for the ordinary man […] because he needs them,” implying that men such as himself are in no need or societal norms but may instead break civil law without fear of apprehension. For Brandon and Phillip, this arrogant belief that they are above moral and societal laws justifies David’s murder as simply the elimination of a “lesser being.”

However, Nietzsche’s philosophy is often utilized by individuals like Hitler to justify his merciless slaughter of Europe, or by Brandon and Phillip to justify their own homicide. Not only does poses a serious threat to the very foundation that supports humanity. C.S. Lewis, in his book The Abolition of Man, paints a rather disturbing image of what would befall humanity if the philosophies of Nietzsche or Brandon and Phillip became realities. Lewis argues that all of mankind is governed by a universal moral code called the Tao, and that the Tao governs man’s sentiments, which in turn should also guide man’s intellect (Abolition 24-26). However, many existential philosophers, including Nietzsche have attempted to separate the intellect from the sentiment and the Tao, thereby creating their own relativistic morals code that would allow them license to perform any action, or in the case of Rope, any crime that they so desire. One must recognize that “the Nietzschean ethic can be accepted only if we are ready to scrap traditional morals as a mere error and them to put ourselves in a position where we can find no ground for any value judgments at all” (Abolition 46). Outside of the Tao, Lewis validly declares that there can be no basis for judgment either by society or the individual man, which will eventually cause the abolition of man altogether.

For Rupert Cadell, Lewis’ fears concerning mankind’s lack of foundational moral grounding slowly become a tangible reality. Once Rupert has discovered the corpse of his former pupil, murder becomes personalized and he is struck with the realization that his own theories and philosophies have become a perverted and evil actuality, and consequently he vehemently castigates Brandon and Phillip telling them, “there must have been something deep inside you from the very start that would let you do this thing, but there’s always been something inside me that would never let me do it.” Rupert very clearly and obviously points to a moral code within himself that all men are called to abide by and is therefore disgusted and appalled by Brandon and Phillip’s blatant contempt for humanity. David’s murder not only represents a disdain for humanity and the conventions that govern it, but also a desire to control the lives of others, and to essentially become God. In Rope, the audience witnesses the progression of the Nietzschean ideals as they are transformed from theoretical concepts of a utopian world governed by “superior beings” to a horrifyingly tragic and cold-blooded murder.

When Sunset Boulevard was first introduced into the world of cinema, it was met with a wide variety of responses from both the movie-going public and Hollywood itself. While many of these reviews lauded Sunset Boulevard, recognizing it for the definitive work on exposing the sinister nature of Hollywood, some filmmakers and producers felt that the subject matter was too controversial and that director Billy Wilder had vilified the film industry with his flagrant disregard for his colleagues and the studios during the golden age of Hollywood. After one screening, director Louis B. Mayer castigated Wider saying, “You have disgraced the industry that made and fed you. You should be tarred and feathered and run out of Hollywood.” However, in this film, Wilder determinedly challenges the sparkling façade created by Hollywood, revealing how studios abandon and discard the talent of older actresses in favor of a younger generation of glamorous starlets.

For Norma Desmond, an aging and fading silent film star, the studio’s love for young and alluring leading ladies causes the downfall of her career and her spiral into a lifestyle that desperately clutches to a world that resides in the past. Joe Gillis, the film’s narrator, compares Norma’s current life with sleepwalking, telling the audience that “she was still sleepwalking along the giddy heights of a lost career,” hinting that like a sleepwalker, it would be dangerous to wake her from her dream world. In Sunset Boulevard, Billy Wilder explores the juxtaposition of reality and fiction. Although this collocation is not completely manifested until the end of the film, Norma repeatedly demonstrates that she is indeed sleepwalking, blurring the reality of her faded stardom and the bleak reality. At the end of the film, Norma is so immersed in her illusion of former glory that when Joe attempts to force her to face reality, she is pushed beyond the limits of her sanity and is completely overcome by her own private reality and fame.

Through his use of lavish and dramatic images, director Billy Wilder further enhances the distinction between reality and Norma Desmond’s own perception of that reality. When Joe first arrives at Desmond’s mansion, a dilapidated and timeworn house, neglected by the world, he compares it to the character Miss Havisham, from Dickens’s timeless classic Great Expectations. Similar to Miss Havisham, everything in Norma’s ostentatious mansion traps her in the past: the display of photographs, the nightly showings of her movies and even the counterfeit fan-mail sent by her butler, until, as Joe observes, “she was afraid of that world outside, afraid it would remind her that time had passed.” Yet both Joe and Max, the butler, are willing to indulge Norma’s fantasies, further skewing her perspective and hold upon reality. Joe uses Norma for his own pecuniary gain but fails to see that she is like a vampire, sucking the real life from his veins until he becomes another victim of Hollywood like Norma. Conversely, Max, through his ardent devotion perpetuates her false reality in another way. Instead of using her and consequently becoming a victim himself, Max contentedly fuels her fantasy by sending her the forged fan mail, widening the gulf between Norma and truth. Despite his hope to spare her the reality of her fading stardom, Max is partly responsible for Norma’s loss of sanity because he essentially feeds her the lies she longs to hear until the Norma in the mirror, the brilliant star, becomes the real Norma, forsaking the aging ingénue. Yet Wilder, through his film, cracks the mirror right down the middle, breaking the hypnotic spell Hollywood holds over its audiences of today and yesteryear.

“Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people to peaceably assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances.” These are among the first rights established in the Constitution by the Founding Fathers of the United States of America: rights foremost in the minds of a blossoming nation that endured much under the tyrannical rule of a government that made no allowances for freedom of expression or thought. However, many have wondered whether the Founding Fathers of this formidable nation realized that the right of free speech might be placed in jeopardy by the passage of legislation targeted to penalize bigoted or insensitive speech. Some citizens may feel that the federal government should punish defamatory and demeaning comments beyond the already existing laws that protect citizens from libel and slander.

Although Congress had already passed the bill, legislative action in regards to Amendment Number 2067 has sparked the interest of citizens around the country. The Amendment allows special federal protection from derogatory remarks targeted specifically towards homosexuals and trans-gender individuals. However, if homosexuals are granted this special sanction by the law, there is nothing to stop all other minorities, special interest groups, or religious groups to petition the government to pass legislation that prohibits individuals from using phrases or terms offensive to them, posing a rather critical problem. The heart of the problem lies in where the boundaries for such a law should be drawn and who would draw them, making a legislation of this nature a potential threat to First Amendment freedoms. In the case of Amendment 2067, one may ask where the distinction is between what is legally acceptable for individuals to say or even think, and who will be regulating and amending this distinction. It is difficult to draw the line between what is universally morally acceptable and what is legally acceptable. Although the opinions of an individual may be unpopular or perhaps even fallacious, the First Amendment still guarantees citizens the right to express these types of opinions through free speech or press. Indeed, the purpose of the First Amendment is to allow American citizens to peaceably discuss ideas and pursue truth without fear of imprisonment by the government.

However, this is not to say that citizens should speak offensively or uncivilly towards religious or ethnic groups. In the early 1990’s several students at Harvard University displayed Confederate flags from their dormitory windows, which was then responded to by a flag bearing a swastika. Derek Bok, the president of Harvard during the incident, made the observation that, “the fact that speech is protected by the First Amendment does not necessarily mean that it is right, proper, or civil […] hanging a Confederate flag in public view—or displaying a swastika in response—is insensitive and unwise because any satisfaction it gives to the students who display these symbols is far outweighed by the discomfort it causes many others […] to disapprove of a particular form of communication, however, is no enough to justify prohibiting it.” However, Bok makes it clear that even though the flags were insensitive, their insensitivity does not merit a law that prohibits them. The right to free speech does not need to be impinged with more restrictions that may prevent the exchange of ideas. However, with the freedom to express ideas of truth and progress, comes the freedom to speak from prejudice or malice. This is the price of American freedom.