Reproduction, Robots, and Mothers

1. Reproduction, Robots, and Mothers

2. Simulation/Reproduction in Forbidden Planet • Robby the Robot--a reproduction of life, a mechanical or artificial “human” • But also, Robby is capable of reproducing practically anything, from Alta’s dresses to alcohol for the Cook. • Krel mind machine--example, 3-D image/copy of Alta. Produce/copy anything. • But it produces another kind of technologically reproduced (or simulated) “life”-- a monstrous life: Monster from the Id.

3. Monsters from the Id • From Freud’s division of the Psyche into Ego, Superego, and Id. • Id = Repressed, Unconscious Forces. Morbius describes monster as “some dark, terrible incomprehensible force.” • (Evil) Double of Morbius. • Unconscious “primal urges”? • Inverse/Double of Robby, too. • “Dark,” dangerous side of technology.

4. Technology in Sci-Fi • Telotte: Sci-Fi always attracted to power of technology and simulation, but often casts technology/simulation as dangerous, dystopian. • We have seen: traditional distinction between Utopian and Dystopian views of Technology (and simulation or reproduction) is whether or not it: • Serves Humans, Under Human Control, Rational (but not too rational). • Out of Human Control = Monstrous, Irrational, Destructive. • Here, as in Metropolis: Rational Technology, taken too far, leads to dangerous, out-of-control technology. • As Id-Monster suggests, dangerous technology presented as a return of what was repressed by (over-)rationality.

5. Robby’s Role • Robby is like a servant, or the “ultimate household appliance,” but notice how his position is represented.

6. Robby’s Role • “treats us like a Mother” • “very charming feminine touches” • What role does Robby play in the family? • Mother figure--serves family, makes Alta’s dresses; replaces Mother (cf. Metropolis) • Why?

7. Where’s the Mother? • Woman/Mother linked to Reproduction, but sexual, not technological. • Traditionally, mother serves husband & family; associated with home, domestic life. • Here: Mother missing, removed; a kind of repression of female figure. • Robby performs functions of mother, takes the place of the mother--a copy of? Reproduces things, but not sexually. • So, what happens to female sexuality/reproduction here?

8. Alta

9. Alta • Why does the Animal attack Alta? • Her sexuality, sexual awakening (ability to reproduce?). No longer “a child.” • Her sexuality disturbs: • Animal attacks, • Male crew members fight over her, • Commander Adams is "bothered" by her, • And by her kissing "everybody." • He turns away when he thinks she is naked, and says, "Oh, Murder."

10. Alta • Plus: her Father's relation to Alta. • Monster from the Id responds to his paternal jealousy, idea that he might lose her. She evokes his "primal urges"? Desires of the Id; unconscious desires. • Hint of Oedipal Conflict over her: Father vs. Commander Adams (calls him “son” before he dies). • Alta, named after the planet (Alta seems to be short for Altaira), is also linked to Krel technology and to the Monster that it raises.

11. Dangerous Reproduction • Note: Strange linkage between Technology/Technological Reproduction & Sexuality/Sexual Reproduction here. • Both presented as potentially dangerous, other, alien. • Each has to be brought under control at end, either domesticated (made to serve “Man”) or else destroyed. • Otherness vs. Domestication, out of control vs. under control.

12. Otherness in Sci-Fi • But Otherness in Sci-Fi isn’t just a matter of gender & sexuality. Often also a matter of Race. • Here, Racial Difference seems missing (repressed?). • 1) All White (& English-speaking) cast. • 2) Krel, the alien race, also missing. • 3) Monster from the Id -- Morbius calls it “the Beast, the Mindless Primitive.” Based on Caliban (whose name is anagram of “cannibal”). Plays on racial stereotypes of “primitive peoples” as “beasts,” “savages,” who are irrational, out-of-control. • 4) Ariel = Robby, figure of domestic servant, slave.

13. Monsters, Mothers, & Others

14. The Alien Quadrilogy • Alien, 1979, dir. Ridley Scott • Aliens, 1986, dir. James Cameron • Alien3, 1992, dir. David Fincher • Alien Resurrection, 1997, dir. Jean-Pierre Jeunet

15. The question of what’s Human and what is Alien/Other appears to be very clear cut in Alien series of films. • But actually, the distinction between humans and aliens changes dramatically over the four films of series.

16. That Dangerous Other • In Aliens, aliens presented as opposite of human, as monstrous, horrifying. • Why Horrifying, Monstrous? What makes the aliens seem so terrifying, monstrous, disgusting, etc.? • How are the aliens presented? • In appearance? • Formally? (how are they shot, lighted, etc?)

17. The Other of/in Us • The aliens are presented as entirely inhuman, dangerous to human life, as Other. • But recall Robin Wood’s argument: Otherness is not simply "something external to the culture or to the self, but also . . . what is repressed . . . in the self and projected outward in order to be hated and disowned." • Monster/Alien/Other = Represents qualities within ourselves (our culture) that we find so awful or frightening, we must reject and externalize.

18. The Other / The Abject • What Wood describes as the Other is similar to the concept of the Abject, as described by French theorist Julia Kristeva. • Both Abject/Other must be kept outside (don't let "it" get in) our space, our selves. • Threat of the Other/Abject is always a threat to boundaries or borders: of normality, of the human, of the self. • Social Fears of bodily invasion/penetration (homophobia), infiltration (Red Scare), mixture (xenophobia, fear of racial miscegenation). • Maintain boundaries (ourselves, our "purity") against that which might "infect" or "pollute" us.

19. Abjection • Abjection is, however, more specific idea than the Other. • Refers to what "disgusts" us, what we reject or expel (or try to). • Primarily, abjection refers to the body, or to those aspects of the body that are not seen as part of the "living subject": bodily fluids and wastes, but also dead bodies ("bodies w/o souls"), body parts, flesh, guts, and gore. • Yet, strangely, we’re also fascinated by the abject, a "perverse pleasure." • Obvious relation to horror films.

20. Abjection • In Barbara Creed's argument, three ways that horror films illustrate abjection. • Images of abjection • The border: abjection as "that which crosses or threatens to cross the border" (often between "the clean and proper body" and the "abject body") • Construction of maternal figure/body as abject (because of its relation to sexuality, sexual reproduction). Creed: the monstrous-feminine.

21. Abjection and Gender • How is abjection related to gender identity? • Creed/Kristeva: image of woman's body, because of maternal (reproductive/sexual) functions, acknowledges its "debt to nature" and is more likely to signify the abject. • Masculine identity: traditionally built on individuation, differentiation of Self from mother. Rigid boundaries protect self against penetration, infiltration, by undifferentiated nature. • Feminine identity: traditionally seen as more relational, fluid, less emphasis on separation from mother. Mother-child dyad never completely abandoned.

22. Abjection and Gender • Female, body, nature—all seen as more “undifferentiated” than opposites: Male, mind, culture, all based on differentiation, maintaining boundaries/ order against undifferentiated, fluid otherness. • Female sexuality, genitalia, menstruation, birth/reproduction: often viewed as fluid, abject, messy, “disgusting” (requiring “feminine hygiene” products, etc.). • Qualities associated with Male often become the qualities associated with Human; Female qualities associated with Aliens, Monsters.

23. Fluidity & the Abject in Aliens

24. Fluidity & the Abject in Aliens • Unknown Passage (that leads where?) • It’s wet, dripping, squishy—clearly organic: • “Looks like some kind of secreted resin” • “Yeah, but secreted from what?” (An unknown, other source) • “Nobody touch nothing.” (It’s disgusting; don’t even want to touch it.) • What happens next? • “Birth Scene,” which exaggerates “live birth” into “chest birth” that breaks through the body (its boundaries) and kills the (female) host.

25. Fluidity & the Abject in Aliens

26. Fluidity & the Abject in Aliens • We see where Passage leads to • Womb: Place of Birth/Reproduction • Mother Alien: Eggs, Slime, Wet, “Squishy” sounds (fluidity) • Insect connection? Unchecked reproductive ability as abject, scary • Penetration and “Impregnation” of human hosts (rather die: “Kill me”) • Body’s boundaries “invaded,” infected, and torn apart: guts exposed (loss of boundaries of self--between inside and outside, self & other) • Ripley’s disgust causes violent reaction

27. Alien (M)Others • Aliens associated with the “horror” of the abject, the monstrous-feminine or mother. • As opposed to the "good" or "proper" (non-sexual? Idealized?) mother. • Creed (in a different article): Alien "construct[s] the feminine as an imaginary 'other' which must be repressed and controlled in order to secure and protect the social order." • Social Order = Human Order = Male Order

28. Alien (M)Others • But also, compare Human Female characters: Ripley, Vasquez. Not traditional (passive? motherly?) feminine roles. • But Ripley also plays the role of Mother (dead daughter Amy) to Newt, who calls her “Mommy” at end. • Strange mirroring between Alien Mother and Ripley. Are they really that different? • But, ultimately, aliens are treated as other, which must be destroyed, expelled, so that the boundaries of the human can be maintained.

29. Alien/Identity • We generally define our identity, our “selves,” by opposition: by what is excluded from it, outside it, other. • True at collective level as well. What is not human, not civilized, etc. • Psychologically, fear of “the abject”: that within ourselves that we do not want to believe is part of ourselves. Sexuality, Reproduction, Bodily Fluids, Body itself. • Externalize or expel it. As Ripley does with the aliens in Alien and Aliens. • Draw rigid boundaries between us and them.

30. Alien Resurrection (1997) • In Alien Resurrection, however, the boundaries between Ripley and the aliens (human and alien) become less rigid, less defined. • Dir. Jean-Pierre Jeunet • Delicatessen, City of Lost Children • Writer, Joss Whedon • Toy Story, Buffy the Vampire Slayer