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I really dislike Kawaii Future Bass or whatever this genre is called so I made it sound shitty with a bunch of random samples.

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Die meisten Menschen sind im Grundverhältnis zu sich selbst Erzähler. Sie lieben nicht die Lyrik, oder nur für Augenblicke, und wenn in den Faden des Lebens auch ein wenig “weil” und “damit” hineingeknüpft wird, so verabscheuen sie doch alle Besinnung, die darüber hinausgreift: sie lieben das ordentliche Nacheinander von Tatsachen, weil es einer Notwendigkeit gleichsieht, und fühlen sich durch den Eindruck, daß ihr Leben einen “Lauf” habe, irgendwie im Chaos geborgen.

Robert Musil - Der Mann ohne Eigenschaften

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Review: "Backstory" by Joschka Laukeninks

https://vimeo.com/245687147

The short film "Backstory" by Joschka Laukeninks shows the life of ana anonymous protagonist. We follow him from his first memories, watching him grow up, go through his parten's divorce, undergo adolescence, fall in love, build a career, start a family, lose his wife and child in an accident, remarry, get a divorce, grow old and eventually die. The film employs a second-person narrator and tells the story in a rather abstract manner turning the protagonist into a kind of every-man and maximizing the viewers opportunities to identify with the story. It is this generic way of storytelling that makes the film so interesting as it comes surprisingly close to - as will be shown in the following paragraphs - a kind of master-narrative of life in contemporary (late-capitalist or post-modern) society.

The film touches upon a number of archetypal experiences that most human beings come across during their lifetime: growing up, loosening the bond with one's parents, first sexual experiences, break-ups, friendships, falling in love, becoming a parent, losing loved ones, aging and dying. These are the great themes of human existence that most people can relate to and feel touched by. However, several details of the story reflect aspects characteristic for our day and age. This text will explore these aspects to show how they mirror the contemporary construction of identity which is - as this text argues - in crisis.

A prototypical protagonist

As part of the aforementioned abstraction, the protagonist is shown in little detail. For example his face isn't shown throughout most of the film and we learn little that might identify him and set him apart from the viewer like his place of birth or his personal interests and opinions. However, the protagonist is clearly shown to be male, white, relatively wealthy, heterosexual, able-bodied etc. So while the film is clearly designed to make as many people as possible relate to it, a whole list of social groups is excluded from identifying with the protagonist, namely women, poor people, members of the LGBTQUIA-community, people with disabilities, people who are not neurotypical, people who are not white and people who have migrated. The exclusion of these identities is not coincidental and draws a clear image of what is thought to be the standard protagonist of our time. Sadly, while history provides us with a great repertoire of stories told from the perspective of rich, heterosexual white men, the film is another missed opportunity to give a stage to the voices that are traditionally overheard. Instead, it reifies yet again a notion of normalcy rendering the aforementioned alternatives as mere deviations.

The loss of the nuclear family

The first incident characterizing the problems of our time is when the protagonist is no longer able to live up to the stereotype of the "happy childhood" because of his parent's divorce. This is made explicit by the narrator who mentions that on his 6th birthday, everything is still as it's supposed to be, right before the separation. This notion of a normal/happy family is one aspect of the story that reflects the problems of contemporary society since the nuclear family has only existed as the standard script when it comes to how people plan on spending their lives. The specificity to a certain sociohistorical setting is however not made apparent in the film. Still, it is crucial to understanding the impact the divorce has on the protagonist. The reduction of people's social framework of reference to the nuclear family - even though it is mostly ahistorically staged as the universal standard - is a relatively new phenomenon and has left people vulnerable because of the overall scarcity of other significant relationships. This vulnerability is reflected in the trauma of the breakup of the father-mother-child trinity that rising divorce-rates have brought about. The overwhelming significance of this constellation is partly due to the meaning of romantic love in the late-capitalist society which will be addressed later on in the text.

Alienated labour

The protagonist's career is mentioned several times throughout the film but always in a completely unenthusiastic manner. The viewer never learns what it is that the protagonist does professionally, just that it is a relatively well paying office job. This is symptomatic if the phenomenon of alienated labour because it suggests that work doesn't mean anything to the protagonist accept something that is necessary in order to build a successful life and/or make a living. The mentioning of work is usually associated with expressions of meaninglessness, emptiness and routine. Apparently, the protagonist has entirely given up any hope to invest his manpower in something that he finds meaningful or fulfilling or that serves a purpose other than earning money and achieving success on a professional level.

Love at first sight

When the protagonist meets his new wife, the two of them are shown in the middle of a raging party quietly staring at each other before the first words even have been exchanged. The narrator immediately suggests that this is "her" (alluding to the trope of "love at first sight" or "the one true love"). There is no doubt, no anxiety, no reconciliation of differences, none of it. This relationship goes on to become the main point of crystallization that provides meaning for the protagonist's existence. While prior, less committed sexual encounters have left him with feelings of frustration and emptiness, his marriage provides him with a feeling of purpose and direction. This is highly representatives for contemporary self-narratives. With the social frame of reference reduced to a minimum, friendships and relationships becoming more and more short-lived, family-bonds loosening, work-relationships progressively growing more instrumental and overall lifestyles becoming increasingly anonymous, it is left to bilateral romantic love to provide people with all the recognition as valuable, unique human beings that they need.

The death of his wife and child is the dramatic high-point of the film and fully reveals the meaning of romantic love for the life of the protagonist, as it is said that after their loss he is alone again. Throughout the rest of the story he never seems to fully recover. The emotionally distant way in which his second marriage is described is particularly noteworthy. The viewer never learns about why this later relationship does not fill the whole that the traumatic event has left behind - possibly it is merely because he is so deeply wounded that he finds himself unable to open up again - but seen in the context of the entire story that this is most likely meant to entertain the trope of the "one true love". The meaninglessness of the protagonists later life implies that his role as a partner is more integral to his identity and construction of meaning than his role as a son, friend, professional and even as a father. Especially the later is interesting because the film dedicates surprisingly little time to portray his relationship with his child (there is definitely a gender-dimension here to be explored). Furthermore, possible alternative sources of meaning such as standing up for one's convictions, working for a greater good, pursuing intellectual or artistic goals etc. are never alluded to in the movie so that, when his wife dies, the protagonist is left with an empty existence and nothing to fall back on. This notion is reinforced in the films final moments when the protagonist's reminiscence over the life he has lived closes in to focus on his wife and the way she "always looked at him". In fact, she also spent her final moments - lying on the pavement bleeding all over - turning to him and their relationship as a primary source of reference for her existence instead of screaming in agony, trying to see whether her child was still alive or just panicking. Their eyes meeting across the devastating sight of the accident is the emotional money-shot of the story.

Absence of Spirituality

The protagonists inability to see himself as part of something bigger and drawing a sense of purpose from his commitment to his convictions, political or artistic work etc. is yet again shown in the very end when the narrator mentions that the protagonist has only a few more seconds before he is gone and than the film cuts to a black screen. There's no tacky gate of heaven, no light in the end of a tunnel, nothing. This reflects the current zeitgeist, characterized by the decreasing meaning of spirituality and religiosity. People's way of imagining their existence is marked by the very absence of any location of one's own existence within a greater religious framework.

Conclusion - the lack of meaning in postmodern society

Illustrated by the various issues discussed in this text, what becomes apparent is the protagonist's overall failure to construct meaning in his life - or to be precis, find a way to narrate his life in a way that provides meaning. While the film arguably comes surprisingly close to becoming an archetypal master-narrative reflecting the contemporary mainstream-discourse on human existence, this crisis can be seen as symptomatic for our day and age. Namely it illustrates critical characteristics of self-narration in a post-modern society such as individualism (the rejection of seeing one's existence within a greater context), lack of direction (no overarching idea on how to set up one's life after the great ideologies have lost their credibility, be it in the realm of politics, religion or tradition), scepticism about one's own agency in life and reliance on ready-made fragments of narration. All these combined show that it has become close to impossible to construct a sense of meaning and purpose in life for the protagonist as well as the audience. Taking into account how the film has been celebrated as a brilliant piece of art, a great piece of wisdom and deeply touching, it is surprising that it does hardly anything but reconstruct a status quo while reproducing a narrative that has nothing left to offer.

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Es ist nicht das “gute Recht” einer jeden Person in den Industrieländern, es sich in den gegebenen Verhältnissen bequem zu machen, unpolitisch zu sein und sich selbst einen guten Lebensstandard zu erarbeiten - denn die eigene Arbeit reicht für den guten Lebensstandard nicht aus. Man muss sich auch in einer politisch-ökonomischen position befinden, in der man die ebenso hart arbeitenden Menschen anderswo übervorteilen kann. Man muss auch die Ressourcen späterer Generationen verheizen und die schleichende Verschärfung sozialer Ungerechtigkeit in Kauf nehmen. Obwohl rechtlich verbürgt, ist es kein “gutes Recht” sonder ethisch unhaltbar nur für sich zu leben, weil es einem nicht gelingt, zu Leben ohne das Leben anderer zu berühren und diese Berührung muss mit Bedacht geschehen. Die Macht, die wir durch unseren Wohlstand haben, muss zu Rechenschaft gezogen werden können. Es ist ein Gewaltakt, die unpolitische Person mit solchen Gedanken zu konfrontieren, ihre Träume und Wünsche in Frage zu stellen - aber es bleibt an Brutalität weit hinter der Gewalt zurück, die sich unter der schimmernden Oberfläche unseres Alltags abspielt.

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Das System hat viele gesichter. Es lebt in jedem von uns und nach belieben verbirgt es sich in den augen derer, die wir lieben und bedient sich unserer intimsten geheimnisse um sich zu schützen, um unser aufbegehren zu brechen. In den zeiten in denen die macht uns bis ins innerste durchdrungen hat, muss der widerstand vom grunde unserer seele ausgehen, müssen wir mit weit offenen herzen kämpfen.

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There's a beauty in you that you don't know but I'm noticing. I feel like I stole a secret that makes me the richest person alive.

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By the way her body looked I could tell that she had been cultivating it, that she would have used a hammer and a chisel in order to craft it in her own image and in that lay her way of neglecting her body - in a hopeless try to transcend the physical basis of her existence which would always be flawed and vulnerable.

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Just like our body is the physical manifestation of our mind, society is the materialisation of ideology. Any possible take on any given issue always gravitates around our desires and our habits of interpreting desires. We can never hope to put a beacon beyond the shores or this raging ocean of desire in order to find orientation. Instead, we have to continuously embrace the chaotic struggle of opposed desires, of contradictory ideologies. Any type of neutrality is actually partial towards a particular ideology (or discursive position) and only appears neutral as long as we cannot look past it’s fassade of objectivity. The idea of objectivity has actually evolved into a potent mechanism of self defense for the existing order since any kind of open ideological partiality is perceived as a dangerous deviation from an undefinable ideal of objective and neutral rationality. The idea of a neutral objectivity is a means of peace keeping in a time when the best we can hope for is all out intellectual and ideological warfare.

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Wenn ich mich in anderen erkenne, lernt meine Seele, wie die Luft zu sein, die es versteht, auch im Wind noch als sie selbst fortzubestehen.

Eduardo galeano - el Libro de lso Abrazos

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Wie haben sie dich, Baum, verschnitten Wie stehst du fremd und sonderbar! Wie hast du hundertmal gelitten, Bis nichts in dir als Trotz und Wille war! Ich bin wie du, mit dem verschnittnen, Gequälten Leben brach ich nicht Und tauche täglich aus durchlittnen Roheiten neu die Stirn ins Licht. Was in mir weich und zart gewesen, Hat mir die Welt zu Tod gehöhnt, Doch unzerstörbar ist mein Wesen, Ich bin zufrieden, bin versöhnt, Geduldig neue Blätter treib ich Aus Ästen hundertmal zerspellt, Und allem Weh zu Trotze bleib ich Verliebt in die verrückte Welt.

Hermann Hesse - Gestutzte Eiche

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Ich schwebe vor Neugier, begierig zu wissen, zu leiden Schwebend zwischen meinen Ängsten Sklave meiner Auren Herr meiner Asche

Mario Benedetti - La vida ese parentesis

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[…]enn wir die Lüge einmal verlassen, die wie eine blanke Oberfläche glänzt, und diese Welt nicht bloß als Spiegel unseres Wunsches sehen, wenn wir es wissen wollen, wer wir sind, […] dann hört unser Sturz nicht mehr auf, und es saust dir in den Ohren, dass du nicht mehr weißt, wo Gott wohnt.

Max Frisch - Don Juan

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Ich frage mich, ob mir jemals die Liebe eines anderen Menschen zu Teil geworden ist, ohne dass ich sie mir genommen hätte. Vielleicht die meiner Kinder doch am Ende sind es die Kinder, die am meisten ihren Eltern verpflichtet sind. Schau her, ich glaube nicht an die Geschichten, die uns das Fernsehen erzählt, von Menschen, die sich begegnen und sich ohne jegliche Schwierigkeit lieben, beide frei und offen, keine Zweifel, keine befürchtete Reue. Ich glaube nicht, dass es jemals so ist, nicht einmal zwischen den allerjüngsten Liebenden. Jede Beziehung ist immer eine Verwirrung von Problemen, von Rangeleien und auch von Beleidigungen und Erniedrigungen. Alle Welt versucht den Rest zu zwingen, nicht zu dem, was sie nicht wollen sondern eher zu dem, von dem sie sich nicht sicher sind, ob sie es wollen, denn es gibt kaum Menschen, die wissen, was sie wollen oder von wem sie es wollen. Man kann das nicht mit Bestimmtheit wissen. Würde niemand jemals versuchen jemand anderen zu in die Pflicht zu nehmen, würde die Welt in sich stehen bleiben und für immer in der Schwebe verharren.

Javier Marìaz - Mein Herz so weiß