Symbolism in Logan (Remastered) | Ascending the Mountain
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- Опубликовано: 20 авг 2024
- The movie Logan has a very powerful symbolic structure which is based on the spiritual ascent up a mountain. It is capable of showing all sides of its basic symbolic structure all at once.
This is a remastered version of a simpler version which is still available here: • Symbolism in Logan | A...
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A couple extra things I thought of while watching this:
1. Logan as Martyr: Logan struggles with “faith” the entire film. Ultimately he decides to sacrifice himself for a future kingdom of new young mutants. This parallels the early Christians willingness to die for the Kingdom of Heaven. It’s unclear whether Logan truly rationally believes that the kids stand a chance, but he decides to take a leap of faith, as proven by his death. (As James says “I will show you my faith by my works”)
2. Logan as Moses: He dies just on the outskirts of the promised land unable to cross the border into Canada himself.
3. Laura as anima: in the larger context of Hollywood this is something to watch out for, but taken on its own Laura being female sort of represents Logan finally making peace with civility and his inner femininity. Throughout the movies Logan has had really rough interactions with women, either becoming overly attached to them to his psychological detriment (Jean Grey) or else disregarding or treating them with hostility. Almost all the women he cares for die in the end, but he is able to save Laura (who as his daughter is sort of himself). Similar to him confronting the evil version of himself, I feel like this represents him confronting the tame and civil side of himself.
Also it’s probably just coincidence but Canada is phonetically similar to Canaan
Having come to Christ through both orthodox Christianity in my adult life and evangelical/non-denominational in my youth, I’d say they were radically different paths. The non-denominational path professed that if you simply believe that Christ is the son of God, you will be saved. Believing in that environment felt like jumping in a cool lake on a hot day. Its easy, open, refreshing, and calm, but there’s a danger in drowning in its depths and it was too easy to swim to shore when I was tired of treading its waters.
Orthodox Christianity is like climbing a mountain. Daunting, challenging, intimidating when I first started yet it felt adventurous and rewarding. It has its own cliffs and rocky outcroppings but the more I climb up, the less I want to climb back down. It’s more sustaining as I want to see the top. And there’s a clear legacy of elders and saints who have climbed the mountain before who guide us to Christ at the summit.
Of course Jonathan Pageau would have a video editor named Covenant.
Can't wait until we get a symbolic interpretation of Pageau's life
Wow, this is beautiful. This just gives the movie so more meaning. I already thought it was an excellent movie, but this just knocks it out of the park. Great work Jonathan.
I'm still in dubio about the issue of the replacement of the masculine with the feminine. I didn't mind it that much in this movie, but in others I find it rather intrusive and blantantly politically motivated. In some movies you get the immediate sense it's forced into it, like the Last Jedi for instance.
I love your analysis on Logan and I also like how you picked up on the feminine taken over the masculine motif in the culture at broad. You have a new subscriber. Directed here by Jordan Peterson !
Eli Have you seen this video it's a pretty awesome take on it.
ruclips.net/video/HUgYoT_xEFY/видео.html
Andrew Klavan also had an almost similar take but he references the movie "Shane" which is shown in the movie and is left out of this analysis.
pjmedia.com/andrewklavan/2017/03/12/what-logan-means/
Optimistically, in regards to the feminine replacing the masculine in this context, we could say this story reflects Jung’s idea that the male anima through the shadow self has a distinct feminine element to it (and female having male, etc.). This would fit nicely into the symbols you have already gleaned from the story. Pessimistically tho, yeah. We can’t ignore the trend. But this one struck a different chord with me compared to the others.
Good to see a more optimistic alternative!
Stefan B.S. Yes. Although, even if you see it that way, this would still be only one exception to the pattern.
Great comment from an aptly named commenter
There is no optimistic vision when the patriachy and nucleus family are dismantled, none.
I'd say a male clone would represent continuity - the heir. A female clone represents change, which is what Logan wants for Laura. A life different from his.
"Mount Logan is the highest mountain in Canada and the second-highest peak in North America after Denali. The mountain was named after Sir William Edmond Logan, a Canadian Geologist and Founder of the Geological Survey of Canada (GSC). Mount Logan is located within Kluane National Park Reserve in southwestern Yukon, less than 40 kilometres (25 mi) north of the Yukon-Alaska border."
Damn.
Man, I knew there was a reason I loved this film.
One of my favorite films
2:36 The opening shot of the movie is Logan being lifted up into frame as the thugs outside jack up his car; literally ascending from volitional obscurity into narrative prominence against his will.
One of my all time favourite films.
You helped me understand why.
Thankyou.
Can you do one on Blade Runner 2049?
That might happen.
There's a lot there in Blade Runner 2049. It would be great to have a Christian analysis of it.
Yes!!! Can't wait!
In the book, there's a blatant "ascent up a mountain," which ends with death, rebirth, and enlightenment. There's even a sacrificial lamb that's killed by a synthetic human ("new humanity"). None of this made it into the films. I hope you'll consider Blade Runner 2049!
Yes, if you find enough interesting to say about Blade Runner 2049, please share!
I find it interesting Logan dismisses Eden as a fairy tail, for good reason though, since it comes from a comic. Yet symbolically, I see it as a reflection of his nihilism, and loss of faith in a higher purpose. The comic serves as a sort of holy book, showing the path to redemption, which he cynically denies at first. But through his own journey and personal transformation, ends up following that very path to redemption.
The comic book is a proxy for the Holy Book because it IS the story of his origin at the level of manifestation in which he exists. that is Wolverine is a comic book character.
hehe, I actually had paused the video at about 8m in to leave my comment, only to realize you talk about that exact thing right after. I should probably finish videos before commenting :) I appreciate your insights, and your explanation added layers of depth to what had popped up in my mind. you're doing god's work, good sir.
Was going to say that of course it’s a comic book that is his holy book - he lives in a world created in comics, so what else could it be? But I see Jonathan beat me to it :)
I would love to know, Jonathan, whether you think the screenwriters are aware of this symbolism when they write these films, or whether it’s the Logos or Holy Spirit (are those the same thing) working through them to speak to the world.
Writing rather late here, but the people making films like this are very talented, and they know exactly what they are doing. If you study film production, you discover how nothing is accidental, everything is a conscious decision especially in the big-budget productions like Logan where every shot costs tremendous amounts of money. The amount of effort and the scale of talent used to make the most of that effort which goes into every step, from pre-production planning to visual composition to editing, can be staggering.
As a side note, this is precisely why Jonathan's concern about the feminine-as-masculine-replacement symbolism prevalent throughout media today is exceptionally valid: the film makers know very consciously that they are doing this. It is not always done negatively, and sometimes still yields fine results, but it runs dangerously close to propaganda in the average case.
That's not to say, of course, that conscious decisions might be made without the symbolism in mind. In Logan's case, however, the threads are too strongly correlated to be accidental; for example in the beginning when Logan's vehicle is damaged, he's trying to prevent it, he's unwilling to accept the inevitability of entropic demise. They hang a lantern on that theme when we learn he is fighting to keep a senile Xavier alive. After Xavier dies, he then uses the shovel that buried Prof. X to damage his vehicle, willingly accepting that entropy and taking active steps towards it, if only symbolic at first. That parallel is not accidental; it is woven too finely.
I noticed in this film that as Logan is battling by his shadow counterpart in the final sequence of the movie, Logan is literally nailed onto the tree when he is mortally impaled. You pointed out this self sacrifice in the video. Laura is then seen cutting the redeemed Logan down from the tree. It seems like a beautiful, terrible cycle where the young eat the fruit that literally is the self sacrifice of the old. I have just finished reading Maps of Meaning, where Peterson painted the symbol of the Tree and its Mystic Fruit through the myths of the crucifixion of Christ and Odin. Thank you foraging a route into this mystery.
Amazing video!
Subscribed. Thanks to Mangold on twitter! Loved the video
This is awesome. Thanks
thank you
This is wonderful. Thank you.
This move was also probably message about end of the era of superheroes which exploded around '90 and 2000 and then slowly get exploited within its framework of secular culture. It's like saying that old heroes need to die and be replaced with something which contains meaning again, or which gives it meaning in the first place. Meaning we have lost along the way.
Bravo 👏🏻
Extremely enlightening. Thank you 🙏🏻
It’s a beautiful experience when you can feel the truth in something on so many levels of analysis at once.
It’s a heart opening experience.
One I am very grateful for.
I hope that more people have the chance of enjoying it. 🙏🏻☯️🌈💜✌🏼
As I reflected on the question you left me with at the end. That you shared that it’s a common cultural trope that the feminine rises to supplant the masculine.
I feel like this would actually be the natural step in the cycle.
I was thinking about it in terms of how once something becomes it’s most Yang. It then reverts to Yin.
Like the thorns, that were once the lowest part of the earth, becoming the crown.
Or like something that has reached its most amount of order it only has disorder left to become. Which is born of the irreducible disorder that remained in the order.
If I watch it more as the energies than the genders. I feel like it’s the energy of my culture, and the energy of my nature.
The energy of my mind, or the energy of my body.
For me when I label my body as just my passions. It leaves me short of its subtleties.
So it’s like,
You grow up from your body into your mind,
You create order.
We get stuck up in that order,
We forget the body beneath.
It at once calls us,
But grows angry at us.
We are at once called to it,
But tired of fighting it,
So we shut it out,
Or attend to it when it’s sedated.
Thanks to your beautiful unpacking of this story.
I can feel more deeply and understand in myself the experience, of now being on a journey of opening the heart,
Which is the part of us which is the child of our mind and body.
Who’s language is at first not heard by us,
As we have not been listening,
And then when listening it is foreign,
Because it is new.
Until it is known.
When it is known,
It is known in the mind,
Earth has reached heaven.
Via the mountain of the heart.
As both body and mind,
Gave themselves,
Sacrificed their individual will.
To listen to the direction of the heart,
To follow a child to Eden.
🐍☯️☀️🌈👼🏼👀❤️🌈⛰🌈🌾🌺🌾
glad to see this reuploaded.
Thank you for the upload, looking forward to your future videos.
Great job!
This review makes me want to rewatch Ingmar Bergman’s Magic Flute. Will also have to consider renting Logan, seems interesting.
Godspede
Brilliant, Can you do Avatar the last Airbender, the tv series?? its 61 episodes long and it's amazing. could get a watch list to shorten it to its most essential episodes. There are lots of "strong female characters" that simply follow masculine traits and the show is rather obvious in its symbolism in that it's the authoritarian Right-wing imperialist tyrannical father as the adversary. I especially want to hear your thoughts on Prince Zuko.
The hero as a man who straddles borders is similar to Professor Geek's concept of the Frontiersman archetype.
His archetype videos are damn good.
It's a bit of a throwback, but I would love to see a symbolic analysis of the Godfather movies.
You should do one of these on the new Devilman show on Netflix. The symbols are so prominent hearing your take on it would be amazing.
Sir you should do one for the god of war series
Beautiful.
Holy fuck... these analysis' are amazing, I nearly cried.
Beast mode.
Tremendous video, keep the good work
Logan was amazing because it shattered the notion that superhero movies have to be dumb and funny and not take themselves too seriously to be good.
This was fucking excellent. Thank you. Can you do Pan's Labyrinth?
A video like this about Mother! would be soooo nice c:
Agreed!!!
Powerful Pageau
16:43 the crucifix is set as the target(as in goal) by the transcendent
Awesome stuff. I heard you won INFOwars earlier with David night. So I subscribed. Another message in this movie like many of the past couple years is the dying of the patriarchy. Say goodbye to the old white men. If you see where the kids are burying Wolverine, there is not one white male in the bunch. It's also politicized with border references. And identity just like the other X-Men movies.
Glad to get in on the ground floor...in all seriousness, what did you think about _Talladega Nights: the ballad of Ricky Bobby_ ?
This was awesome. It is interesting the movies we love but maybe can’t quite explain why. Until you lay these dialogues out.
I’ve always loved Wolverine but been terrible disappointed with every movie version of his story until this movie. I thought ‘finally. It was told as well as can be by today’s Hollywood’.
I recognize my love for his character and others of his trope (Hellboy being my fave) as the war in the self between all these aspects you discussed. And with characters this tragically human, it must aim at the Cross for resolution or the story fails.
Thank you for posting this
This is so f***ing good
It's the return of Hippolyta before our eyes, everywhere.
This is great!
Jonathan: Could you comment on how the contemporary male has to integrate the feminine (or the anima) to be truly heroic? Or in other words, isn't masculinity "toxic" if both the shadow AND the anima are not integrated?
"Eden" is a "return to Genesis".
I would love to see Blade Runner 2049!!
Can you do the Crusades?
Logan's healing factor weakened because adamantium poisoned his body
Is there anything different from the original blocked one? This is my favorite movie review, glad it’s back up!
The changes are minimal. There are a few new scenes which make this newest version a slightly better viewing experience, in my opinion.
Can you do one on "Avatar the Last Airbender", the greatest show that ever was?
That is what a Canadian would say of this movie, yes.
I'm just joking, I really appreciate your unfolding of this movie and think that the symbolic structure you underline is so strong that it shadows its very on the nose political statements.
I know these might be tedious but, can you do the manga Berserk or Naruto?
Yassine Motaouakkil yes please do Naruto. It's Cain and Abel with a happy ending I think
Hunter
You should consider a symbolic interpretation of newest version the movie 'It'!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
I found the symbolism of Laura turning the cross 45° to place an X above Logan's grave significant. You interpret everything in Christian imagery, as is your ideological lens, so it should stand out that the X was the sign of the Christ. It puts a little bow on the idea of Logan as a Christ figure.
Due to my own ideological framework, I loved the idea that a person could take the old Christian ideas, turn them to a new orientation, and use that new alignment as a form of personal identity. I don't believe in gods, & see the Bible as at best allegory & at worst mystical, magical nonsense. That being said, there are things worth drawing from the Biblical stories which don't rely on the existence of a supernatural being. I think it is possible for a person to take the stories, incorporate the good (hard work, commitment to family & tribe, personal sacrifice) while setting aside the bad (notions of eternal life, reward or punishment after death, the general hubris of believers pretending to be simultaneously humble & in a personal relationship with the creator of the universe) to cobble together a functioning worldview.
Nietzsche feared what we might become once God was found dead. If we're all made in the image of this god, it is our duty to embody goodness in a world without divinity. Just my personal spin on it. Great video.
i see flat earth reference as well......shouts out to the book of enoch
I don't know, Jonathan... you can't find intentional symbolism in EVERYTHING. Don't you think you're kinda reaching on this one... what? What's that? Hmm, that's interesting... that is too, and so is that MY GOD you are right
Wat
The other Logan
Why Christianity?
I think I understand why you prioritize mythology over science - to my understanding, you think that mythology shows us how we human beings will inevitably experience the world, while science at best can show us the “raw facts” that lead to our perception (such as George Lakoff does with his empirical exploration of embodied cognition and metaphorical frames) without showing us how to prioritize these facts.
But I don’t understand why you’ve prioritized the myths associated with Christianity (and not, for example, the myths of the ancient Greeks - specifically Olympian myths such as Homer’s “Iliad” and the pre-Euripidean Greek tragedies). Do you consider Christianity as “more true” than these myths? If so, why? If not, why not explore those myths with equal fervor?
I ask this because I have a vague suspicion that I can’t quite articulate yet, but that I know is “inspired” by my exploration of Friedrich Nietzsche’s work. So far, he seems to argue that myths are not created equal and that the types of myths you are drawn to reflect your level of health (in “The Birth Of Tragedy” and “Twilight of the Idols” to some extent, and “The Antichrist” to a much greater degree). He argues that the images and mythic structures of Buddhism, Christianity, Euripidean plays, and “modern myths” are only attractive to “exhausted/sick” people, whereas the images and mythic structure of the Ancient Greeks is attractive to people who have a “superabundance of health” I really want to know what your perspective is on this because I like your perspectives and don’t want to misunderstand you. Do you think that there are symbols that are “more healthy” to expose yourself to than others, even if they represent the same thing? Are Achilles and Christ really comparable, especially when considering the behaviors that they actually manifest in their myths? Etc.
(I am going to post this comment on a few of your videos in the hopes that you will respond to it. If that seems to you like spam, I apologize.)
I think Nietzsche was wrong and that he did not see all aspects of Christianity, only decadent protestant German Luteranism. Funny enough, Christ is the very union of the Apollonian and Dionysian strands he so talked about, he only could not see it. Also, there is no way to live in the Greek Myths today. It is useful to know them, but one cannot live in them. Christianity offers a living tradition which embodies the stories on both an individual and social level.
Jonathan Pageau
Why do you think Nietzsche was wrong about Christianity? What, specifically, do you think he didn’t see in it?
Why do you consider Christ the union of the Apollonian and the Dionysian (rather than the epitome of the Apollonian, as Nietzsche seems to suggest when referencing Raphael’s painting “The Transfiguration” as an example of Apollonian art)? What in “the Christ image” is Dionysian?
Why can’t we “live in” Greek myths (or at least try to)?
And finally, to refer back to two of my original questions: Do you think that sick people are drawn to different myths (including the behaviors and overall aesthetic of the mythic symbols) than healthy people? Do you think that Christianity is “more true” than Greek myths? If so, why - and why prioritize Christianity in light of the answers to these questions?
Thank you for responding so soon, by the way. I know I’ve essentially barraged you with questions, but I do want to know how you answer these questions in order to see if there is a “hierarchy of myths” and whether exposure to Christianity is actually beneficial to (or at least not harmful to) my health.
Reginald D. He allready told you the disagreement tho Nietzche thinks christ embodies the indivual that sacrificed himself for the group- for the construct of their sins, he is the ultimate altruist actor. In "meek shall inherit the world" For him meek means weak. While in traditional view Christ is the actor that mediates between order and chaos, Apollon and Dionysos. And "meek" means those who have swords but keep them reserved only for the proper use, rather those who don't have one at all.
Reginald D. And maybe Greek myths are not liveable because they don't have an overarching structure, one true ideal(god), but they are only the incomplete fight of many ideals. It's like stuck in Ragnarok.
Reginald D. Which kinda reflects their early political structure
To a man with a hammer, everything looks like nails.
Logan is Canadian
...Jango Fett...Boba Fett...
I feel like you should explain that these movies are abominations. Who is the being in the bottomless pit, that needs to be set free?
I wanted to like the film but just couldn't get past the replacement theology: all the vilians are white guys and even the ones who aren't explicitly evil (like Professor X) still hurt people simply by their presence,; the future is POC and female; and even the past in which white dudes were heros is presented as false when Logan criticizes the comic books. Laura is presented as a more perfect version of Logan because she has both front claws for attacking AND back claws for defending, being described as the head Lionness. So not only does the Matriarchy replace the Patriarchy, it does so in a more perfect and complete way.
Hated this movie solely because they put that little girl in that role. Ruined the whole movie for me
This is great!