Movie Analysis Essay on Roger and Me

Introduction

The film, Roger and Me is a documentary that takes into consideration much economic importance as it presents capitalism's newest form. The film shows a nice example of a theory called Gunnar Myrdal's which denotes circular and repetitive causation. The filmmaker, Michael Moore was from a town called Flint which has various factories of the largest auto companies in the universe, General Motors (Orvell, 2015). General Motors has for many years prospered in its activities as it has profitably benefited. In addition, the workers at the company showed much loyalty due to the contention of the employer and the jobs in the company without forgetting their cool payments. According to the film, everyone in the film maker's family worked for General Motors. Moore in the film portrays that everyone in his hometown became economically stable and also spiritually and as their cultures created a connection with the company's influences. In fact, the closure of the company impacted negatively the people of Flint town since many of the residents worked in the company's factories. The tragedy starts in the town and thus Myrdal's theories start cycle movements. The closure of eleven factories in Flint, Michigan contributed to laying off of more than approximated 30,000 laborers. In an economy where their many people are involved in capitalist processes of an economy, a disaster prevails. People in Flint town were left with no one to buy their services and thus they had no one to depend on. More precisely, they had no person to sell their services to. In the film, capitalism, ideological conflicts, materialism, religion, socialism, power, and authority are the main themes that are evident in the film.

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In relation to the film, Marx recognizes the existence of homeless, city slums and immigration even in some of the richest countries in the world. The tragedies that Marx highlights are caused mainly by the rich people who exploit the poor in the workplaces. Despite working so hard in the organizations that are owned by the rich and elite groups, the workers live a lesser life than the owners of the companies (Leach, 2017). General Motors closing the factories in Michigan State show how oppressed the people working in the company become due to lack of jobs. Marx in his writings implied materialism was at its highest in General Motors. Marx relates the occurrences in the film with capitalism in his writings saying that the rich are much centralized as they only consider only their social class and not the other people. By closing all the industries in Flint town, it shows that the director of General Motors only valued making profits and not livelihoods of the 30000 workers who were employed in the company. At the time that Marx did his writing, he stated that there is a new form of inequality in different classes of people which is the main character in the film (Rich, 2016). Relating Weber's writings on capitalism with the film, it is evident that Weber believed in hard work for one to become successful. The workers in the General Motors industries were hardworking so as they could afford a good life for themselves. However, they were denied a chance after the capitalist economy interfered by closing the factories in Michigan town. Capitalist as a theme in the film makes the people living in the town poorer as demonstrated in the film and as explained by Weber. Durkheim addresses capitalism and maintains that the capitalist's economists look for ways of disintegrating people so that they can have control over them. By General Motors seizing jobs in Flint town, it was evident that they got disintegrated and thus families stopped living together which meant that they could be easily ruled by the ones with money.

Class conflicts in the film evidently show up. Many people get oppressed by the modern class of rich people and society has not yet come up with solutions to solve the problem. Marx states that the rich are using the old ways to oppress the people as they struggle in old places as well as old ways. In the film, the director of General Motors oppressed people living in Flint town as he made sure they went to their old ways of living. Many people started their life in slums as they could not afford the lives that they lived when they worked for the company. The society that they lived in became complicated in the order of their arrangement and their social rank degraded. Weber in his publication of Protestant Ethic and the spirit of capitalism, he clearly shows the origins of social inequality with a staggering output. The author shows how depression can make one unable to perform their tasks and thus lagging behind other working citizens. His experiences show how there can be class conflicts due to lack of jobs to do. In the film, the director of General Motors made cool $2 million for himself when he relocated the company to Mexico where he could afford cheap labor. The people of Flint town were left in poverty and thus exhibiting lower social class as the director of the company lived a first-class kind of life. Durkheim shows how the poor class of people is categorized as being dirty people. In his small videos, the author shows a character in a runt family. He indicates that the character by the name of Brian does not know how to use the toilets properly. He portrays how bad breath and dandruff made children hate him since he came from a poor family and a lower class. Being at a lower class in social class causes many problems such as crime and suicidal attempts (Marx, 2015). Considering Durkheim approach towards class conflicts and relating them to the film, it is clear that many people entered into crime after the factories were closed in Flint town due to lack of jobs. The prisons were fully occupied and thus no more to absorb new criminals who engaged in various bad activities.

General Motors closing their doors in Flint town is a kind of materialist attitude by the management. Materialism in the film is a theme that is more evident. The factories closure was not because of any financial or economic hardships, but it was because the managers in the company wanted to realize more and more money than they already had. The film shows that the managers opened factories in Mexico as a way of satisfying their greed where they paid much less for labor than they could pay for the workers in America. According to Marx, materialism is only for ones' inner fulfillment. Marx moved out of Germany and got married to his longtime girlfriend in a Christian ceremony. His writings show that they had a colorful honeymoon in Switzerland which was funded by his wife's mother. Materialism is evident in the things that Marx did. Comparing Marx and the managers in the film, all have the love for material things. By moving to Mexico, General Motors made more profits out of exploiting the workers in a poor country. Durkheim states that love for material possession by human beings is insatiable as nothing can restrain human appetite. The author adds that external forces should be used to stop the greedy appetite by a few leaders which probably are the government official. If the Michigan officials could take a step towards stopping the company from closing the factories in Flint town, poverty crisis could not be an issue in the town.

As seen in the film, there is absolutely unscrupulous greed when some people want to make money. This is a characteristic that is observed in a few countries with bourgeois capitalist forms of developments that measurements are according to higher standards and the citizens in such countries have remained backward. Every employer should be aware that lack of understanding the needs of the labors in the said countries like the United States has caused some principal obstacles to their capitalistic developments (Jaramillo et al, 2016). The capitalist governments will never make proper use of workers whose practices seem undisciplined anymore, but it can make proper use the workers for the sake of the businessman who looks so much unscrupulous in the things that he does. The things that the businessman does do not necessarily lie in the line of development of any impulse to make money in a legitimate way but in a way of mistreating those customers. The United States government acquired capitalistic trade since all its businesses were done using money and it was observed in their economic society as they seemed like they were farming for taxes which General Motors could outrightly pay even when working from Mexico.

In modern society, employers use more technical ways so that they can secure the biggest possible labor from their workers. The type of technicality that they use is called piece-rate devices. Like for example, in the field of agricultural produce, harvest gathering is a good example where a lot of workers are required because the weather could be uncertain and thus the variation between many profits and possibility of losses wholly depends on the speed of harvesting. Thus, the piece-rate formula of employment is employed in such cases. In the film Roger and Me, General Motors understood that in Mexico will afford many needy workers who would accept to work on the basis of piece-work and they never experienced that in Flint town. With the affordability of such system of payments in Mexico, General Motors knew that they could make a lot of money since people could work on many pieces and increase their income for they were paid little amounts compared to what labors in the United States were paid. The interest of General Motors was to speed up its production with the increased results and work intensity and thus their attempt increased the piece rates of the labors in Mexico. The company thought that it has given them an opportunity to make earnings which the workers perceive as being very high and this is purely aiming at the workers to help them gain their own good money.

Capitalism also affects religion in a number of ways. Marx pointed this by using a student called Bruno Bauer who was a follower of Marx philosophy (Kalberg, 2017). The student had received a philosophical position at the University of Bonn. In the university, the student became fired due to his criticism of Christianity. Such criticism among the gatherings by university students caused a number of problems, but the publication of such views in the Prussia was taken differently. The time the student criticized the miracles of Jesus was a time when the government had strongest ties with the church and that time the Prussians treated church criticism to charge with treason. Marx and the student's story compare to the film Roger and Me in a number of ways. When watching Roger and Me, it so much striking as it looks like it is short in the current years. The members of the gated community and also the conservative entertainers who said that there are tough times since many people are unemployed since they have not backed up by the government. When Smith makes delivery of a Christmas message as he quotes Charles Dickens, he sounded like he twisted the religious doctrine in support of his own view of the world. In the film, what stood out more religiously and still stands out in the current world is how Moore is frustrated about the people running the country lack of concern to listening to the voices of the people they were harming. The president sending a Christmas message sounded like he never listened to himself and also to the nationals and that is so callous.

Practical rationalism is understood as a type of attitude that judges the world in a conscious manner in terms of...