Did you know that many movies made today are based on philosophical concepts presented centuries ago? Though it may sound somewhat surprising, it’s actually true for many films. This blog post will examine how movies such as The Lego Movie, The Matrix, and Inception all take inspiration from the 5th century philosopher, Plato. Specifically, these movies all draw inspiration from both Plato’s Allegory of the Cave, and his Theory of the Forms.
The video above was very useful for me earlier in the semester when I first began looking into Plato’s Theory of Forms for my midterm presentation.
In addition, this video helps to visualize Plato’s Allegory of the Cave.
Since both of these topics will be vital to understand for my blog post, I will go over them again once more. If you have any questions about them, or if I fail to mention an aspect of either one, I highly recommend that you go check out those two short videos. They total about 8 minutes of helpful narrative and visuals.
To briefly go over Plato’s Allegory of the Cave, we start inside of a dark cave where there is no light coming in from the outside. There are people who have been in this cave their whole lives, who have only ever faced a wall their entire lives. This wall has shadows cast onto it by a burning fire from behind them. Since this is all they have ever seen, they believe that these shadows are reality. One prisoner is freed and goes to the surface, where he is blinded by all of the light. As his eyes adjust, he sees objects like trees, animals, and ultimately the sun. He realized that the shadows were just representations of the real objects that he was now seeing. He goes back into the cave to tell his fellow cave dwellers about what he discovered. But, as he returns to the darkness, he can no longer see. His friends say that he has ruined his eyesight by going up to the surface. As the enlightened prisoner tries to free the cave dwellers, they kill him, out of fear that they too will damage their eyesight.
Next, we’ll take a quick look at Plato’s Theory of the Forms, which can be seen in his allegory of the cave. Plato believed that the objects and systems we experienced in everyday life were actually imperfect attempts at replicating the perfect version of that thing. For example, Plato would say the car you drive is not a perfect example of a car, but merely one attempt at recreating the FORM of a car. Or, the “perfect relationship” one might think that they have found is actually just an imperfect replica of the truly perfect relationship. Plato believed that the ideal versions of things were called the “forms”, and that they did not exist in the physical realm, but rather as perfect examples of what something should be in our minds. Just like how a home designer needs a perfect blueprint to try and create a close to perfect home, the form is the thing that will guide us towards the true goal of something.
So, now that we know a little bit more about Plato’s Allegory, The Theory of the Forms, and how they both work together, we can take a look at how these concepts have made their way into modern movies. The first movie we will be taking a look at is The Lego Movie.
The Lego Movie, directed by Phil Lord and Chris Miller, is a great example of both Plato’s Cave and his Theory of Forms. To start, Emmet Brickowski lives in a world where his life has been ordered and structured for him. He enjoys it though, and doesn’t question his role in society, much like the prisoners in the beginning of Plato’s Allegory. Then, along comes Wildstyle, who “broke Emmet’s chains” and helped him see what life was really like. Much like how the sun hurt the freed cave dweller’s eyes, this rebellion from the system was uncomfortable to Emmet. Later on in the movie, we see Plato’s Theory of Forms as Emmet is thrown out of the reality that he knew, and into what the viewer would recognize as the “real world”.
Emmet sees his town that he lived in as merely toys that had been assembled by giants who he meets in the basement. He realizes that the reality he thought he knew was merely a replica of the real thing. Plato would say that Emmet had been exposed to the Realm of the Forms, where he could see that the lego structures he had always known were merely forms of the real buildings that the giants had lived in.
The next movie we will take a look at will be The Matrix
The Matrix
The next movie that plays off of Plato’s work is The Matrix. This movie was one of the strongest examples of Plato’s work in modern movies that I found. In fact, it was the movie that made me want to choose this as my topic in the first place. To begin, the main character, who goes by the name of Neo, is living in what he believes to be a normal world. Everything he has experienced his whole life has made sense, much like the prisoners in Plato’s Allegory. Then everything changes when Morpheus offers Neo the chance to see what the world is really like. Much like Plato’s prisoner, Neo is “brought into the light” as he is forcibly removed from the Matrix, only to wake up in the dark chaos that is the real world.
Much like the freed prisoner, Neo struggles with this new reality, but ultimately comes to terms with it and accepts it to be the truth. And just as the prisoner goes back to enlighten his fellow prisoners, Neo agrees to fight alongside those who freed him, in order to save the human race.
Finally, one more movie that we can see has ties to Plato’s work is Christopher Nolan’s “Inception”.
Inception
In Inception, a common theme is whether or not the characters are in reality, or if they are in a dream. This uncertainty of reality coincides with the false sense of reality Plato’s prisoners lived in. Just like how the prisoners believed the things they were experiencing were real, many of the characters in Inception also believed that the dream world they had been placed in was reality. Infact, one character from the movie became so sure that the dream she was in was reality, that she wanted to settle down and have kids there. Something I find interesting to think about is if inception can have a dream within a dream, is there such a thing as a form within a form? Maybe it would be something like a drawing of a chair, which is ultimately a physical attempt at making the form of the chair. Kind of hurts my head to think about…
In conclusion, both Plato’s Allegory of the Cave and his Theory of Forms have played important roles in modern movies like The Lego Movie, The Matrix, and Inception. Each one of these movies has managed to encapsulate certain aspects of Plato’s theories and turn them into an essential part of the story. It was fun for me to get to do some more research on Plato, and the more I become familiar with it, the more I’m seeing his themes show up in my life. I hope you all enjoyed learning about the connections many modern movies have to Plato’s Allegory of the Cave and his Theory of Forms!
PLATO ON: The Forms: https://youtu.be/MgotDFs6cdE
PLATO ON: The Allegory of the Cave: https://youtu.be/SWlUKJIMge4
The Lego Movie Poster: https://www.imdb.com/title/tt1490017/
The Matrix Poster: https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0133093/
Inception Poster: https://www.rottentomatoes.com/m/inception
Lego Movie Basement: https://carboncostume.com/finn-from-the-lego-movie/
Neo wakes up: http://walkjohnnywalk.com/category/blog/health-and-fitness/
Drawing of a chair: https://www.istockphoto.com/vector/chair-carpentered-wooden-vintage-pencil-drawing-gm539205417-58502086
The 10 Best Movies Referring to Plato’s Allegory of the Cave: http://www.tasteofcinema.com/2015/the-10-best-movies-referring-to-platos-allegory-of-the-cave/2/
The thought of Plato talking about cars is mildly amusing, in the same way that Rebecca Goldstein's "Plato at the Googleplex" is...
ReplyDeleteIt's true, though, Plato's perfectionism has set a boundary of thought that's worked its way into the popular culture. If he hadn't existed someone in Hollywood would have to have invented him.