A Little Bird Told Me . . .
The gossip of the members of his community about his demotion, rather than the demotion itself, is the direct cause of the doorman's downfall in The Last Laugh. Some of the most expressive images in the film demonstrate the spread of gossip and the resultant mockery of the neighbors: the camera moves to an outstretched ear, the camera follows the doorman along a walk of shame, grotesque and blurry heads superimposed on the neighborhood mock him with unabashed laughter. What is the movie saying about gossip as a form of communication? What is it saying about the community that listens to it? How does what other people think of us influence how we think of ourselves?
The Last Laugh shows a lot of gossip surrounding the doorman’s walk home and behind his back. I believe the movie shows how destructive and cruel gossip can be. Before the gossip started to spread, the doorman was able to pretend. During the wedding he attended after his firing, he kept up appearances, as he didn’t want anyone to know. People treated him as if he still held such a prestigious role. He was wary at first, but gave in the lie. He was unaware that word had gotten out. If it had not been for those who listen on what happens behind closed doors, his demotion could’ve been kept secret. Since he was unaware of the spread of the gossip, he tried to keep up appearances. Sadly, his walk home turned into a walk of shame as people laughed at him from every angle. He probably did not know why it was happening. However, he manages to figure it out, and he breaks down further. His distant and slow behaviors carried into his personal life. The gossipers spread a private fact about his life to the world, and it affected him negatively. The spread of the gossip also clues viewers into the lifestyle of where the doorman lives. He isn’t invited to parties because everyone enjoys him, he is invited because they perceive his job as prestigious. When word is spread that he loses his job everyone abandons him. While we nowadays can see that gossip is bad, the movie drives the point deeper in. The person who eavesdrops originally has warts, and the superimposed faces during the doorman’s walk of shame are not pleasing to eye. Back then they probably would’ve been considered ugly. These aspects of the movie shows how gossip was perceived back then. Gossip was used by ugly people. Those who eavesdropped from behind closed doors, and spread ugly news for those to ridicule the subject and chuckle about their misfortune.
ReplyDeleteThe Last Laugh tells us that when everyone joins in and participates, gossip is an effective form of spreading information but not in a positive way. What happens in the last laugh is the doorman gets demoted because of his age. Nobody knows about it at first. Now, the former doorman freaks out about people figuring out he is not the real doorman anymore. He continues to wear his uniform when walking down the street to try and act like nothing was happening. What he did not realize until he walked the street was that everyone knew he lost his job, and if some did not know, others told them right away. The doorman was so embarrassed when he saw people spreading around the bad news. Everyone knew about what happened with him because everyone was participating in spreading the gossip around. Gossip is not something someone wants to become a part of. It is hard to avoid though because it really is not in someone’s wanting to be gossiped about. Gossip can be twisted and cause people to think differently about someone. Other people gossip because they do not want to be the ones talked about when other people are gossiping. Gossip does affect people. It affects the people who are gossiping and the ones who are being gossiped about. The people who gossip should feel bad about themselves and/or shouldn’t let what other people say affect their original opinion on someone change. Then, the one who is being gossiped, in this instance the former doorman, does not deserve to have people laugh at him for losing his job. It just makes him feel worse about himself and more of a failure. People should not make others feel like they have failed. The people in this movie should have talked about what they could do to help him feel better, not gossiped about how he lost his job because he’s getting old. Although gossip may be an effective way of spreading information (especially back then), it is not a healthy or positive form of communication or spreading information.
ReplyDeleteThe depiction of gossip is strong in The Last Laugh. Scenes in which disorienting figures of heads, ears, and mouths have been shown when the doorman is walking back to his room. The goal of the film is to show that gossip is something that can be all consuming to an individual as many people look to preserve their own self-image to those around them to stay in a positive mind set. The film sets up the gossip as a large portion of images that completely fill the screen and almost cover the doorman as he trudges back to his apartment. Film effects like this are meant to show that these are in his subconscious. He know people are talking about him, but the human mind as a tendency to over think a number of things in our life, so even if the gossip wasn’t actually as bad as the doorman thinks, it still absolutely destructive to how he perceives his self-image. The destructive force that gossip is shown to have in this film is a great amount. The movie shows that the community that listens to the gossip is a secret one. They do not want to be seen by the person they are talking so much about. An example of this is when the door man is coming back from work and all the residents avoid being seen or direct eye contact with the doorman. The movie shows that this form of communication is one that is cancerous. Within a few hours of the husband being demoted, the whole apartment complex knows of the news and no longer look up to the doorman with the respect shown earlier in the movie.
ReplyDeleteThe Last Laugh shows that even the most prideful of people can suffer from societal embarrassment. Gossip moves extremely fast as a form of communication. People get a rush out of spreading rumors and talking about other people because it makes them feel better. It helps them forget or ignore the problems of their lives by focusing on other people's. The community, hardworking low to middle income, does not bring up a fellow working man who has lost everything that meant to him. There are communistic values in these movies as the worker ends up with the short end of the stick compared to the elite and corporations. The community pushes him down in his time of distress in the same system that puts all of them down. The community is not even a community as the people in the apartment complex only look out for each other. A community is supposed to be a place of safe haven with people that care about you. They instead are happy and find his downfall hilarious. Other people's judgments about us make us think we have to fit a certain societal position. In society, there are expectations that may, in fact, be detrimental to your mental or physical health. We tend to find flaws in ourselves that may have been hinted at or even directly told to us. This leads us to chase the fantasy of appeasing society. This is not possible because humans have shown that they will always put someone down to "better" themselves.
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