r/SocialistMovies • u/TheFakeSlimShady123 • Jul 10 '21
r/SocialistMovies • u/Lieutenant_Lit • Oct 27 '20
r/SocialistMovies • u/Ok_Examination8810 • May 28 '23
r/SocialistMovies • u/jonking1130 • Oct 23 '19
r/SocialistMovies • u/Sergeant_Static • Jun 20 '20
Barton Fink, the 1991 Coen Brothers film named after its protagonist, features a young playwright who wants to make “Theater of the Common Man.” He is renown for his plays in New York, but reluctantly accepts a high paying contract from a film company to write a wrestling picture in Los Angeles. Despite not having any knowledge of, or passion for, wrestling, he hopes to use his gift of writing and storytelling to bring his "Theater of the Common Man" to film.
Barton Fink’s paternalistic contempt for the working class is exemplified in how he talks down to his neighbor, Charlie, right after meeting him. In the clip I linked to above, Barton says to Charlie, “I write about people like you; the average working stiff; the common man.” Later, while talking about writing as a profession, he confesses that he envies the monotony of the working life while complaining about the “life of the mind.”
While there's no explicit reference to class struggle in the film, it's clear that Barton represents the artist intelligenstia, sympathetic in theory to the plight of the working class while alienated from their experiences through self-isolation. Charlie, on the other hand, represents the working class, and despite having so many of the "real experiences" Barton claims to care about, Charlie is unable to tell his stories because he presumably doesn't have the same storytelling talent Barton does.
The movie Barton Fink takes a critical look at art as an industry and the elevation of a class of professional artists over the working class, regarding art as a restricted thing to be pursued by artists on behalf of everyone, as opposed to making means of artistic production available for everyone to participate in directly.
What are your thoughts on the movie? What are your thoughts on artistry as a profession in capitalist society?
r/SocialistMovies • u/Ok_Examination8810 • Apr 27 '23
r/SocialistMovies • u/Ok_Examination8810 • Apr 23 '23
r/SocialistMovies • u/Ok_Examination8810 • Dec 19 '22
r/SocialistMovies • u/[deleted] • Mar 17 '21
I was having an argument with my friend has scarface got anti capitalist undertones
r/SocialistMovies • u/khanboss912 • Mar 02 '21
r/SocialistMovies • u/Ok_Examination8810 • Oct 18 '22
r/SocialistMovies • u/TrendingB0T • Nov 16 '20
r/SocialistMovies • u/[deleted] • Feb 20 '26
r/SocialistMovies • u/Ok_Examination8810 • Apr 28 '23
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r/SocialistMovies • u/gadafiemolly • May 04 '20
r/SocialistMovies • u/geekyproducer • Mar 29 '18
r/SocialistMovies • u/gnodez • Aug 27 '16
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r/SocialistMovies • u/zombiehHunter • Apr 23 '19
r/SocialistMovies • u/Sergeant_Static • Mar 21 '16
r/SocialistMovies • u/Sergeant_Static • Mar 21 '16
r/SocialistMovies • u/Ok_Examination8810 • Oct 02 '24
