The meaning of life

I got bored today, quel surpise i hear you chunter, and found myself perusing the shelves containing the family collection of retail dvds, to see whether there were any new ones that I hadn't seen, when I discovered that my dad had bought the Monty Python box set. Shunning other contenders such as the likes of Gone With The Wind, I extracted The Meaning of Life as I couldn't remember whether I'd seen it. This choice I did not regret despite having in fact seen it, the joys of timeless comedy and all that coming to my rescue.

There were many things I enjoyed about the film, many of them the trademarks of the Python crew, the tongue in cheek wit, the sarcasm, the incredibly educated humour for which they are famed, but also the fact that throughout the film, they rather astutely comment on the nature of the audience and the ways in which one could attract them. At the very end of the film, Michael Palin's character the Lady Presenter, comments the following:

"here are some completely gratuitous pictures of penises to annoy the censors and to hopefully spark some sort of controversy, which, it seems, is the only way, these days, to get the jaded, video-sated public off their fucking arses and back in the sodding cinema."

Whilst arguably over cynical and most definitely a sweeping generalisation, one cannot deny the old argument of no smoke without fire, for which a sense of apathy as supposed to surprise seems more appropriate. I would obviously argue that for many people, myself included, this is not the case. I would like to say most people, but there is no denying that with the advent of films such as Mega Shark Vs. Giant Octopus* being but a tame example with many more hugely excessive films coming to mind, one can only assume that increasingly people do not go to the cinema to see something that is a genuine masterpiece of film so much as a cheap thrill or shock. Quel surprise again I hear you call out, Hollywood amongst others has been slowly but surely dumbing down cinema for years in the name of profit, to some extent this may be true but there have also been some classics come out of Tinseltown to charge to its aid.

A scathing attack of the film industry is not in fact where I was headed with this rant, no, in fact my disagreement was with the label for Lady Gaga. I say disagreement, I'm not sure whether I should applaud the calculating nature of those controlling the pop sensation. they have produced what, as Palin helpfully summarised, the public want. Whilst these thoughts seem rather tenuously linked, it was in fact a scene called Find The Fish in the same film that made me think of Gaga. A scene deliberately set up to be obtuse drawing inspiration no doubt from the surrealist movements, which in  a way is the very epitome of a deliberate intense shock to induce a reaction and/or material gain, seemed to coalesce the idea of scandal being linked to sale quite graphically with the similar ideologies of the great Gaga herself. I wonder if you can tell why:

Whilst I cannot personally deny that I am not Lady Gaga's biggest musical fan, or the fact that she has most certainly been manipulated by record labels for maximum effect, I cannot also say that I do not respect her for becoming arguably the largest pop sensation around at the moment - the Madonna of the modern age if you will.

Going back to the film however, despite all of the sketches relating to aspects of life and their amusing take upon them, fish number 5 was correct in is prediction that "Personally, I very much doubt if they're going to say anything about the meaning of life at all." In fact, in the true self mocking style of any of the truly clever and often remarkable comedians that have broached the subject, the closest they ever really get is always closely followed by ridiculous notions.

"That's right. Yeah, I've had a team working on this over the past few weeks, and, uh, what we've come up with can be reduced to two fundamental concepts.

One: people are not wearing enough hats.

Two: matter is energy.  In the universe, there are many energy fields which we cannot normally perceive. Some energies have a spiritual source which act upon a person's soul. However, this soul does not exist ab initio, as orthodox Christianity teaches. It has to be brought into existence by a process of guided self-observation. However, this is rarely achieved, owing to man's uniqueability to be distracted from spiritual matters by everyday trivia."

Whether the answer indeed be a distinct lack of hats, or perhaps even 42 in the case of Douglas Adams, I care not to discuss it because ultimately it is a futile search. Taking advice from Danny in American History X, always end an essay with a quote because somebody else probably said it better before you, "The more I learn, the more I learn how little I know." Socrates might have said it first but it's sentiment has been echoed down by many great men, who would I be to argue? Because judging from this essay I digress too quickly to hold an argument.

*There is now actually a sequel; imaginatively entitled Mega Shark Vs. Crocosaurus...