The thing that bothers me the most about Atlas Shrugged isn't the fact that it's promoting a pretty morally repugnant ideology. What bothers me is that nothing in this movie makes any fucking sense.
I mean, I just realized something else: you know how in the last post, I was talking about how the story has this big trains motif? That undermines the entire fucking story. The story is about how government involvement just makes everything terrible, but transcontinental railroads in the United States were possible mainly because of land grants and other government assistance.
And another thing that hurts my brain is that the movie is focusing so much on, like, these big industrial magnates - Taggart Transcontinental, Rearden Steel, D'Anconia Copper, Wyatt Oil... but that doesn't accurately reflect the modern economy in the United States, which is overwhelmingly services-oriented.
So anyway, back to the plot. Dagny arranges for a dinner date with Francisco D'Anconia (why?) before going to meet with Hank Rearden. Hank and Dagny meet to talk about more boring shit with trains, and then because the screenwriter has no idea how to make a conversation work, it transitions abruptly to inviting Dagny to his wedding anniversary party. I mean, look at this fucking writing.
Rearden: There was a company, years ago, that made terrific engines, in Wisconsin, I think. Closed suddenly, but I think they may have machine tools and parts lying around that you could use. I could look into it if you like.
Taggart: There's so much at stake. We have to make it.
[pause]
Rearden: Did you get Lillian's invitation to our anniversary party?
So their meeting concludes with them giving each other a meaningful stare in an attempt to fabricate chemistry, and then she meets with D'Anconia and at dinner and splashes water in his face. She's mad at him for the stunt with the copper mine. Y'see, Franky here thought it'd be hilarious to invest in a worthless mine in Mexico, get people to invest in it (namely James Taggart) and then let the Mexicans seize it and leave everyone with a giant crock of nothing.
Real joker there, that Francisco D'Anconia. The film makes a brief mention of stockholders, but it mainly focuses on how D'Anconia managed to make James Taggart look like a fool. But this goes back to my point in the last blog post about how these people make horrible business decisions. Franky here just squandered a shitload of investor money on a practical joke. How does the board of directors not can his ass? He's taking everyone for a ride just for his own kicks holy shit he is the cokehead douchebag from Horrible Bosses. That makes so much sense.
And speaking of "douchebag," we have yet another actor who fails to get the needed charisma for the part. He's a pretty-boy, for sure, but he don't fill me with confidence. More like I'd be afraid he'd give me a venereal disease by fucking proximity.
And then the bizarre part happens when she starts going on about "What happened to the man I used to love?" Huh? When did you establish that these two ever had a thing together? Or that they know each other? This is the first actual scene this character has had - his earlier appearance was just him being on-screen and having some other douchebags comment on his existence. I guess you could maybe argue that Dagny arranging for a dinner date kinda hints at it, but it's still fucking confusing because, like with Owen before him, the movie doesn't bother to give us any actual establishment of its characters.
So then we have the anniversary party. It's really boring. Again we have Hank's family being vapid, and his wife Lilian doesn't appreciate the bracelet, speaking disdainfully of it and ultimately trading it to Dagny for a necklace (if you look closely in this scene, you'll see Schilling doing something that resembles acting).
Then James Taggart is accosted at the bar by some douchebag who talks about a professor or philosopher or something who says "Happiness is an illusion experienced by those with shallow emotions" and he's all reverent when he's quoting it. James looks like he just wants to be done with this fucking movie and get a paycheck and then do a bit part in Two and a Half Men.
Then Hank sees D'Anconia and gets mad 'cause of the stunt he pulled that hurt the Taggarts, and then D'Anconia goes up to talk to him and deliver what one of the main themes of the movie is. He tells Rearden that pretty much everyone at that party depends on him, and the reason he's so miserable is that he's letting the worthless peons around him take advantage of him. His wife, his brother, his mother, and all the other ingrates.
Okay, let's break down the exact central premise of this story: there are a handful of truly productive people who do all the actual work, and if they decided to quit, then everything would fall apart, because everyone else is so fucking stupid and incompetent that they can't wipe their asses without a government handout.
If this story were on a smaller scale, and concerned a few qualified people at say... a club, or a business, or at some other more microcosmic organization, you could get a workable story there. But as it is, the story here tries to expand it to a macroeconomic level, and it just don't work that way.
Obviously, what Ayn Rand is doing is spinning around the concept of a strike. Laborers don't like their lot, so they stop production until they can negotiate with the employers. Ayn Rand is proposing that hey, let's just make it the dudes at the top doing the strike. Then the workers will really be helpless. Except that doesn't work in the real world. Apple hasn't collapsed due to the death of Steve Jobs, for example. A CEO is appointed by a board of directors, and can be replaced accordingly. Sure, some cases might have a harder time of it, but seldom is it truly a death knell for the company, much less society.
Of course, reality isn't a problem for this, because it contrives to make everyone else retarded so that the Randian Übermenschen can triumph.
What I'm saying is that the central premise of this movie is outlandishly implausible. And I wade through stories about magical lesbian horses who shoot guns. Your story makes no sen
So anyway, Rearden isn't happy with the party, bitches to his wife a bit in a thing that contains what's actually a decent exchange ("Next time we have a party, don't invite people you think are my friends," "but Hank, you don't have any friends."
So then Dagny and James are in a limo and also at some point there's a guy with a sandwich board advertising himself as a dude who was high-up in a Fortune 500 company and a CPA for 20 years and why doesn't he use the fucking internet to find employers? And with all these people going on strike, shouldn't there be openings? Fuck, that's one of the risks of real-world strikes; unless there are, like, laws against it, the employers can just ignore the strikers and hire new workers who'll put up with more shit.
Gaah, it's images like that that betray the fact that this movie is a fucking cartoon.
There's a sequence where we watch construction crews lay down new track for the railroad. It's not as exciting as the movie thinks it is. And the news (National News Television, get it? 'cause the gubmint has nationalized the news media!) is talking about how this is real large-scale and how the company hasn't done any maintenance on some of this track for over a hundred years and how there's really nothing else of interest in the world so they're focusing on a fucking railroad and wait wait wait back up for a moment. A hundred years? They established earlier in the movie that this company was founded by their father. I mean... the Taggart siblings look to be in, what, their forties or something? How fucking old was their dad? Or maybe it was founded by their grandfather... but then Eddie said that James hadn't done any improvements on the track since since the death of their father, so presumably their father did some upkeep.
Nothing makes sense.
So Dagny and James are heading to a dinner where she's expected to make a speech at a dinner party, at which he reveals that there's gonna be someone from some state science institute speaking out against Rearden Metal. And he's all gloaty about this. Why? He's only undermining his own company. I know he's like, got some weird envy about his sister, but here he's showing that he's willing to sabotage his own company just to spite her.
This character doesn't make sense.
James Taggart is absolutely baffling. There's no consistency to anything he does. In one scene he's a straw give things to charity guy. In another he's a shrewd Machiavellian manipulator who's good at getting politicians to do things that benefit him and his company. In other scenes he just does things for no reason other than to be the bad guy.
And Dagny is pissy because the person who's gonna be speaking out against the metal is someone who did a smear job in a magazine against Rearden that, of course, we haven't been aware of until this point because the screenwriter doesn't know what his job is.
There's also a mention on the news about how the government passed another bill that makes it illegal for any one person to own more than one company. As a way of preventing monopolies. I don't understand how this pertains to Rearden, or how it makes any sense. Rearden hasn't expressed interest in owning any companies, and if he just stays doing his own thing I don't understand how it would impact him. And furthermore, there is literally no fucking way this kind of bill could possibly exist, because tons of people own multiple companies. They're called stock portfolios. You own shares in several different companies. This bill makes absolutely no sense and I don't understand what the bad guys are trying to do.
But you know, maybe I'm just not looking at the big picture. Maybe this bill isn't actually about Rearden. No, we have to take a step back and analyze things in the real-world context that Ayn Rand obviously intended. No, the bill isn't about Rearden. It's about Carnegie. Andrew Carnegie, the real-world steel magnate upon whom Rearden is likely based. Famous for his strategy of vertical integration, where he'd acquire all the steps in the production process and have complete control over the supply chain, giving him a form of monopoly over the steel industry. And I think I put more thought into that than the filmmakers.
So Dagny gets mad and gets out of the car. Oh, good, run-down things that look like a depression has hit. Nice change from all those high-end places the film keeps putting us. She decides she'll leave James to defend the decision to use the metal himself. James goes "how's it gonna look when we can't defend our own proposal?" It's as though the film is trying to remind me how nothing he does makes sense.
Oh no. It's happening again. I'm at the point where I'm so irritated with what I'm looking at that I start getting the inkling suspicion that it's actually trying to piss me off.
More newscasts following the railroad work. Seriously, when was the last time you turned on the news and heard them talking about developments in the fucking railroad industry?
And then we get this.
You know what a big fat liberal government usually does when the economy is going south? They try to encourage more production. You know, like how FDR did all those government programs to put people to work doing things like building and agriculture jobs? That's why liberals are associated with spending! It's Keynesian economics! Aggregate demand! These are simple concepts!
The screenwriter is a businessman. He should understand these very simple concepts.
I don't think this movie understands why people might object to monopolies. It also doesn't seem to understand that when the government makes moves against monopolies, they generally don't go "slow down production." What they generally do is target predatory or anti-consumer practices. For example, in many states you're not allowed to price your merchandise at less than cost, so as to keep you from running competitors out of business when they simply can't match that.
But Rearden doesn't have competitors because he's the only one who's making this metal. In a sense he already has a monopoly on that.
The reason people don't tend to like monopolies is they tend to be bad for things. With no one to compete with there's less incentive to improve. It's also easier for them to charge exorbitant prices when they might not be able to get away with it otherwise.
But the movie doesn't seem to give these as reasons for anything happening. It has the bad guy giving explanations that don't make any fucking sense. In the real world the government would be contracting this guy because they need to rebuild infrastructure 'n' shit.
So Hank Rearden asks the douchebag to answer one question. If he can answer it truthfully, he'll consider the request: Is Rearden metal any good or not?
Douchebag answers the government is offering to buy the rights to Rearden metal, rather than give an actual answer, because nothing these characters does makes any sense. Instead of answering, which would get Rearden to sell them the fucking rights, he responds "I think that's a very selfish question to ask at a time of great economic uncertainty."
Nothing in this fucking movie makes any sense. Nobody acts like an actual person.
"The question of Rearden metal being good or not is irrelevant" he just said he'd sell you the fucking thing you want if you answer the question just answer the question and you'll get exactly what you want why are you so fucking stupid.
This script is so bad, and these characters so nonsensical, it is hurting my brain.
So the douchebag gives more non-answers because why do things that make sense, and he expresses befuddlement that Rearden would rather struggle with meager gains than accept a fortune for the rights to the metal. Rearden responds "Because it's mine" and admonishes the douchebag because he won't ever understand. It'd actually be a fairly decent exchange there if not for the absolute stupidity of everything else in the scene just tell him you think the metal's good.
Oh no, the best part is this in the sequence of non-answers.
This scene is of fucking stupid. Like so many things in this movie, it doesn't make sense.
Also, every time I start this movie I have to see the same image of Rearden standing in front of a window pane, where we see a reflection of his face alongside his metalworks. And he has that fucking haircut.
Then we get a stupid montage of print media condemning the metal for no reason.
Then Dagny talks with some fatso who doesn't want to make more switches out of the metal enough about the fucking metal already this subplot is making my brain hurt with how stupid it is. And apparently he's been getting threats from the State Science Institute.
Why are they going through all the effort of a pointless smear campaign when could have just oh forget it.
Then we cut to Dagny talking to someone from the State Science Institute, and we have no idea who he is, or why we should care. Some dude who knows the metal is good but is going along with the smear job because hey, public opinion controls how the money flows, so he has to...
I can't ignore it. The story won't let me ignore it because all the conflict is centering around something that doesn't make sense.
Then, apropos of nothing, really, he starts to talk about how he had three awesome students once. The first is that douchebag D'Anconia. The second is Ragnar the pirate. If he shows up in the movie then maybe we talk about how he doesn't make sense. The third simply vanished. He don't say who it is, though. The actor and the composer are giving it their all, but
Okay, seriously, the score here is actually good. Why can't this composer get better work?
So, anyway, back to trains. Oh, Wyatt's here. Good. He's nice to Dagny now, 'cause of how she managed some kind of off-screen crisis.
Actually, that's something that bothers me about Dagny. She doesn't really do anything other than walk around and talk to people. But then, nothing happens in this movie apart from overly-expository dialogue. The thing's so busy trying to have people explain the plot that it doesn't bother to, like, actually build characters or shit like that.
Here's Rearden again and the score's trying to make me believe this is some kind of romance. Because nothing gets me hot like railroad talk.
So we see a
O lawd
We see a bread line outside of a van labeled "Ministry of Welfare" with the words "Redistribution of Food." Since when the fuck does the United States call things "Ministries"?
So she arrives to have Eddie tell her that someone else we don't know has quit. He also says that stock has plummeted since the State Science Institute has denounced Rearden metal.
Question: If this government institute is able to denounce the metal as a public safety hazard... why aren't they doing it? When actual government things move against things, they generally take actual action, rather than arrange for disparaging newspaper articles.
Dagny decides she don't need those outside investors and is just gonna stand on her own. There's an amusing bit where James Taggart is playing with a toy train set like he don't give a fuck about anything. Why, oh why do I feel like James Taggart has some kind of actual character inside that could conceivably make for something compelling?
Anyway, Dagny tells him that Taggart Transcontinental is "finished." She's gonna launch her own company and a long convoluted explanation about how she's gonna finish the railroad and transfer the properties around and ugggh. And what is her new company gonna be called? The John Galt Line!
And then she lays out how James ain't gonna do shit to her or she'll "destroy" him, and I'm sorry Schilling, you just can't sell the menace.
Then she meets with D'Anconia 'cause she wants funding, but he says money's too tight and ughh. Why do we have to be with this character again? Stay with Hank, I was just starting to get Stockholm Syndrome.
Composer, please back off, you're doing too much.
Anyway, D'Anconia can blow a shitton of stockholder money on a dumb prank but can't invest in a business thing? Nothing makes sense.
She explains the name of the "John Galt Line."
More sequences of Dagny having trouble getting funding that almost seem like they're from an actual movie because they don't have loads of bad expository dialogue.
But then she gets a breakthrough when Ken Danagger (someone else we don't know) chimes in with "hey, I'm interested in funding you!" So she cheerfully heads to Rearden with more offers about building a bridge out of his metal and blah blah blah.
But then Rearden gives her pictures of a mysterious engine. What could it beeee?
Actually, this is a good place to leave off. After a half-hour of nothing that makes sense, ending on something that seems like a plot development will put me in a better mood.
Comments
- So, it's worth noting that they actually got lucky in terms of the capital strike: thanks to improved transport and capital mobility generally (outsourcing) since 1957, it's now easier to do this sort of thing without hurting yourself more than the people you are trying to spite.
- See, the TV station name thing would work better if the big three broadcasters hadn't already been American Broadcasting Company, National Broadcasting Company, and Columbia Broadcasting System. But that's another thing that's changed in the last half century, isn't it?
- A hundred years? They established earlier in the movie that this company was founded by their father. I mean... the Taggart siblings look to be in, what, their forties or something? How fucking old was their dad? Or maybe it was founded by their grandfather... but then Eddie said that James hadn't done any improvements on the track since since the death of their father, so presumably their father did some upkeep.
Maybe they bought new lines other people built? But if they were so bad, where were they getting the money?- And furthermore, there is literally no fucking way this kind of bill could possibly exist, because tons of people own multiple companies. They're called stock portfolios. You own shares in several different companies. This bill makes absolutely no sense and I don't understand what the bad guys are trying to do.
Attention everyone: we have outlawed mutual funds. Holding companies are fine, though, you just can't pyramid them and there's no intercorporate limited liability. Oh, and insurance companies and pension funds can only invest in bonds now, maybe real estate. Sure, you can still get synthetic exposure through the options and futures markets, but given how we've f*cked the liquidity of the underlying instruments, I don't know how much good that'll do you.- The Carnegie connection is an interesting idea, but the simple fact is that model can still work even if you can only own one company. You just lose the shielding of assets against bankruptcy courts via segmenting them among legally separate subsidiaries. Hell, under this system you could still effectively buy up other companies by simply purchasing their assets instead of their stock, leaving the target empty except for a bunch of cash which is distributed to shareholders as a liquidating dividend.
- More newscasts following the railroad work. Seriously, when was the last time you turned on the news and heard them talking about developments in the fucking railroad industry?
Probably 2010, when Berkshire Hathaway completed its purchase of BNSF. Granted, I'm almost exclusively a text-based news consumer, so I wouldn't have actually seen it on the "news," but it surely got at least MSNBC play.- Some Douchebag talking to Rearden: "The state science institute is simply requesting that you stop production until the economy can stabilize."
Nobody thinks like this. You know what a big fat liberal government usually does when the economy is going south? They try to encourage more production. You know, like how FDR did all those government programs to put people to work doing things like building and agriculture jobs? In fairness, this was probably referencing the Agricultural Adjustment Act (and maybe some other similar ones), a New Deal program that subsidized farmers not to plant. The goal was to raise the price of crops so the industry could be profitable.- "If Rearden metal is no good, then it's a physical danger. If it is good, it's a social danger."
Nobody talks like this. Nobody thinks like this. Nobody has ever balked at the social danger of a company producing a product that is too good. Isn't that the basis of the Luddite movement? That mechanization was producing a product too well, too cheap, and with unskilled labor, thus forcing skilled artisans out of work? It's never been very reputable, but it is an opinion people have. We're now seeing the same thing with robots.- Why are they going through all the effort of a pointless smear campaign when could have just oh forget it.
I mean, good point. If they're so evil and antipropertarian, why not just seize the factory or whatever overnight? There'd probably be records and stuff. Buy off the technicians if you have to.- We see a bread line outside of a van labeled "Ministry of Welfare" with the words "Redistribution of Food." Since when the fuck does the United States call things "Ministries"?
Would "Department," "Bureau," or "Office" really have been that hard?- Question: If this government institute is able to denounce the metal as a public safety hazard... why aren't they doing it? When actual government things move against things, they generally take actual action, rather than arrange for disparaging newspaper articles.
My best attempt at guessing the answer: everyone in government has been so mollycoddled they don't even know how to run an authoritarian state.- Anyway, Dagny tells him that Taggart Transcontinental is "finished."
Fun fact: even the largest railroads in America only span half the continent. BNSF is Chicago and west, plus a small branch to Alabama, UP is pretty similar. Norfolk Southern is in the east, only going as far west as Kansas City. Etc. There is Canadian National, though, but the transcontinental part is all in . . . Canada.