The Ambiguity of Populist Logic

This presentation will use the movie, They Live from 1988 and the interpretations of it as a way of approaching the question of ambiguity.

My main question is that even though the movie’s main message is meant to be criticism of “unrestrained capitalism and yuppies” (Carpenter), what happens when populist far right thinks the movie reflects their arguments precisely? Is it a simple question of polysemy?

I think not. The right and left logics are pretty similar when it comes to conspiracy theories about the global elites. Both far (fascist) right and part of the left read John Carpenter’s They Live as an allegory of what they have been saying all along. In the film, a global elite co-opted by aliens control finance and the media. They rule through ideological propaganda in advertisements and TV programs.

The far right conspiracy site The Vigilant Citizen, for example, argues that the elite in the movie is the Illuminati. Others point to the “Jewish control of finance and media.” Alex Jones of Infowars cannot stop praising the film. On the other side, Slavoj Zizek thinks that the film points at “the extreme violence of liberation.” The director himself objects to the conspiracist interpretations.

This is a quote from a review: "The message that is communicated here: Mass media is the elite’s favorite tool to indoctrinate the masses and to keep them in servitude."

So, how to read it?

If the message of the movie They Live is a critique of finance capitalism and its total control of the media that can easily be owned by the far right, then there must be something about the populist logic that characterizes insurgent movements regardless of their political orientation. This presentation will draw also on several other movies to make its argument.