If you were offered the chance to learn the truth…would you take it?
My English teacher once told me that good short stories were the ones that spoke to universal truths.
These were the stories that go beyond mere characters and their antics through an imaginary universe. They offer an insight into the human condition: what is life? what is truth? what is reality?
The same could be said for memorable films. Only films convey their meaning in a more sensory way - using both audio and visual elements to enter the mind of the viewer.
And perhaps even shift your perspective.
The following 10 films are chosen because they shed light on the forces at work within our lives, this very moment. They use satire and metaphor to approach the truths that would otherwise be too difficult to understand, or too terrifying to comprehend.
Most of all, these films challenge you to wake up.
The Truman Show (1998)
Jim Carrey plays Truman Burbank, the first child ever legally adopted by a corporation. His entire life is constructed inside a gigantic set, encompassing the picturesque town of SeaHaven. Everything is artificial — from the buildings, to the people, to the very sun above his head.
It’s too easy to call the film a satirical extension of “reality television.” Instead, Peter Weir deftly uses the motif of reality TV to present the “un-realities” of our own world. How the majority of us are psychologically controlled, through fear and comfort to, as Cristof says, “accept the reality of the world that we’re given.”
Read more: The Meaning Of The Truman Show
I Heart Huckabees (2004)
Imagine you were experiencing an existential crisis. But rather than work through it yourself, you hire existential detectives to help you track down the source of your suffering. Imagine one of those detectives is Dustin Hoffman with a bad haircut.
I Heart Huckabees is a quirky, rabbit hole of a film. Many of the characters, from the smarmy marketing executive (Jude Law), to the angry nihlistic firefighter (Mark Walberg) act out the various philosophies of the past thousand years.
Read more: Essay on I Heart Huckabees
Waking Life (2001)
What if you were chained in a dimly-lit cave your whole life where you saw only shadows of real things reflected on its back wall?
Suddenly you’re free and come into the sunlight. Would you recognize this new world as more real than your cave world? Would you be able to wake up?
Talk about a mind trip. Richard Linklater’s film Waking Life, is both visually beautiful and intellectually stimulating. The filmmakers use a ground-breaking technique (at the time) called ‘rotoscoping’ to colour over the images to create a dream-like animation.
Just a few of the ideas covered in unbroken dialogues: dreaming versus reality, existentialism, buddhism, situationism, post-modernism, the list goes on.
Read more: Essay on Waking Life
The Matrix (1999)
For obvious reasons, this was a paradigm-shifting film in the world of movies. But it also introduced a whole generation (myself included) to question the nature of reality. What is real? And how do you know it’s real?
The film’s other great contribution to mass society was the possibility that an unseen force is controlling our destiny. Morpheus reveals the ultimate truth that Neo’s mind can barely process: the Matrix is control. And the only way to break free? Open your mind.
Read more: Collection of essays on The Matrix
Dark City (1998)
Do you ever feel like you’re playing a role? Released 1 year before The Matrix, another film introduced the concept of a hidden beings controlling the destiny of humanity.
Dark City follows Rufus Sewell, a man framed for murder, as he’s pursued by faceless super beings that can manipulate time. Unfortunately for the beings, the protagonist is unwittingly gifted with their own powers of psychokinesis, and a challenge for domination ensues.
Read more: Dark City on Wikipedia
American Beauty (1999)
Horny suburban dad obsesses over his friends’ daughter, a vapid cheerleader. But there’s much more to this dark tale of the American dream gone awry.
Notable elements of this award-winning film include the dehumanizing effects of consumerism, the repressed sexuality of a gay military man, and the pot smoking defiance of Ricky Fitts, who sees the beauty of the entire universe in a single, swaying plastic bag.
Read more: American Beauty and the Idea Of Freedom
Fight Club (1999)
“Advertising has us chasing cars and clothes, working jobs we hate so we can buy shit we don’t need. We’re the middle children of history, man. No purpose or place. We have no Great War. No Great Depression. Our Great War’s a spiritual war… our Great Depression is our lives.”
Tyler Durden’s words ring true in this dark, angry look at young people’s failures to interact with the value system they’re expected to uphold. Far from being a manifesto for violence, the film is rumination on the lengths we will go to experience real emotion, even if it means (metaphorically) bashing someone’s head in.
Read more Fight Club: A Ritual Cure For The Spiritual Ailment Of American Masculinity
Donnie Darko (2001)
Sometimes, to make something better, you’ve got to burn it all down and start over. Such is the relationship between Graham Greene’s The Destructors, and the cult classic Donnie Darko.
The film seamlessly weaves together notions of God, the non-linear nature of time, mind-control, and the freakiest bunny mask you’ve ever seen. It may take multiple viewings to discern a few messages from this multi-layered flick, but each time around will be just as rewarding.
Read more: Essay on Donnie Darko
Brazil (1985)
A dystopian, black comedy, Brazil reveals the terrifying indifference of bureaucracy in a totalitarian state. Although director Terry Gilliam claims never to have read 1984, the themes are too similar to dismiss.
Sam Lowry, a government cog in their machine, habitually escapes his dead-end job by imagining a fantasy world of romantic struggles.
Unfortunately, the system roots out dissidents with fervour. The villains in the film are neither malicious nor sadistic, they are merely doing their jobs.
Read more: Analysis of Brazil
Network (1976)
The news stopped being about enlightening the masses a long time ago.
Instead, news attempts to portray a world view that allows those in power to stay in power. This is never more true than 30 years after the film Network was released, when Howard Beale proclaimed “I’m mad as hell, and I’m not going to take it anymore!”
He called for viewers everywhere to stand up, and demand democratic control over their lives once again. The irony is even more biting when it’s revealed democracy, along with nations, peoples, and countries, no longer exists. The only thing left: the global system of finance.
Read more: The Rise of the Superclass
What do you think of the films in the list? Share your thoughts in the comments!
Ian MacKenzie is the founder and editor of Brave New Traveler. Aside from writing, he spends his time exploring the fundamental nature of existence and wishing he did more backpacking.
译文:
十部颠覆你思想的电影
如果有探讨真相的机会，你会抓住它吗？
我的英语老师曾告诉我好的短篇故事是要能说出普遍真理的。
有一些故事超脱于虚幻世界里的角色以及他们夸张的卖弄，而去洞察人类的生存条件：什么是生活？什么是真相？什么是真实？
那些经典电影同样如此。也只有电影能以一种更能被感知的方式传递思想——结合声像因素直击观众头脑。
甚至是改变你的视角。 以下十部电影入选是因为它们在人们处于工作压力时散发光芒，它们用讽刺和暗喻来揭示那些过于空泛难解真相。更重要的是，这些电影会让你醍醐灌顶。
《楚门的世界》（1998）
吉姆·凯瑞饰演的埃德·哈里是第一个被电视公司合法收养的孩子。埃德的整个人生在一个被巨大摄影棚包围的海景镇里上演着。周围的一切都是假的——从房子到人甚至是他头顶上的太阳。
这部电影很容易会被看作是对真人秀节目的讽刺。不同的是，皮特威尔巧妙的运用了真实电视节目的主题去表现我们现实世界的不真实。人们内心的害怕，克里斯托弗所说的由接受现有世界的真实性所带来的安逸感，这些都使大部分人在心理上被控制了。
I Heart Huckabees (2004)（我爱哈克比）
想象你正经历一场真实危机，你没有选择自己解决，而是雇了侦探去追踪你不快乐的源泉，再想象一下其中一个侦探正是戴着糟糕假头套的达斯丁·霍夫曼。
我爱哈克比是怪诞的，奇特的，充满幻想的。剧中的很多角色，无论是爱拍马屁的超级市场经理，还是充满愤慨的无政府主义者消防员，都在上演着过去几千年来的人生哲理。
《梦醒人生》（2001） 设想你被关在一个昏暗的山洞里，你所能看到的整个人生不过是真实事物反射在黒墙上的影子。
突然之间你自由了，来到阳光下，你会认出比起曾经的山洞这个新的世界才更真实吗？你能醒悟过来吗？
这是一次心灵之旅，理查德·林克莱所导演的梦醒人生，在画面上视觉效果突出，内容上具有激发性。摄制组运用了一种创新的转描技术来对影像进行彩绘，使整个动画有了一种如梦似幻的效果，
在影片大段对白中充溢着各种思潮：梦和现实，存在主义，佛义，情境决定行为论，后现代主义等等。
《黑客帝国》（1999）
很明显的，这是一部具有典型创新意义的电影，也向这一代人（包括我）提出了一个关于真实本质的问题：什么才是真的？
你又怎么能知道它是真的。
黑客帝国对大众社会的另一个巨大贡献是提出了一种可能性：一种未知的力量正掌控着我们的命运。墨菲斯揭示了尼奥几乎不能理解的终极真相：Matrix这个虚拟世界控制着一切，挣脱的唯一方法即打开你的大脑。
《移魂都市》（1998）
你曾有过自己正在扮演一个角色的感觉吗？比起黑客帝国移魂都市要早一年发行，这也是一部关于隐藏力量控制人类命运的电影。
在移魂都市中，卢夫斯·塞维尔饰演一名被陷害谋杀的男子。他被一群可以操纵时间的未名生物所追踪。男主角无意中被赋予了这种生物的能力，随之而来的是对现有统治的挑战。
《美国美人》（1999）
住在郊区的好色老爸迷上了他朋友的女儿--一个乏味的啦啦队长。这是一个关于扭曲了的美国梦的黑色电影，而它告诉我们的决不仅仅是这些。
这部获奖累累的电影里包含了很多有名的桥段：挥霍性消费的影响，同性恋退伍军人对性的压抑，以吸食大麻抗拒社会里克 菲茨，而他从一个孤单，摇晃的塑料袋里看到了整个世界。
《搏击会》（1999）
“广告诱惑我们追逐汽车和时尚,于是我们拼命工作,买那些没用的狗屎,我们是被历史遗忘的,没有目的、没有地位、没有世界大战、也没有经济大萧条,我们的战争就是心灵的战争,我们的生活就是经济大萧条.”
年轻人们缺乏与他们本应拥护的社会价值体系的互动，泰勒德本的话恰如其分地体现了那种颓废，愤慨的观点。影片并不是暴力的宣言，而是一种沉思——我们将竭尽所有的力气去感受真实的情感，甚至那意味着去打破某人的头。
《死亡幻觉》（2001） 有时，要改进某些东西，你需要把它们全部推倒，重新再来。这也是格雷厄姆·格林的破坏者与死亡幻觉的联系。
这部电影将很多因素完美的交织在一起：上帝的概念，时间非线性的本质，控制大脑，还有你所看过的最古怪的兔子面具。理解影片多层次的内涵也许需要你看许多次，但每一次都绝对值得。
《巴西》（1985） 巴西是一部反乌托邦的黑色喜剧，它揭示了一个极权主义国家中官僚政治所带来了的极大冷漠感。尽管导演特里·吉列姆声称从未读过1984而两者主题的过于相似却让人不容忽视。
吉姆·布兰德本特是政府机器中的一个齿轮，常常幻想另一个美妙世界中的艳遇来逃避自己无出路的工作。
不幸的是，这个社会对消灭持异议者十分狂热盲目。电影中的反派角色并不是本性恶毒或残酷，他们只是在做他们的工作而已。
《电视台风云》（1976）
很长时间以来，新闻不再教育大众。
相反，新闻里传递的是让大亨们继续掌权的社会观点。这恰恰是电视台风云发行后三十年的写照，那时霍华德比厄说道:“我已经忍无可忍，我受够了！”
他号召所有的观众，要求民主再一次莅临人们的生活。随着民族，公民，国家的概念不再存在，唯一剩下的是全球经济的体系。
你对名单中的电影有什么想法呢？写下你的评论，分享你的思想。
Ian MacKenzie伊恩·麦肯齐
伊恩·麦肯齐是美丽新世界网站的创始人和编辑。除了写作他花了大量时间探索存在的基础本质，同时也希望自己能多多去背包旅行。