The Culture Industry

In my research I have been reading a lot about The Frankfurt School, a group of neo-marxist theorists, and Theodor Adorno's theories of The Culture Industry.

Adorno described the Culture Industry as essentially a form of brain-washing of the masses by the current regime, capitalism. The aim, according to him, is to discourage any reactionary action by the masses that may pose a threat to them. Standardization plays a large part in this, by controlling all media and making sure everything is uniform and supports their interests they can keep the masses in line. Pseudo-Individualization also plays a large roll, by presenting the masses with the illusion of a choice and the illusion of free-will. For example the choice between two political parties that are exactly the same, it isn't really free-will, it is still under control.

I've summarized the theories extremely briefly and haven't really done them any justice but that's the basic idea, or at least as far as I know. Honestly I'm kind of inclined to agree somewhat, it is easy for me to see the illusion of a choice and of free-will in modern society. However, then Adorno goes to apply his theories to popular music and it all becomes very clear that his theories are very much based on his own, quite frankly, elitist opinions on the subject.

Adorno comes to popular music from the point of view of the 'enlightened intellectual' who holds western classical music and avant-garde music as the best music can offer. He begins to talk about popular music as regressive thinking and as a form of 'false needs' put upon people by society. He describes how interchangeable segments of popular music is and views it as a sign that it is less than the music he loves. Basically his point seemed to be that society is dumbing down the public through the media so as to keep them in line, but as I've already stated his ideas are very much founded upon his own opinions.

There were a number of critiques of Adorno and The Frankfurt School's theories, with a number of good points. For example Gendron points out that Adorno neglects the difference between the functional and the textural. For example the difference between a washing machine and popular music, one is there the fulfill a basic function while the other is very subjective. He also neglects the various different musical genres of popular music, many which differ greatly from one another. It was even pointed out that standardization may occur not because of a ruling society attempting to keep control but rather because of the demands of the consuming masses. One of the key criticisms of Adorno and The Frankfurt School's idea is that they do not attempt to prove any of there ideas with empirical evidence, many of there ideas can't be proven with empirical evidence, and from my point of view if you can't back up your point with evidence your probably wrong.

I think I will argue against Adorno, I wish to make the point that both intellectual films, films that challenge and provoke thought, and entertainment films, films that are there purely for enjoyment purposes, both have there place and neither is more or less than the other.

I also wish to make the point that neither is the true problem with cinema, as I see it, the true problem are films that are made not to entertain nor to provoke thought but to make a profit. I think that this is destructive to cinema, because it encourages lazy film making and creates a system where the trailers, ticket sales and marketing campaigns are more important than the film itself or the audience's experience. For example, as Kevin Smith pointed out, after making Clerks 2 and after being hounded by the people funding the film to keep it on budget, they then revealed to him that they intended to spend twice the budget of the movie on advertising.