Professional Documents
Culture Documents
FACULTY OF COMMUICATIO
M.A. Thesis
Sona Ertekin
Table of Contents
Acknowledgements ............................................................. 4
1. Introduction ...........................................................................5
3. Conclusion .............................................................................88
4. Epilogue .................................................................................91
6. Appendix
ACKOWLEDGEMETS
Selim Eyüboğlu, for his guidance and contribution. He helped me find out
what I was carried away with, and let me express it in my own way. In fact I
after.
There are two people that I am grateful. Ömer and Meral Madra.
Without you I could’t have made it. Thank you for all the magic you put in
my life.
I would like to thank to Şerif Erol, Tolga Yalkin and all Açık Radyo
their academic experience, time and ideas with me throughout the whole
process.
Murat Garibağaoğlu for their endless support and belief. They certainly
And finally I wish to thank my whole big family. I believe that I took
the power to start from my mother, and the power to complete from my
father. My precious grandmother Seniha Ertekin and all the others were
ITRODUCTIO
Lord Byron
by what she has seen. He writes that cognitive science fiction texts, push the
that such works are beyond the cognitive understanding of their time, and
fiction was today”. Like the utopias and fantastic texts, science fiction texts
tell us about what is going on with our world. Just as Alice’s story tells us
about England of the Victorian era with its ridiculous kings, queens, croquet
by her elder sister. The afternoon sun is high up and Alice is really bored.
She looks at her sisters book but it’s a disappointment since it has no
pictures. At that moment she notices a white rabbit. Hastily walking by, the
rabbit looks at his pocket watch and complains about being late. Alice,
surprised at the sight of a talking rabbit with a pocket watch, stands up and
7
follows the rabbit, and then out of curiosity, jumps in the rabbit hole after
him. She falls and falls and falls and the adventure begins. ii
most splendid adventure, Alice is ready for the next one; Through The
Looking Glass. In this second book, after an indefinite period since the first
adventure, Alice is inside her family house with her cat Dinah and her two
kittens. Alice tells the black kitten, Kitty, about the “looking-glass house”. It
is a house you can see through the mirror on the wall. It looks exactly like
the family house, “only things go the other way. iii The looking-glass house
and walking through the mirror, begins this new adventure. It is only after
her voyage to Wonderland, she finds out that there is another level or realm
of reality inside her own family house. That is to say, after experiencing a
different reality, she finds out that world she is living in, also constitutes of
the moment that Alice enters the looking-glass house is quite ambiguous.
It is almost as if the looking-glass house comes to life and the mirror melts
only after the very words fall from the little girl’s lips. Things happen
Wonderland; after watching science fiction films about virtual reality for
and cloning are no more a dream, a world where “simulation” has become a
social theory. It is after reading and watching science fiction for years that
eXistenZ and The Matrix are two of the recent movies concerning
virtual reality and consequently technology. Yet they approach the virtual
and virtual reality as the “looking-glass house”, and ordinary reality as the
“family house” we will find out that The Matrix looks at the “looking-glass
films comment on the nature of the hyperreal universe we’re living in.
Guy Debord explains the transformation of the world into a new order based
that was directly lived has moved away into a representation.” v Ten years
after, Jean Baudrillard indicates the death of the real, due to excess of
representation;
Hyperreal is the point where the natural unity of the signifier and the
we are experiencing around the world today. The pseudo media events that
take place every now and then can be examples of hyperreality. On 2 April
Pentagon. The tape appeared on most the TV stations all over the world.
Soon after, BBC, Guardian and The Toronto Star disclosed that, after being
treated, Private Lynch was taken to the US forces, but she was returned as
the US soldiers opened fire on the ambulance. Later on, they attacked the
hospital, "saved" Jessica Lynch and seized the hospital staff as prisoners.
production on Private Lynch’s heroic tale has already begun, and an Iraqi
10
fan of Jessica sent her a Ferrari as a gift to celebrate her release. viii This
technology, the body, virtual reality and capitalism in general. I believe that
these criteria are all interrelated and they constitute both motivations and
believe that the study of such criteria can be fruitful in getting a better
understanding of hyperreality.
phenomenon that can be applied to all aspects of our life. All explanations
hyperreality through The Matrix and eXistenZ. The following chapters look
questioned as the reason behind the fact that individuals are driven towards
virtual reality, since they are not satisfied with their real life. In metropolitan
life, individuals are split between their career and what they actually want to
The next chapter “Pause and Stretch” questions the notion of time in
indefinite point of history, eXistenZ deals with the notion of time in virtual
reality, which is much more elastic and different than the time in real life.
The third chapter “The Lotus Eaters or Temet Nosce” is about the
notion of identity in the two films. The characters in eXistenZ yield to their
multiple game characters and lose their original identities, whereas The
The third chapter “No Telos” questions belief and the idea of
well as the obscure telos in The Matrix. eXistenZ doesn’t even mourn after
the long gone “belief”. However there is a conflict between the followers of
virtual reality games and realists throughout the film. Believers are
eXistenZ.
place in the human body. Ironically the body is an absence in virtual reality.
13
However eXistenZ creates a new paradigm concerning mind and body, but
films. The cage stands for the real life in eXistenZ, and for virtual reality in
The Matrix. But what is more important is the films’ approaches to the
as the machines, and the capitalist system in eXistenZ, which traps people
The last chapter, “The Other Side of the Glass” continues the
eXistenZ. Virtual reality is an irreversible step out of Plato’s cave that leads
The boundaries between reality and simulation; signifier and the signified
i
Mustafa Arslantunalı, Ayçöreği: Teknoloji, Dil ve Đletişim Üzerine
Denemeler (Đstanbul: Đletişim, 1992), p.110
ii
Lewis Carroll, Alice in Wonderland (Ankara: Milli Eğitim
Basımevi, 1946), p.3
iii
Lewis Carroll, “Through The Looking Glass” Project Gutenberg
and Duncan Research Shareware,
http://rabbit.eng.miami.edu/text/carroll/lookingglass
iv
Ibid.
v
Qtd. in Scott Bukatman, Terminal Identity: The Virtual Subject in
Post-modern Science Fiction (London: Duke University Press, 1993), p.35
vi
Jean Baudrillard, Symbolic Exchange and Death (London: Sage
Publications, 1993), p.71
vii
Jean Baudrillard, qtd. in Necmi Zeka, “Introduction:Yolları
Çatallanan Bahçe, Aynalı Gökdelenler, Dil Oyunları ve Robespierre”
Postmodernizm, ed. Necmi Zeka (Đstanbul: Kıyı Yayınları, 1994), p.8
viii
Azmi Bishara, “Casualty of Truth: Even Hollywood May Not Be
Able To Save the Story of Private Lynch” Al Ahram 09 Jun.2003,
http://www.zmag.org
ix
Op. cit. Terminal Identity, p.81
15
CHAPTER OE
junkie-boy of our century, who spends his life between his room and his
security number, he pays his taxes and helps his landlady carry out her
garbage.” However his hacker identity divides his life in half. As Agent
Smith puts it, he seems to be living two lives. “His other life is spent on
computers, where he goes by the alias Neo and is guilty of virtually every
depressive life spent mostly in front of the two computer screens placed on
the office table, over which he probably often falls asleep. Even his
The scene that Neo is being scorned by his boss has a strong taste of
estrangement. As they talk, we see the workers cleaning the glass windows
of the plaza on the background, and we hear the wiping sound on the glass.
His job is far from satisfying him by any means, except economically.
Allegra Geller(2) is a star game designer who, like Neo, spends most
of her time alone in her room, designing the games. It is thought that “she
would like it best if she never had to show them to anybody.” However, in
order to make a living she has to sell her games and make public
She definitely does not work and design games in order to make a
living, on the contrary she sells her games, to be able to stay alone in her
room, design games and spend her time in virtual reality. Yet their
motivations are very different. Neo is not at ease with the life he’s leading.
He knows that something’s going wrong with the world, but he is not
completely aware of the inside story. Without knowing the fact that he is
resists the system but he cannot rebel, because he doesn’t know what’s
behind the system that entraps him. On the other hand Allegra(2) is aware of
the power dynamics behind the system she’s living in, but she manipulates
it. Through the game companies, she “does her own thing”. In the heart of
the system, she creates game realms and alters the very notion of reality.
19
any virtual reality games. Allegra(2) calls him a “pr nerd”. Ted tells
Allegra(2) that he was dying to play one of her games but he has never been
ported, out of the fear of getting paralysed during the porting process.
Fig. Hata! Yalnızca Ana Belge. The factory as the “spatialization” of estrangement
Ted(4) and Allegra(4) are workers in a filthy game pod factory. They
workplace.
All these characters are working in certain jobs but none of them is
in harmony with his/her career. They work because they have to. Neo and
20
Allegra(2) work in order to make a living and spend most of their time in
Allegra. Ted(4) and Allegra(4) are trying to destroy the factory they’re
working for. They all are victims of the “strange delusion” that has
holds its sway” which we call “career”.ix This is the drama of the people
living in a system where our “right to be lazy” has been taken from our
hands long time ago and the sign of the split personality crisis people suffer,
being divided between self and career. David Harvey explains that, Jonathan
Raban envisioned the city as the origin of the multiplicity of roles performed
The dissatisfaction caused by the life style reduced to office and weekend,
can be seen as the very reason that drives people towards virtual reality. Neo
works in a boring job but at night he’s the wild hacker, the king of virtual
The Matrix.
21
ix
David Harvey, The Condition of Postmodernity (Cambridge:
Blackwell, 1995) p.6
CHAPTER TWO
After Neo is taken out of The Matrix, the guerrillas bring him on
board the Nebuchadnezzar. When Neo comes to, he asks Morpheus what
this place is. Morpheus answers; “More important than what, is when.” But
he cannot tell the exact time. The sign attached on the deck of
Year: 2096” However they do not know the exact date when the machines
Time had taken over another meaning in the period after the
time and space forms a substantial nexus of social power, that we cannot
once a sign of new-found creativity and an agent and catalyst in the use of
knowledge for wealth and power.” David Harvey adds that “money can be
used to command time (our own or that of others) and space. Conversely,
command of time and space can be converted back into command over
system. Because of that, when the machines took over and the capitalist
system broke down in The Matrix, time is lost along with it. And as the film
is a saga that recounts the war fought to go back to the olden days of the
23
system, they also fight to get their precious time and “real” space back in
their hands. Time is what we must have, in order to keep our lives in order,
so that we can keep the machine going. It is out there in the film as a
On the contrary, in eXistenZ, time is what we try to get rid of. And
the game is the way to escape and trick time. As they’re getting ready to
play the game in the church, the seminar leader asks Allegra(2) how long
they’re going to play. Right before they start, Allegra(2) tells the gamers
that they’ll be back in no time at all. By the end of the film we understand
that, what we have been watching for the last one and a half hours has all
been a game that has begun even before the beginning of the film. And the
gamers talk to each other about the game. One of the gamers, Hugo(1) asks
Merle(1) who had not entered the game, how long they had been playing.
He especially asks her, because in the game, time runs in a different course.
Merle(1) tells that they have been playing for twenty minutes. That is a
surprise for him; “God, it seemed like days, it’s fantastic.” Another gamer,
Darcy Nader(1) adds to that; “Just think about it man, if you stayed your
whole life in the game world, then you could have lived about, I don’t
know, five hundred years.” Virtual reality enables you to pause and stretch
time, along with life. It is a choice if you “prefer not to”.ix It is an escape
but again in terms allowed by the system, for we should keep in mind that
the escapism and illusion of freedom, eXistenZ displays the attempt to get
rid of what is fought for in The Matrix; time, with all its connotations. The
24
fantasy and a synthetic form of space and time, they clash the rationality
CHAPTER THREE
Hassan Sabbahix
The “lotus eaters” Odysseus meets on his journey “let the memory of
all that had been, fade from their minds.”ix The gamers in eXistenZ
completely yield to their game characters in the same fashion. They leave
reality and their original selves (if there is such a thing in a hyperreal
universe) behind and completely merge into the game reality. They float
successful in the game, one has to adapt him/herself completely to the game
reality and let his/her game character appear and take over. That is to say, if
you wish to play well, you have to forget who you are, and initiate a state of
oblivion.
remember that everything inside The Matrix is part of a simulation, and not
eXistenZ; forgetting who you are in real life. Whereas in The Matrix, who
you really are, is the one thing you should never forget.
Allegra(3) what had just happened. Because he had not meant to say what
he just did. Allegra(3) tells him that it was his game character who said that.
“It’s kind of a schizophrenic feeling isn’t it? You’ll get used to it.” She
explains that there are things that have to be said to advance the plot. “Most
26
things get said whether you wanna say them or not. Don’t fight it, just go
with it.”
Fig. Hata! Yalnızca Ana Belge. Ted cannot “help” killing the waiter
The mechanics of what makes the game character run properly is the
“game urge”. The game urge is the reason why you do things whether you
wish to do them or not. These pseudo urges cause Ted(4), to treat people
sticky dish made of a two headed mutated amphibian. While eating Ted(4)
tells Allegra(4) that he finds it disgusting but he can’t help it. Allegra(4)
explains him why; “Yeah, it’s a genuine game urge. Something your game
character was born to do. Don’t fight it.” Ted(4) answers “I’m fighting it,
but it isn’t doing me any good.” After a most revolting appetite scene,
Ted(4) constitutes a gun from what is left of “our two headed friend”. He
tells he feels the urge to kill someone and it is the Chinese waiter that he
27
needs to kill. Ted(4) is not sure if he can kill him because everything’s so
realistic and the waiter is so very nice. But Allegra(4) knows better. “You
won’t be able to stop it; you might as well enjoy it.” Ted follows his game
urge and kills the waiter. Whatever he says he will not do, he does.
The game characters in this section are the ones they had
“downloaded” from the micropods that Darcy Nader(3) had given. These
the other game characters they had been practising on other levels of reality.
Therefore the game has the function to let the gamers experience many
diverse identities other than their own. In The Matrix, we come across the
Role Playing games. This form of transitory identity is one that involves the
the gamer carries his own personality and conflicts into this fantastic form
motherly at the same time. She is the ultimate woman as she can perform
multiple social roles. She can be the whore, the mother, the sister and all,
perform via game characters, sets them free to be whatever they want to.
28
house, the coffee-table you buy, constitute your image, and identity doesn’t
“personalize” your cell phone and your desktop, whatever that means, of
course only within the limits of given choices. You are free to create your
own combination as you are free to combine the pareo, bikini and tops at
Marks & Spencer. That is to say, you are free to choose from a set of
options, free to be what you want, but only inside certain preset choices. As
worker in the Trout Farm. He looks at his name tag to learn his new name.
looks at his own name tag and says “Yeah. Yeah it works, I must be
about how people get acquainted with their own game characters, or he is a
game character and is just making fun of Ted(4). Either way, outside all
contexts what we witness in this scene is a man looking at his name tag in
game. They find themselves back in the ski chalet. At this point his real life
who we really are? As multiple realities lessens the reality of the real,
transitory moment that lasts forever. This is the reason behind the
schizophrenic feeling Allegra(4) had told Ted(4) about, and it leads us back
to Raban’s Soft City where people are lost in the labyrinth of multiple roles.
that are sure of who they are, whether they are in The Matrix or not. The
Reeves’ female twin”.ix They had been freed long time ago so we do not
know anything about who they had been inside The Matrix. Because, it does
not matter as in The Matrix, there’s only one reality, and The Matrix is
point of view regarding who the characters are in reality, and who they had
in the film. Stimulus and phenomena are questioned and considered in terms
of authenticity. The effects and feelings invoked by these are not considered
as evidence to make it real. Moreover, the effects are not important or valid.
Neo gets back in The Matrix for the first time since he was freed, in
order to see the oracle. As they pass a Chinese restaurant Neo tells Trinity
that he used to eat there. That is before he was freed. And he asks “I have
memories from my life, none of them happened. What does that mean?”
Trinity answers “That the Matrix cannot tell you who you are.” If so, who is
He used to love, get cold, think; he used to get curious and hungry. He used
Fig. Hata! Yalnızca Ana Belge. “Suits” that run the system
because someone told him it was not real, and rediscovering who he really
is. And what he discovers is that he is not even a person, he is the hero of a
(and quite pale at that) with receding hairlines, wear the requisite suits of
However, Neo is just another suit, only cooler. Again using Edward
Miller’s terms, his “form fitting black leather vinyl Prada-wear” is a part of
his “residual self image” which Morpheus explains as the “mental projection
of your digital self”. This is where things get tricky. We know that, what is
in The Matrix is not real. Their identity is based on who and what they are
in the real world. And this identity is reflected as a digital projection when
32
they enter The Matrix. Then why is it different then what they really look
like?
Inside The Matrix they are chic, cool and they don’t have the plugs
that are the signs of their past slavery. That is to say, they experience what
image in The Matrix reflects the limited point of view that operates within
Oracle’s kitchen wall) means “examine your outwear”. It also “proves the
old Hollywood saying that costume is character.”ix And as for eXistenZ you
ix
Hassan Sabbah quoted by William Burroughs in Decisions.
ix
Edith Hamilton, Mythology: Timeless Tales of Gods and Heroes
(New York: Mentor, 1969) p.211
ix
Qtd. in Scott Bukatman, Terminal Identity: The Virtual Subject in
Post-modern Science Fiction (London: Duke University Press, 1993), p.35
ix
Miller, Edward D., “The Matrix and the Medium’s Message.”
Social Policy, Online Edition,
http://www.socialpolicy.org/recent_issues/SU00/nedmiller.html
ix
Ibid.
ix
Ibid.
CHAPTER FOUR
34
O TELOS
“‘Do you know, I always thought Unicorns were fabulous monsters too? I
never saw one alive before!’ ‘Well, now that we have seen each other’ said
forever.”
of salvation constitutes the core of the story; is Neo the one? This is the
question all the guerrillas have in mind, including Neo. If he believes, the
notion of belief will be brought back into life. Because, it is lost along with
Matrix. But Hollywood asks questions in order to give specific answers. The
answer is; no matter how weird the world gets, we have to believe, because
saviours and heroes still exist and life is useless without belief and whatever
expresses, Neo is like Alice stumbling down the rabbit whole. If he does not
believe in himself, he will keep on falling and falling which is what the
a believer all the way long. He is like John the Baptist who had told Jesus
that he is “the one”. This is a fact that all the guerrillas (except Cypher)
respect, but about which they all are curious. The oracle explains Neo what
is to believe. “Morpheus believes in you, Neo. And no one, not you, not
matter what. The guerrillas who work off their life in order to learn if he’s
right or wrong are all curious, but they will all wake and see that he had
been right all the way long. So the question is to believe or not.
On the other hand we have Cypher, who is actually the only human
touch we come across in The Matrix. After he was freed from The Matrix,
he was taken onboard the Nebuchadnezzar and began a guerrilla life. For
sometime he was in love with Trinity, but he couldn’t get any positive
response. He did not believe in salvation, he couldn’t find love. There was
prefers to be an actor in The Matrix, rather than being a guerrilla fighting for
reality. This is a very natural human reaction. He is the only character in The
scape goat. He is the sinner. He performs the ultimate sin which is to deny
the superiority of authenticity. “You know, I know this steak doesn’t exist. I
know that when I put it in my mouth, The Matrix is telling my brain that it
is juicy and delicious. After nine years, you know what I realize? Ignorance
is bliss.” This is where we are faced with the question of going back in The
Matrix and the idea that the red pill sucks. In the scene that Cypher gives
36
away all the guerrillas, he explains Trinity why; “I’m tired Trinity. I’m tired
of this war. I’m tired of fighting. I’m tired of this ship, being cold, eating the
same god damn goop everyday. But most of all, I’m tired of that jack-off
and all of his bullshit.” All of a sudden we are awakened to the fact that
(because of her rank) and Neo (because he possibly is “the one”) calls him
“sir” which gives away the military hierarchy they live with and the fact that
this is a war movie. It is just free of the anxiety of being politically correct
since the enemy is made of steel instead of flesh and bone. Cypher is the
traitor in this war movie. He is there for us to see what we must not do. He
chooses virtual reality instead of the real world, like Allegra(2). Their
motivations are similar too. They are not satisfied in the real world so they
prefer to live in virtual reality. For them, it doesn’t matter if what they
experience is real or not, as long as they are happy. Here we come across a
experience things which evoke certain feelings. If you feel it, who is to say
it is not real? That is why we can say that a person called Neo doesn’t exist
if we are to accept the statement that whatever is virtual is not real. For
millennium spirit. They are everyone, who knows but prefers to live as if
he/she does not “know”. The people who are estranged by theories and
37
histoires”ix are out of circulation. Cypher says that Morpheus has tricked
them into getting out of The Matrix, which seems right. Morpheus also
tricks Neo by under-informing him. The advertising genius almost sells The
Matrix to him as if it’s the coolest thing of the century, shared by a designer
the urge to possess. But you don’t really know what you’re buying and you
accusation, Trinity tells that Morpheus has set them free. More important
Morpheus’ orders; or is it the free will to decide where to live and what to
live by even if it is to live a lie? Trinity tells him The Matrix isn’t real. In
return Cypher performs a demonstration on how real virtual reality can be.
“I disagree, Trinity. I think The Matrix can be more real than this world. All
I do is pull the plug here. But there, you have to watch Apoc die.” After
Apoc it’s Switch’s turn. They’re true believers but they aren’t attractive
enough which is why they have to die. As Edward Miller puts it; “the
message from Hollywood is clear: the many must wait for the heroic and
Switch, she says; “Not like this… not like this…” She is offended to die
that will be remembered, but you have to be pretty to make even a second
38
class hero. Even when you’re on the brink of death, what matters is the
cause and the cause only. This counter-reminds what Ted(3) in eXistenZ
tells a game character. “We’re here Darcy Nader, and that’s all that
matters.”
eXistenZ deals with the same question of belief, but evaluates it from
eXistenZ too, but no single belief. There are several things to believe or not.
all three. A believer of one of these is a disbeliever of the other and vice
versa. This portrays the diversity of belief in society and the “mobile”
line, almost looks like a religious painting, probably representing the last
supper. Someone will betray, but who? The first Christians believed that the
world was headed in the wrong direction and that it was transitory. They
believed in a heaven and a hell. When the world itself turned into a hell,
everyone could pick-up something to go with his/her own taste and income.
companies increase their income too. That way, we kill two birds with one
stone. Here we have a religion in the middle of the capitalist system, which
keeps the machine going, eXistenZ; “not just a game, but a new game
system.” eXistenZ is the religion of the ones who do not believe. This
virtual reality belongs to the ones who have given up hope long time ago. A
The second group of believers are the “realists” who oppose the idea
the realist discourse, game artists “have to suffer for all the harm they’ve
done and intended to do to the human race” which is “the most effective
supported by the rival company Antenna Research but that’s another issue.
Trout Farm. Due to his intervention, they kill the Chinese waiter.
Afterwards in the kitchen Ted(4) asks him why the Chinese waiter had to
die. Yevgeny(4) tells him that a waiter who hears many things spoken
Ted(4) is unaware of the mechanics of the system and naively asks him, “He
Us! (…) We love you, now that you have proven to be truthful and
who has devoted himself to the Realist cause. But his situation is far from
says “Us”. But there’s no “Us” either. Revolution is unrealistic. It’s a fairy
tale. That is why being a believer is like believing the world is flat.
blindly believes in something and fights for it. Allegra(4) as a heathen and
Ted(4) as an ignorant square, are far from taking him seriously. And what’s
all the more ironic is although Yevgeny(4) acts like a true believer of reality,
help but ask, you can’t believe in believers these days, can you?
and Allegra(2) take refuge at the ski hut. Allegra(2) tells him that realists are
after her and have already attempted to assassinate her. Vinokur(2) tells he’s
already heard “this ridiculous story about some fetwa” against her. The
Allegra(2). They consider her as the “demoness”, because she creates other
constitutes the tragic flaw of human civilization in The Matrix. The nerve to
realists. The assassin in the first church scene yells “Death to the demoness,
42
at the Chinese restaurant, Ted(4) tells the same thing to Allegra(4) but she
doesn’t find it amusing. Towards the end of the film things get all mixed up.
realist and is killed by Allegra who this time shouts “Death to the demon
Ted Pikul!” Afterwards we understand that all that happened throughout the
film had been a game. We learn that Ted(1) and Allegra(1) are both realists
who has created the new game system “tranCendenZ” for the game
the guerrillas in The Matrix, the gamers have long ago given up belief in
salvation. The obscure “telos” that constitutes the backbone of The Matrix is
just “play”.ix At the Chinese restaurant, after they order the “special” Ted(4)
wants to pause the game; “The game can be paused can’t it? I mean all
“Yeah, sure. But why, what’s wrong? Aren’t you dying to see what’s so
special about the special?” Because this is a world with “no telos”. What
makes people keep on living is the urge to see “what’s so special about the
“happiness of pursuit” in The Matrix that keeps them going.ix And no matter
what you pursue, it is the third group of believers that win either way.
43
“They”, the inseparable element of the holy trinity; who are invisible, but
are everywhere.
ix
Qtd. in Scott Bukatman, Terminal Identity: The Virtual Subject in
Post-modern Science Fiction (London: Duke University Press, 1993), p.136
ix
Ihab Hassan, “The Culture of Postmodernism” Theory, Culture
and Society: Explorations in Critical Social Sciences Vol:2 No:3, 1985.
ix
Walt Whitman
CHAPTER FIVE
SAFETY VALVES
The cell phone has a crucial role in The Matrix. Most of the time it
helps the guerrillas find their way through situations that are a matter of life
and death. They use safety-catch Nokia telephones specially designed for
the film. The cell phone used here is a vital magical instrument, a life saver
and a symbol of power. In the scene we see Neo sitting in his “veal-
fattening pen”, the agents come looking for him but he doesn’t know that. In
and is about to jump out of the window over to the scaffold. But he drops
his phone, and it’s over. Without his phone, he can’t make it. He can’t make
true. At this point of the film he is not freed from The Matrix yet, therefore
he is not conscious of the fact that everything he sees around and everything
he owns is part of a computer simulation. Towards the end of the film Neo
takes the cell phone of a man on the street from his hand, in order to make
after him “That’s my phone, that’s my best phone.” The cell phone
see around the world today. The guerrillas’ use of the cell-phone is
helps the guerrillas get in and out of The Matrix. However, the cell-phone
reflects another kind of addiction; the “image addiction” that overrides The
motorcycles and other fancy gadgets. The guerrillas “are clad head to toe in
form fitting black leather vinyl Prada-wear.”ix Edward Miller’s point is;
Douglas Rushkoff tells that long before the personal computers and
called the Interzone, where machines mutate into creatures and people can
46
possibilities were discovered one by one, while science fiction writers like
William Gibson and Bruce Sterling created the cyberpunk myth that defined
the tone of the 90's.ix William Gibson's revelation of his choice of subject
matter is significant: "One of the reasons I think, that I use computers in that
way is that I got really interested in these obsessive things. I hadn't heard
anybody talk about anything, with that intensity since the sixties. It was like
listening to people talk about drugs."ix Beginning from the 90's, cyberspace
filled the space in the lives of many young people looking for a meaning,
providing them with an endless dark space within their computers in their
own rooms. Douglas Rushkoff puts it that "the cyberian vision is a heretical
itself."ix The hackers were presented as a threat to society as they had the
power to pull down the vast networks of the government and capitalist
power groups. At the same time, the myth created around cyber-space
became popular through films, cartoons, comics, music and magazines. The
the 90's. However,it is the caricature of the cyber-space myth that already
collapsed in the media pool. Moreover, in it's technophobic tone that depicts
the destructive aspects of virtual reality and technology, The Matrix negates
47
its own cyber-punk aspect. The obsession with authenticity presented along
with the cyber-punk imagery, the heroes revolting in order to get back to the
old system are all ironic. Therefore, the cyber-punk element is only visible
are exceptions that "strive to become 'one' with the machine."ix The guerilla
technology that matters, but who dominates it. Conversely the gamers in
eXistenZ tend to walk the virtual path towards a unity with the machine.
with an opaque, organic, texture. When it rings, its translucid surface turns
pink as it is when you put a lit torch behind your finger. Ted’s(2) pinkphone
rings as they drive, running away from the assassins who’re after Allegra(2).
Allegra(2) immediately picks up the phone and throws it out of the window.
thinks that it is “a range finder” which will let people know where they hide.
48
cellular phones, and not without reason as cellular phones are used by
There aren’t any other cell phones around, in eXistenZ. This movie filled
crucial need.
The difference between the approaches of the two films towards cell
obviously an addict of virtual reality. When she comes to the church, Ted(2)
is surprised to see that a big star like her is so shy. She’s quite, maybe
understandable, as she’s not used to being in “real” public, and she doesn’t
pay much attention to the first level of reality. She spends most of her time
in her room, designing games and playing them. As the creator of virtual
reality games and game systems, Allegra(2) is more than just a star.
advance but since it alters reality itself, such action has miraculous effects
reactions from the society. Some people become her followers whereas
some people accuse her of violating reality. Causing all the menace and
miracle Allegra(2) becomes a Virgin Mary figure. She is the creator, and
eXistenZ is like a womb all the players are connected to, using umbi-cords
which are devices resembling umbilical cords, that connect the gamer to the
game system. Allegra(2), associates herself with the womb she creates.
50
When she talks about her game, she calls it “her”. At one point Ted(2) and
Allegra(2) are being chased down by some curious power groups and
One of those umbi-chords got ripped out of her. Ripped out of her. Just as
the game architecture was being downloaded from her to all those slave
pods. That’s a very vulnerable time for her.” At this point the connection
between Allegra(2) and her game becomes very clear. The vulnerable time
of the pod was a vulnerable time for Allegra(2) too. Although she spends
most of her time alone in her room, she came to the church and exposed
herself. She let people connect to her game. When the cord was ripped out,
between Allegra(2) and her game results in her disconnection with the
game. She’s a very cool woman who remains calm even when there’s a
hoard of assassins after her. However she cannot remain so calm when her
game is the issue. She can do anything in order to save it. She uses her
sexual and motherly authority and talks Ted(2) into getting a bioport and
playing with her. She is really successful in this; given Ted(2) is extremely
techno-phobic, and has never played any games in an age where people can
get legal bioport instalments at malls and illegal ones at a local country gas
station. Unfortunately Ted gets a flawed installation from the gas station
operator Gas(2), who wants to kill Allegra(2) in order to get the five million
dollar reward for her dead body. The flawed port breaks down the pod,
which puts the only and original version of eXistenZ in danger. At this point
Allegra(2) gets furious. “I’m locked outside my own game. I can’t get me in
or it out!” As she can’t get in it, and can’t get the game out of the pod, she
cannot take the game out of herself either. This is what we call addiction.
She gets really mad whenever her game is in danger. After Ted(2)
kills Gas(2) who has attempted to kill them, they run away. As they’re
driving away Ted(2) is anxious and doesn’t know what to do. She tells
Allegra(2) that they need help. But she’s obsessed with her pod and game
only, and she answers “Yeah, I gotta get this pod fixed.” Like a junkie that
walks around with his/her needle set and necessary stuff, Allegra(2) carries
Farm trying to serve the realist cause. Allegra(3) decides to port into a sick
pod in order to spread the illness to all the other pods. Her mission is to
destroy all the pods inside the factory. The moment she ports into the sick
pod she turns really bad. Ted(3) tries to unport her but he cannot get the
umbi-cord out of her bioport. The creator of games has finally become one
with the game. The organic union becomes literal, they become one body.
When Ted(3) wants to cut her free, for the first time the cool girl
says that she’s afraid. This is a very, very human moment, where we hear
what is left of her identity. After Ted(3) cuts the umbi-cord, the cord starts
to bleed and the blood that spills belongs to Allegra(3). As she’s bleeding to
53
death, they fortunately “pop right out of the game.” She cannot bear living a
life without games, a life spent “on the most pathetic level of reality”.
cannot understand why Allegra(2) is so upset. She tells him that in the pod
was “the only, the original version of eXistenZ.” And she adds, “I devoted
five of my most passionate years for this strange little creature. And I never
regretted it Pikul. Because I knew it was the only thing that could give my
life a meaning.” The question is, what makes people desperately looking for
a meaning? What makes The Matrix guerrillas jump around with a cell
phone glued to their hand, showing off with mirrored glasses and leather
suits? Can it be the fact that they live in a filthy ship, eating a semi-liquid-
ending orders? Can it be the “veal-fattening pen” and all the system behind
that, which makes people, run away into their dark rooms, to wander virtual
reality and walk around in their offices at daytime like pale faced ghosts?
Some do sports, some watch TV, some take drugs and some crawl inside
virtual reality. This isn’t any different from the image addiction portrayed in
The Matrix. In fact this isn’t different from any kind of addiction. People try
In this century, the things that we buy such as the telephone, or the
pod, or the computer; are presented as what we need. But these needs are
based on illusions of necessity. They are created to push more green blood
in the market. Finally “the things you own end up owning you.”ix They
notice that we have become addicts. If they are harmed or lost we cannot
function properly, which is why the position of the consumer is not much
different than that of the junkie. It is a way to pause life, a place to be.
way enables them to keep on functioning properly in the system. What’s the
buy? You watch TV and learn what you “need” to buy, to be what you
should “want” to be, and that is to be rich and attractive. So you go to work
merchandise. No sales talk necessary. The client will crawl through a sewer
and beg to buy… the junk merchant does not sell his product to the
drinks” loaded with caffeine and taurine. By making it faster they make a
more economic use of time. They wear fancy clothes and dance till the
morning. They buy club music and chill-out cd’s to listen at home. They
buy music magazines to learn what they “need” to wear and listen; where
be able to go to work on Monday. They have to work real hard all week to
pay for all these, so they don’t have time to think about politics or whatever
55
is going on around the world. Here comes Friday, they go to the club again
and it goes like this on and on and on. Like the weekend hippies of the 70’s.
The crucial point is that when they’re dancing in the club, or at a golden
dawn in a beach party, they feel free. They feel they are out of the system,
they think they’re doing something that contradicts the system. But this is an
illusion. It’s only make believe. It is what stops you from standing up and
saying “no”. It is oblivion. That is why the revolutionaries of the 60’s used
to shout “We want the world and we want it now” whereas the slogan for
our times is “Another world is possible”. We have forgotten the idea that
another world is possible, while we were busy working and partying. “The
younger generation, who had grown up in this new world, clearly felt no
1840’s Paris he writes “they were at once perceptive and trenchant in their
faith that they had the power to transcend it, that they could live and work
freely beyond it’s norms and demands.” He adds that “nobody in the
“there’s nothing outside the text.” The cell phones, computers, hacking
career and fancy clothes of The Matrix and the cyber-game system in
eXistenZ are nothing else but a safety valve, and they all have an exclusive
ix
Ibid.
ix
Douglas Rushkoff, Cyberia (New York: Harper Collins, 1993)
p.221
ix
Ibid. p.220-42
ix
Qtd. in ibid. p.229
ix
Ibid. p.260
ix
Ibid. p.239
ix
Qtd. in Scott Bukatman, Terminal Identity: The Virtual Subject in
Post-modern Science Fiction (London: Duke University Press, 1993), p.36
ix
Fight Club. Dir. David Fincher. Perf. Edward Norton, Brad Pitt
and Helena Bonham Carter. 20th Century Fox, 1999.
ix
Qtd. in Scott Bukatman, Terminal Identity: The Virtual Subject in
Post-modern Science Fiction (London: Duke University Press, 1993), p.37
ix
Marshall Berman, All That Is Solid Melts Into Air: The Experience
of Modernity (London: Verso, 1997), p.81
ix
Ibid. p.119
57
CHAPTER SIX
“My grandfather taught me to sail when I was a kid. He made me learn the
stars in case all the G.P.S. satellites fell out of the sky at once. He said
anyone who put his life in the hands of anything run by batteries was a
jackass.”
Neo that throughout history, the human race has always been dependent on
machines to survive. It seems that humans in this film have not learned from
indefinite point of history, the human race has become slave to the machines
with artificial intelligence it once created. Therefore machines are the major
behind all evil and suffering. However, technology is still a major element
of human life. Humans in the real world spend most of their time in ultra-
technological ships if not in the city of Zion. Their life is not only
surrounded but filled in and filled to the brim with technology. They try to
make the most of it to fight and to survive since there’s no other way in a
in the film. Humans slave to technology fight it, again using the terms of
technology. They live a boring, distasteful life in the real world but they
seek juice and satisfaction in The Matrix where they jump off the buildings
and walk around in “90’s high fashion.” And they have “guns, lots of guns.”
During his training when Neo stays online for ten hours, Tank calls him “a
machine”. When Neo goes to Lafayette Hotel to meet Morpheus for the first
technology and he admires Trinity for making them on her own. Therefore
the machines can do. Moreover, he is also a human. And he can fly too. He
all the digits and flesh, actually he is the messiah of a religion worshipping
power.
significant. In the first scene Allegra(2) tells the audience that the
possibilities are great, but people are “programmed” to accept so little. Later
on she tells them she’s ready to “download” eXistenZ by Antenna into all of
them. Likewise, when she speaks of her pod, she calls it “her”. She talks as
if it’s a person. Terms for machinery are used for people, and machines are
referred to as people. What we see here is the mechanisation of the body and
60
eXistenZ defines both the human, and the machine which portrays the
ultimate union of the two in the most natural way possible. And this
picture of the late 20th century. The same love-hate relationship can be
traced in the films portrayal of the city. City is the cage, city is where we
Morpheus. The Oracle’s house with a cosy countryside ambience and her
homemade cookies are in contrast with all the city imagery, but it’s only out
there to add a dash of nostalgia in this liquid digital & steel cocktail, as it is
the case with the analogue machines and antique looking telephones.
eXistenZ always have the power to “pause” the game whenever they want
to. On the contrary the guerrillas in The Matrix don’t have the power to
And what’s even worse, it is not easy for them to get out of it because they
are hunted down by the agents, sentient programs inside The Matrix.
Besides, if you are killed in The Matrix, you die in real life too and vice
versa. Whereas in eXistenZ, the gamers automatically “pop right out of the
61
view of the same issue is safe and comfortable. However in eXistenZ the
game, you never know if you’re still in another game or not. At this point
notions like safety and comfort become irrelevant. The game expands itself
over time and space, and becomes a new kind of hyperreal existence that
The first words we hear in eXistenZ are spoken by the seminar leader
experience now, whatever it is, has its own rules, its own frames of
What they are talking about is the most advanced form of virtual
created by this game system is not at all different than the reality we’re
living in. They talk about such advanced technology, but they write its name
the contrary we see that technology has merged into daily life and has
become an organic part of it. Real life(2) and virtual reality(2) are so alike
and close to each other that it creates an uncanny feeling. This situation of
course is in total contrast with the futuristic imagery and ambience of The
Matrix. In The Matrix, the humans “grown” in “endless fields” are attached
to the system with cables. Because of that, the people who are freed from
The Matrix have “plugs” all over their body. They also have a kind of
electrical socket at the back of their head, which enables them to get inside
The Matrix whenever a huge needle like metal device is inserted. Therefore
cords” resemble umbilical cords, the pods look like human organs.
At one point Ted(2) asks Allegra(2) how come bioports don’t get infected
although they open right into your body. Allegra(2) tells him not to be
ludicrous, then opens her mouth and takes out her tongue. She means that a
bioport which is “shot into your spine after it is popped up with a little
hydrogun” is as natural as all the other orifices in your body. Even the
weapons are made of flesh and bone and they fire human teeth. In this way
it is also possible for them to get past metal and synthetic detectors. The
natural and in tune with human life that it’s depicted as organic. However,
64
Eyes closed, they all sit together, their hands slowly playing with the nipples
part of life and literally a part of the body. These new genitals are somewhat
odd, but you begin to take pleasure through them at once. This can be
than what we see in all offices, banks etc. everday; people looking at plastic
After Ted(2) gets a bioport for the first time, Allegra(2) lubricates
the hole with a machine oil spray as if it’s an asshole. She tells him that new
ports are a bit tight and she doesn’t want to hurt him. Allegra(2) calls Ted(2)
with his surname all the time and Ted(2) asks her if she could call him just
Ted? She answers “Maybe afterwards.” That is to say, after they play the
game together. The game is an act of intimacy people share, lying or sitting
is reluctant. Aroused with anger Allegra(2) wraps the umbi-cord around her
sexual reference that we see in here. Allegra(2) has sexual authority over
Ted and she makes use of it frequently. At one point she seduces Ted(2) by
pulling his inserted umbi-cord between her toes. Sometimes she’s motherly,
Afterwards Allegra licks the end of the umbi-cord, inserts it in Ted(2), turns
it slightly, they lie on the bed together and the game begins.
Further inside the game they use micropods to enter another game.
These micropods are so small they don’t know what to do with them. The
bioports in the game are also different. Much more weird, more much
uncanny, and all the more erotic. Allegra(2) applies the pod to Ted(2) and
the little animal disappears inside her back. After Ted(2) does Allegra(2),
his game character is sexually aroused which causes him to put his tongue in
66
Allegra’s(2) bioport and lick it. This time we see that the bioport literally
we see in here. The Matrix has a techno-phobic tone indeed and its overall
that makes it interesting for the average viewer is the technology portrayed
in the film. The bugging device that liquefies and turns into a steel bug, the
extremes that virtual reality can go, humans’ efficiency and control over
virtual reality, the ultra technological machinery are gadgets used as hooks
is power and who ever has that is “cool”. Actually the technology portrayed
67
previous chapters I have mentioned that Morpheus almost sells The Matrix
to Neo as if it’s the coolest thing of the century. In the same fashion,
what you buy; the product or the life-style. Likewise, ultra-technology and
fetishistic in action and imagery. Andreas Huyssen points that Fritz Lang’s
between phobia and fetishism, however, we do not see any trace of an effort
fetishistic too, but this techno-fetishism is totally different than the power
into life; it has merged into the human body along with the mind. The
too. That is to say, it is fascinating, but it can bring one to the edge, and you
never know which side you will fall into. Therefore eXistenZ displays an
68
CHAPTER SEVE
and doubts, Neo thinks that the world he’s been living is real. When he is
arrested by the agents, they take him into a room full of screens to
interrogate him. First they try to negotiate and talk him into switching sides.
Neo is self-confident and does not hesitate to give them “the finger”. He
asks his “phone call”, the unquestionable right of every American citizen.
Until here everything is solid. But Neo’s behavior begins to get on Agent
Smith’s digital nerves, thus he decides to teach him a lesson about what he’s
messing with; “Tell me Mr. Anderson, what good is a phone call if you’re
something impossible, it can’t be real. But he cannot open his mouth to cry
out. A second later he witnesses a most obnoxious sight taking place in his
own body.
very eyes is inserted in his body through his belly button. This is the
moment where he is faced with the fact that all he has experienced until then
is irrelevant and invalid. His first and strongest encounter with the fact that
reality is not what he has thought to be, takes place in his own body. The
fortress of our own reality. Mouse in The Matrix says that “to deny our own
impulses, (which relates to the body) is to deny the very thing that makes us
human.” But when you enter virtual reality, you leave your body behind.
if we keep in mind the words of Scott Bukatman about the notion of body in
the Cronenberg film. Bukatman points that “the rabid physicality of the
‘monsters from the id’ are rendered physical, and figures of desire roam the
landscape. One significant difference is that the landscape is now the body
of the protagonist, and the confusions, tumours, lesions and the new
body (becomes) the over determined metaphorical site for the expression of
penetrated. Surgically… you know what I mean. (…) It’s too freaky, makes
my skin crawl.” Ted(2) has never played any virtual reality games because
he didn’t have a bioport. His fear of getting a bioport fitted is the sign of his
fear of virtual reality. Ted also fears that such penetration will alter his
sexuality and transform him into a woman. It is the fear of losing virginity, a
fear of rape. eXistenZ breaks down the barriers between sexual roles as well
roles getting in close proximity along with reality and illusion are matters of
virginity. Ted fears them both. Through this little hole that opens right into
your body, you attach yourself to virtual reality with an umbi-cord. As you
enter virtual reality, you are penetrated by virtual reality and technology as
well. Ted’s(2) fear of getting a bioport has another reason again related to
the body, the chance of getting a permanent spinal paralysis during the
process of getting a bioport. The spinal paralysis state is not much different
than the position of the people in virtual reality. Their bodies lie or sit
electronic devices and they lie down in a state of inertia. It’s “travelling
without moving.”ix There’s no place for the actual body in virtual space, it is
eXistenZ, whereas the guerrillas in The Matrix are not interested in bodily
metaphor of the human body. Morpheus tells Neo that “human body
72
generates more bio-electricity than a 120 volt battery and over 25,000
BTU’s of body heat.” He explains Neo that the machines have changed
human beings into a power source, and shows him a 1.5 volt Duracell
battery. Then we understand why Switch used to call Neo a “copper top”. A
how the pods work. “eXistenZ gamepod is basically an animal Mr. Pikul.”
Ted(2) naively asks “Where do the batteries go?” Vinokur(3) thinks he’s
joking but Allegra(2) is there to answer. “It ports into you. You’re the
power source. Your body, your metabolism, your energy. You get tired, run
down, it won’t work properly.” This moment of revelation is far from being
voluntarily share their bodies and energy with the meta-flesh machines. That
is because they are crippled and paralysed by the system. Ted’s(2) fear of
spinal paralysis has already come true but he doesn’t know that. People play
the virtual reality games in order to experience what they cannot in real life.
They voluntarily leave their body behind and float in a realm free of matter.
disappears behind his back Ted(4) panics. “It’s in my spine? It’s working its
way around my spinal chord?” To help him calm down Allegra(3) reminds
him that it is just a game and not real. His body is safely lying on a bed in
the ski hut. In contrast, the things happening to your body in virtual reality
affect your actual body in The Matrix. At one point during his training, Neo
73
he is out of the program and back in real life he notices that his mouth is
tells him that his mind makes it real. Neo asks him if you die in real life
when you are killed the Matrix. Morpheus tells him that the body cannot
live without the mind. That is to say whatever the mind may do in virtual
reality, our body is our connection to reality. The body is in contrast with
the slippery, vague position of the mind in virtual reality. The body is
they are aroused and they start kissing. But their arousal is nothing more
sequence.” This bodily action reminds Ted(3) of his own real body. “Where
are our real bodies? Are they alright? What if they’re hungry, what if there’s
space where there is no physical matter, therefore no “body” is too much for
him. This is where boundaries and definitions disappear and the whole
which the boundaries between the body, mind and technology disappear into
something else. Something we may call again with a Cronenberg term; “The
New Flesh”.
75
CHAPTER EIGHT
THE CAGE
Hotel, where Morpheus tells him about the Matrix. “Let me tell you why
you’re here. You’re here because you know something. What you know you
can’t explain. But you feel it. You’ve felt it your entire life. That there’s
something wrong with the world. You don’t know what it is but it is there,
like a splinter in your mind, driving you mad.” What he is talking about is,
the Matrix. “The Matrix is everywhere. It is all around us, even now in this
very room. You can see it when you look out your window or when you
turn on your television. You can feel it when you go to work, when you go
to church, when you pay your taxes. It is the world that has been pulled over
your eyes to blind you from the truth.” Neo knows how it feels, but he
doesn’t know what it is. “What truth?” Morpheus answers, “That you are a
slave, Neo. Like everyone else you were born into bondage, born into a
prison that you cannot smell or taste or touch. A prison for your mind.”
program in order to explain him the current condition of the world so that he
will understand what exactly the Matrix is. At first Neo cannot believe what
Morpheus’ answer is tricky. “What is real? How do you define real? If you
are talking about what you can feel, what you can smell, what you can taste
and see, then real is simply electrical signals interpreted by your brain.”
77
What he means is that we cannot define real with sensory perception but
Lafayette Hotel, in order to define the Matrix; “a prison that you cannot
smell or taste or touch”. That is to say, we cannot define real with our senses
but we define virtual reality with them. Actually he does not exactly define
“real” but the whole movie is a quest for reality and the only criteria of
count as real. Reality is not defined but it is out there, it is an obscure telos
gas station to have it installed. It turns out that the operator of the station,
Gas, is a gamer and a big fan of Allegra(2) too. He says that Allegra’s(2)
games have changed his life. Before the operation Ted(2) and Gas(2) have a
little talk. Ted(2) asks him what his life was like before it was changed by
cannot understand. “You still operate a gas station don’t you?” Gas says
“Only on the most pathetic level of reality. Geller’s work liberated me.” Just
when he’s about to have the bioport fitted Ted(2) changes his mind and
decides not have it. Without a bioport he cannot enter virtual reality and
play games. Allegra(2) knows that his fear of “being penetrated surgically”
is the sign of his fear of virtual reality along with his sexual insecurity.
“This is it you see. This is the cage of your own making which keeps you
trapped and pacing in the smallest possible space forever. Break out of your
Here we see that the reality fought for in The Matrix is considered as
as “a prison for the mind” whereas in eXistenZ reality itself is “the cage”
instead of virtual reality. The cage is a metaphor used by Max Weber in his
Protestant Ethics and the Spirit of Capitalism. The “iron cage” of Max
Marshall Berman adds that Max Weber did not have much confidence in
It is important that the cage/prison metaphor is used for virtual reality in The
Matrix and for real life in eXistenZ. The Matrix’s approach is not to deny the
prison but to deny the reason behind that. This is not much different than the
ruling class’ argument on why the cage is not a prison. “The Matrix is a
system, Neo. That system is our enemy. But when you’re inside, you look
79
around. What do you see? Business men, teachers, lawyers, carpenters. The
very minds of the people we are trying to save. But until we do, these people
are still a part of that system, and that makes them our enemy.” They seem
to have dedicated themselves to save those people who are assimilated while
worthless and invalid. But they gallivant in the Matrix in isolating mirrored
shades and eye-catching, designer-cut outfit, with guns. “The Matrix” way
to deny the prison is to say that there is something wrong in this world, it is
like a cage but this cannot be real, some evil artificial intelligence must have
comes up there and really wants to ski. Allegra(2) tells him that nobody
actually skis any more. They play a virtual ski game instead. That is why
80
Allegra(2) uses a ski boot as a bag. What’s the use of a ski boot if you don’t
even need to wait for the snow? At the beginning of the film a focus group
is gathered in a rural church. A young boy comes late and Ted(2) who is in
charge, scans him and his belongings. The boy asks him if it’s a weapons
check. Ted(2) tells him that they check people more for recording devices.
“A lot of money invested in these games Noel.” The virtual reality games
are the “hype” in this world. You can get bioports installed at malls. There
are the largest and most powerful ones. These rival companies are fighting
an invisible war. Cortical Systematics try to kill Allegra(2) and steal her
and take advantage of the Realist Underground who believe these games to
be the menace of the century. Agents, double agents and moles abound. You
cannot trust anyone so Allegra(2) doesn’t ever let Ted(2) or Kiri Vinokur(2)
contact Antenna. The relationship between all these forces is all too
complicated and not very clear. But the reason is crystal clear and obviously
green.
unconsciously attached to virtual reality. But the reasons behind that expose
two drastically different points of view. In The Matrix, people are plugged
into machines and they live in virtual reality but they’re unconscious of their
situation. When you look at eXistenZ, people again spend most of their time
chapters, the virtual reality games in eXistenZ are safety valves of the
81
system. Gas(2) can keep on operating the gas station because he satisfies
company gets its way; he keeps on playing, the game company gets its way,
so he doesn’t stand up and pause the biggest game, the system itself. There
is a huge web of capital and power behind all this technology and the
capitalist system is the obvious reason why the world has come to this.
However, the reason for a similar situation in The Matrix, are the evil
machines.
The tragic flaw of human kind was to play god and therefore create
evil, abstracts the idea and puts all relevant and logical reasons out of focus.
the cage which is the capitalist system. Such positioning deviates the subject
expression in The Matrix presents a false criticism of the system. The war of
the attractive and chic heroes, for an obscure telos has no relation to our life.
people living in a capitalist system, and the power dynamics behind that is
all there for us to see. eXistenZ is not a didactic “answer” like The Matrix .
The question in The Matrix is the reason behind the uneasiness caused by
urban lifestyle.
According to the film the reason is the evil machines, and the nerve
of human kind to play god. But we don’t have to worry, because it’s not
real. On the other hand, eXistenZ is a dystopia where we find all we are
question is there only if you choose to ask yourself. A question that forces
simulations.
CHAPTER IE
THE OTHER SIDE OF THE GLASS
According to the cave metaphor, people live inside a cave whose wide
The people who are born and raised in the cave are chained in such a
way that they cannot move or turn around. They can only look forward. The
only light source in the place is far above and behind them. These people do
not see any actual objects, but they see their shadows reflected on the inner
wall of the cave. Their reality is based on the shadows itself. If one of them
84
is freed and let outside, at first he will not be able to see anything as his eyes
aren’t used to the light outside.ix When the freed person gets used to the
light outside he will be able to see the objects as they really are. At that
point if somebody comes up to him and tells that all he had seen until then is
an illusion, he would believe that the shadows he had seen all his life to be
more real. Then he would get used to the reality outside. After a period of
time, if he was taken back to the cave, all the other people inside the cave
would think that he had ruined his eyesight when he was outside, and they
would make fun of him. Plato tells Glaucon, if he tried to tell them that the
shadows were not real, and tried to take them out of the cave, they would
drastic. The transitions full of digital visuals and annoying digital sound
the transitions in eXistenZ are so very smooth and even pleasant. The first
impressed by the smooth transition. “That was beautiful. I feel just like me.
Is that kind of transition normal? That kinda smooth interlacing from place
to place?”
in two films are drastically different. In The Matrix, virtual reality is exactly
like the world as it is in the year 1999. And real one is a deserted world with
a scorched sun. Ironically enough, the film takes place in another space
between the two. Technology itself becomes a space in The Matrix in which
the guerillas dwell. The difference between the real and the virtual is not so
clear in eXistenZ. The game realities have the same elements and objects
such as jobs, game-pods etc. The images and themes we come across
repeatedly in all the levels tend to get more weird as the rabbit hole goes
86
deeper. The bio-ports and pods in level one are made of plastic. They
become organic in level two; they are “made of fertilized amphibian eggs
filled with synthetic DNA”. In level three, there are micropods that
disappear in the body and the bio-ports are kind of like a Martian organelle,
something even hard to imagine. When we come to the fourth level, it all
gets too far. “Can you believe the game version of your pod? It’s sick, but
grotesque.” The objects and themes getting even more weird by the levels
irregular and without a certain pattern. In the first scene at the church which
takes place in the second level of reality, we come across a gun made of
flesh and bone. In the fourth level Ted(4) puts together the parts of his meal
and constitutes the same gun. After he kills the Chinese waiter, a white dog
takes the gun away. When they go back to the third level, Hugo(3) hands
them the gun and tells that Darcy Nader’s(3) dog has brought it. Further in
the film, Allegra and Ted are lost in the levels of reality and so are we. This
time Kiri Vinokur has the gun and he tells his dog has brought this. By the
end of the film we understand that all this had been a game all along the
way. This is were we learn that the dog belongs to Ted(1), in whose fur
all images and themes get folded one over another. The result is an endless
here. I don’t know what’s going on. We’re both stumbling around in this
unformed world, whose logic and objectives are largely unknown, seemingy
not gonna be easy to market. She says that it’s a game everybody’s already
When Neo goes back in the Matrix for the first time, he is certainly
convinced that it is virtual and not real. He goes through places he used to
going back in reality results in a trauma for Ted. His real life feels
completely unreal. “It’s worse than that. I’m not sure. I-I’m not sure here
Ted is like a virgin before having his bio-port fitted. Virtual reality is
Jean Baudrillard this is “the Perfect Crime”; and “the murder of the real” is
one that is more tragic than Nietzsche proclaiming the death of god.
Brian Massumi brings it up that there must be another choice than being a
“naive realist” or being a “sponge”. He adds that Gilles Deleuze and Felix
Once you get out of the cave, and you see the objects as they really
are, things will never be the same even if you get back in the cave. Your
perception of reality will be changed, you will live the rest of your life in a
through experience is something that tends to increase only. The red pill in
The Matrix has the same characteristic. Morpheus offers two choices to
Neo;
Accordingly, once you get out of the cave, even if you go back in the
Matrix you will still know that there’s another reality out there. Cypher’s
virtual reality conciously as Neo does is that step out of the cave. It is the
Matrix, it is beyond The Matrix. It pulls down all the oppositions and
creates a whole new paradigm where there are no rules. This is an insecure,
rules. Such slippery ground is too much for them. And when we look at The
Matrix, the rules themselves are not important; what matters is who puts and
keeps them.
COCLUSIO
matter how far out of our reality they may be, they all tell us a very familiar
story. They all tell us about our world, our times and ourselves. I chose to
study The Matrix and eXistenZ in order to take a look at our own lives, in
the light of these films’ opposing points of view. I explored the socio-
living in. I believe that the study of virtual reality and technology can be a
to virtual reality and consider the same matter in opposing points of view.
believe that the study of the multi faceted aspects of our highly
“technologized” life, can help us understand why we have come to this state
of hyperreality, and also help us explain the oddities in our lives which are
films. The dissatisfaction caused by the endless cycle of work, home and
attractive and even fascinating throughout the film. It is ironic that The
Matrix seems to resist its own subject matter; hyperreality and technology.
notions such as time, identity and belief. But in eXistenZ we see that all
these notions are mutating and transforming into their own projections in a
components like eXistenZ does, rather than the insistent position of denial
and humanity has already made this choice. At this point, ethics must be the
crucial question that will determine the course of the new (dis)order. We’re
Virtual reality and the so called reality are the equally real and equally
fantastic lands stretching on the two sides of these mirrors. But the mirror
and degenerate. “Things fall apart, the center cannot hold, Mere anarchy is
loosed upon the world”ix But it is not a time for mourning. Neither it calls
can’t be avoided”.ix
ix
Friedrich Nietzsche
93
EPILOGUE
I’m Sona Ertekin. I believe that I exist in this very moment, in this
things happen everyday. But you get used to it. The world is getting stranger
everyday; well, that’s ok because you cannot change one thing, and that is
change. But still there’s something wrong. I’ve always had this feeling that
there’s something wrong with this world but I don’t know what it is. Maybe
it’s because it feels quite, unreal. I turn on the tv, and what I see does not
seem to be real. After all the war films I have seen, watching the wars “live”
feels completely unreal. The news on the paper, the smiling faces on ads,
the fact that people go to work everyday and spend hours in front of their
ravishing pleasure while watching them, yet I could not even sleep in the
fearful afterhours. I used to tell myself those creatures, killers and spacemen
are not real. They are impersonated by actors in studios. And even better
94
was the idea that those actors and studios were actually in America, which is
far enough. For sure I used to know that those creatures were not real, they
the reality that surrounds us… is not so real. The constantly changing world
proof of reality. Because reality is not a singular whole any more. It is rather
an endless realm of multiple layers, all existing both on their own and in
other side. As time passed by, I discovered that the more I were involved in
looking the same, in their own dream way. They began to get more
dreamt. In this way I could direct my own dreams and do whatever I wanted
diary came to reflect to lives; one spent in ordinary reality, and one in
dreams. Then I began to question who is to say that dreams are not real.
socialize without getting out of their dark rooms. I watch the newscast on
TV and I don’t have a clue what’s going on around the world. Whatever I
do, I help someone get more rich and make someone get even more poor.
In an earlier scene in eXistenZ, Ted kills the Chinese waiter and all
the “game characters” in the restaurant stand still. Ted tells them it’s just a
misunderstanding over the check. By the end of eXistenZ, Ted and Allegra
gamers” around them stand still. After all the “twists and turns” they are lost
within multiple realities and cannot be sure if they’re still in a game or not.
And after all the murders they have witnessed or commited inside the
games, they are nullified, they cannot react or respond. Nothing seems to be
real. The last words in the film are significant. It is a question asked by a
gamer; “Hey, tell me the truth, are we still in the game?” Ironically,
all is real. All sorts of dreams and nightmares flood in through the liquid
WORKS CITED
2001: A Space Odyssey. Dir. Stanley Kubrick. Perf. Keir Dullea, Gary
Publications, 1993
Press, 2000
Berman, Marshall; All That Is Solid Melts Into Air: The Experience of
Publishers, 1993.
http://enculturation.gmu.edu/2_1/blakesley/
1946
http://rabbit.eng.miami.edu/text/carroll/lookingglass
London: 1997
http://www.film-philosophy.com/vol4-2000/n3wright
http://members.tripod.com/~duPrie/essays/matrixhtm
eXistenZ. Dir. David Cronenberg. With Jennifer Jason Leigh, Jude Law, Ian
Fight Club. Dir. David Fincher. Perf. Edward Norton, Brad Pitt and Helena
http://www.marxists.org/archive/lafargue/works/lazy/
http://www.findarticles.com/cf_0/m0412/4_28/68741268/p1/article.h
tml
http://www.anu.edu.au/HRC/first_and_last/works/realer.htm
The Matrix. Dir. Andy Wachowski and Larry Wachowski. Perf. Keanu
Miller, Edward D.; “The Matrix and the Medium’s Message.” Social Policy
Online Edition
http://www.socialpolicy.org/recent_issues/SU00/nedmiller.html
Warner Bros,1999.
Wells, HG; A Short History of the World London: Penguin Books, 1962
Wright, Richard; “The Matrix Rules” Film Philosophy
http://www.film-philosophy.com/vol4-2000/n3wright
100
APPEDIX I
In the future, the world is under the rule of machines with artificial
intelligence. Zion is the only human city left over the world. During the war
between man and the machines, human beings have scorched the sun in
order to deprive the machines of solar energy. Finding out they can use the
simulated world called “The Matrix” to pacify their new energy source. In
this way, human beings live with the illusion that they live in 1999, that is
before the artificial intelligence took over. Actually they are “grown” in
artificial wombs in power plantations, plugged into the machines and fed the
Neo is ready to fight along with the people of Zion. Morpheus takes Neo to
see the oracle inside The Matrix. The oracle tells Neo that he is not “the
one”, but at a certain point of his life, he will have to choose between his
life and Morpheus’. One of the members of the crew, Cypher betrays the
guerrilla force and helps the agents track them down in The Matrix. The
101
agents corner the guerrillas in an old hotel. Morpheus gives himself in, in
order to save Neo and the others. Meanwhile, Cypher is on board the
kill Neo, he is killed by Tank, another guerilla. In this way, Neo and Trinity
get out of The Matrix and return onboard the ship. Back in The Matrix, the
agents interrogate Morpheus in order to break him down and learn the code
that will enable them to enter Zion. It is time for Neo to decide between his
Matrix to save Morpheus. Together they fight the agents and save him.
Trinity get out of The Matrix. As Neo is just about to get out, he is
killed during the fight but he does not die; he is resurrected as a super-
human, capable of doing everything the machines can do, and even more. At
that moment he discovers that he really is “the one”. Both Zion and
Nebuchadnezzar are saved for the time being but the war of human beings
APPEDIX II
focus group in a rural church for the product testing of her latest
attacks and shoots Allegra with a weird organic gun shooting human teeth.
She runs away with a marketing trainee called Ted. She mistakenly thinks
Ted is her bodyguard. They take refuge in a motel. They are being chased
eXistenZ has been damaged during the attack. In order to understand if the
whole in the spine that enables the gamers to plug into the game-pod and
enter virtual reality. Allegra talks him into getting one and they go to a local
country gas station to get an illegal bioport installment. They play a game at
the gas station immediately after the installation. However, they find out
that the operator of the station, Gas, has installed a flawed port into Ted,
which damages Allegra’s game/system along with the pod. It turns out that
Gas has done this on purpose, to get the bonus for killing Allegra and
destroying her game/system. Gas attacks Allegra and gets killed by Ted.
After that, Ted and Allegra take refuge in a ski hut which in fact is the
103
new port into Ted and also operates the damaged pod. Allegra and Ted play
In this game Ted and Allegra are in a game shop called Darcy
Nader’s Game Emporium. Darcy Nader tells them to port into some micro-
pods to download their new identites. They port and begin a new game
Inside this game within a game, Ted and Allegra are members of the
meet Yevgeny Nourish who they think is their contact at the factory.
Following his instructions, Ted kills a waiter in the Chinese restaurant. After
the incident they get out of this game and get back to the game at Darcy
At the game shop, Hugo Carlaw tells them that they have killed their
actual contact at the factory, The Chinese waiter. They learn that Yevgeny
game.
Back in the farm, Allegra decides to port into a diseased pod and
spread the illness to all the other pods to destroy them. After the porting she
turns bad. Ted tries to unport her but he can’t. Desperately he cuts her free
They instantly get out of the game and find themselves in the ski hut.
One of the game characters, Hugo Carlaw enters the room with a rifle in his
hand, and orders them to get out. They are confused and they cannot
104
sure if they are still inside a game. Outside the hut, Kiri Vinokur comes and
tells Allegra that he has been working for the rival game company for some
time and admits that he has copied eXistenZ during the operation. Allegra
kills Kiri Vinokur. It turns out that Ted was a realist who has dedicated
himself to kill Allegra but she attacks first and kills Ted.
The scenery slowly turns into the sight of the church and we understand
that all that we have seen was already a game. In reality Yevgeny
Nourish is a star game designer whereas Ted and Allegra are a couple
among the test group. However it turns out that they are in fact Realists
determined to kill Yevgeny Nourish. They kill Yevgeny Nourish and as
they are about to leave, one of the gamers asks: “Hey, tell me the truth,
are we still in the game?”
105
APPEDIX III
constantly getting in and out of games within games. Their characters and
attributes also differ according to the level of reality. The table below
names of the characters throughout this work indicate the reality level that
Reality
Level Scene/Site Game Characters
1 • The last church • Outside all games • Ted and Allegra are a
scene Realist couple in a
product testing group.
• Yevgeny Nourish is a
star game designer
2 • The first church • A game played by • Allegra is a star game
scene. characters in level 1. designer and Ted is a
• The car marketing trainee.
• The gas station
• The ski hut
3 • Darcy Nader’s • The game Ted and • Ted and Allegra are
Game Emporium Allegra play at the ski members of the
hut. Realist Underground
but they are not
aware of this.
4 • The trout farm • The micro-pod game • Ted and Allegra are
• The Chinese played at Darcy members of the
restaurant Nader’s Game Realist Underground
Emporium disguised as workers
in the Trout Farm
• Yevgeny Nourish is a
double-agent.