Messages in Movies

The Matrix is a science fiction movie about a post-apocalypic world where machines control most of the world and most of the human race. The language is horrible (we have TV-G so it blocks it out), the violence is extreme (although mostly computer generated and therefore unrealistic to me) and there are a few gratuitous flesh scenes (fast forward is made for this). So I don't necessarily recommend it, but for those who have seen it, it's certainly full of ideas to think about, and ideas that might give some of us common ground for discussion of those ideas with those trapped in a worldly culture.

During a war between humans and machines the humans blocked the sun, thinking that would leave the machines with no powersource. However, the machines have developed the ability to rely on human beings for their energy source. They create millions of embryos through in vitro fertilization and these human beings are kept from conception until their death in egg shaped pods filled with a sort of amniotic fluid. They are hooked up to the machine's power grid supplying all of the power the machine world needs. To keep them content the machines feed them an alternate reality, but that's a different part of the story.

One of the most powerful moments in the movie is when a leader of the resistance, Morpheus, is explaining this to a human recently rescued from his pod, Neo.
Morpheus shows Neo the 'hatcheries' where all those human babies are created for the purpose of providing life and energy to another species. He shows Neo a baby in one of those pods, with tubes running from its scalp and down its spine. It's rather a horrible image. Then Morpheus says, "The Matrix is a computer-generated dream world built to keep us under control in order to change a human being into this."
And he holds up a Duracell battery.

I do not know what the Wachowski brothers were thinking when they wrote that scene and filmed it, but I know what I thought when I watched it. I thought it was one of the most powerful pro-life messages I had ever seen on film. It is immoral to create human life for the sole purpose of using that new life as a battery, as energy for the support of other life. And there's not much difference between that and creating human beings for spare parts, as in 'fetal tissue research.'

Movies are full of messages. Some of them we create ourselves based on what we bring to the viewing. But some of them are deliberate efforts to 'educate' or enlighten the viewing public. I've discussed with a friend in real life how a certain movie series he loves strike me as akin to sitting in a New Age Sunday School class for several hours of indoctrination (and no, I won't tell what movie series that is).

Summit Ministries has a fascinating article on the messages in movies and the movie makers who want to teach us. I know the Common Room Scholars will enjoy it as two of the movies mentioned are The Matrix and The Truman Show.