A Black Cat Crosses Your Path: The Indelible Durability of Black Cat Superstitions Through Their Use in Horror Films

 

            The association of cats with the occult, Halloween and generally anything spooky, has been woven into our culture through centuries’ long entanglements of superstitions, folklore, and anti-cat rhetoric; coupled with the embrace and overall cultural primacy of dogs in many western civilizations. This specious speciesist behavior can be, in part, attributed to the differences in domestication between cats and dogs. Whereas dogs were domesticated first, simultaneously independent in other geographic regions and bred for a variety of purposes that were both practical for the survival of the human species and for social companionship (the dog is “man’s best friend”[1], after all), the domestication of cats, while similarly early and paralleled geographic independence and diversity, their use was far more practical, in the elimination of vermin. Unlike K-9 integration, cats have undergone little genetic or behavioral changes as they have been independently integrated across countries and continents. This independence and lack of evolutionary refinement led to the negative associations many cultures developed around felines, especially black cats. This paper is a brief exploration of those negative associations/superstitions from a sociological perspective, steeping the enmity of cats in the ubiquitous proliferation of the Christian religion and mechanisms of gendered oppression, to the point where these associations eventually get reproduced in our modern mythology of movies.

HISTORICAL CONTEXT  

            The practiced acrimony toward (black) cats is a byproduct of religious colonialism. Masculinely coded and just as fragile, the manifest destiny minded, pre-pubecently lecherous institution of Christianity sought to eradicate any belief that did not align with their patriarchically hegemonic monotheism; and black cats were caught in its undertow. Prior to this invasive transformation, cats were revered as symbols of the divine in a variety of non-Western cultures, including Egypt and Greece. Even European folklore had a more amenable association with cats prior to this invasion; seeing cats as being both spiritual and familial companions. Yet, as the influence of the church spread, it wrestled power from the people to loom their manufactured divinity over the people they were enslaving.

            In 1233, Pope Gregory declared that black cats were an incarnation of Satan. This sparked an inquisition into duplicitous demonology and established literal “witch hunts” that were designed to eradicate a Luciferian cult that had developed in the region (Wilde, 2017)[2]. That these practices pre-date both the decree and the Christian religion itself was of no matter, as the goal was a complete elimination or emulsification of these traditions; stripping what they need from them and gaining loyalty and obedience while amassing power though establishing authority.  This process can be understood through the Sociology of Religion

 

            The Sociology of Religion

The power of the oligarchic patriarchal Christianity and its demonization of black cats can be understood by looking at the Sociology of religion and the work of Emile Durkheim and Max Weber. Durkheim (2001) discusses the foundational principle of the sacred, a concept that predates the formation of institutionalized religion. The sacred is socially constructed through individual and group interactions surrounding a belief or object, and the restrictions that we place on how that object, belief or behavior can be expressed. Something becomes sacred through our own experiences, when other people tell us something is sacred, or when there are social restrictions and consequences around the mishandling of an object or behavior. Ironically, “sacredness” does not only include the divine, but also the diabolical. Therefore, even though black cats and the superstitions around their behavior consider them to be deplorable, they are still sacred.

The valuation of black cats as still being sacred hits at the core of the power of religion for Durkheim; the content of belief is less important than the function and control of that belief. Social organization determines how people are going to understand and accept religious belief. But this practice has more to do with social order and social control rather than anything spiritual. This is what Durkheim called “collective effervescence” where through emotional contagion and appeal to a higher authority, feelings of emotional security, comfort and solace get attributed to a higher power or an exalted entity when those feelings of elation, fear, hope and sadness are, instead, the product of basic group dynamics. This, on the surface, seems to promote spiritual plurality as it is the group, and not the belief that is the most important.  However, the culturally relativistic practice of spiritual plurality does not develop into the acquisition of and exercise of social power. For that, belief needs to be greatly regulated, creating a tighter grip on what is considered acceptable, and an elaborate policing of belief and behaviors that a group does not find to be legitimate. It requires bureaucratic institutionalization.

Max Weber (2002) understands the relationship between religious belief and social structures, in the way it uses belief as a resource and currency to allow that structure to replicate itself. The cultivation of that “collective effervescence” is done through legitimation in the form of the social structure that establishes the social order. Belief Systems (folktales and other indigenous stories) are born out of traditional levels of authority, which justifies its ascension to power through tribal leaderships supported by bloodline or birth order. Unfortunately, this still allows for plurality, thereby minimizing the power of the system’s ability to create collective effervescence. To control how people experience belief, and maximize the output of disassociation between the power of a belief and the recognition of group dynamics, belief systems have to be bureaucratized by being transformed into a religion.

  A religion is a belief system that has been routinized. There are fixed jurisdictions of authorities, the organizational chart is structured as a hierarchy, there is archival communication and correspondence, there is a level of impersonality and an obligatory drive for the reproduction of the religious structure itself (Weber 2019). This obligatory reproductive drive of religion is also comparable to the institutions of masculinity and capitalism of which they too share a bureaucratic organization and the fatal flaw of fragility requiring proliferation in lew of perishing. All three institutional mechanisms have rigid belief structures without acceptance of diversity difference or deference. Therefore, Capitalism must propagate itself through profit and monopolization, Masculinity through a toxic hegemonic expression of itself that every person has to accept, acquiesce, amplify or interrogate, and religion through monotheistic missionary work and conversion. Each has a drive and focus to cover the planet, because it is threatened by anything that isn’t itself or complementary to it. Thus, the vilification of black cats can find its origin in the eradication of nonwestern beliefs and cultures because they threaten the fragile supremacist organization of oligarchic Patriarchal Christianity. Since this proliferation of these uniform institutions continue today, many of these beliefs and practices are reproduced in our film and popular culture.

 

SOCIAL ANALYSIS

            Film and popular culture are forms of soft power within society. They influence public perception and reflect the values that we both live by and aspire to. They are a mirror and a wish fulfilment fantasy separately or often simultaneously. Since the historic valuation of dogs as the animal most coveted for human companionship, cats have been regulated to something other, less than. This is, at least in part because of the threat that cats pose to the religious social order throughout history, being associated with beliefs and practices that needed to be eradicated to strengthen the importance and claim of Oligarchic Patriarchal Christianity. Furthering this aim, is that one of the most consistent representations of cats, particularly black cats, is within the Horror genre. This is using the language of cinema as another tool to reinforce the erroneous claim that cats have a sacredly diabolical “nature”.  Granted it is unclear if these depictions have the same lofty purpose as the religious decrees of the past; or that the “spooky” nature of [black] cats has seeped into our culture for so long that it has poisoned our attitudes toward these feline familiars by being part of the horror zeitgeist. To interrogate this further, there is an interesting juxtaposition of two representations of black cats in horror films, one from within the hegemonically Christian United States of the 1940’s in Cat People  and the 1960’s Japanese Feminist Horror film Kuroneko.

            Black Cat Comparisons in Film: Cat People and Kuroneko

                The 1942 film Cat People is one of the first horror films by producer Val Lewen for RKO pictures. The film follows the budding romance between Serbian Immigrant Irena (Simone Simon) and her bespoken beau Oliver Reed (Kent Smith). As their courtship turns to marriage, Irena confides in Oliver that she is descendant of a group of witches, cursed to transform into violent cat-like beasts whenever they feel either love or passion; pursued to almost eradication by King John. The majority of the film’s economic runtime (of 77 minutes) is spent in denial or trying to cure Irena of this so-called delusion through Psychoanalysis, until the fears are realized, and the transformations begin.

             Cat People has a lot of socially relevant and seemingly progressive themes for the time (divorce, the struggles of immigration, the ease of white male privilege, the importance of mental health, the validity of working women and platonic cisgendered heterosexual friendships). Part of this progressiveness is due to it being a genre picture in Horror. Much like Noir of the 1930’s, more progressive ideas and attitudes were allowed because it was in a genre that was perceived as a fantasy, as outside the realm of reality.  Also, in typical Hollywood fashion of the time, the film ultimately forgoes these progressive themes, labeling them as dangerous (vilifying female sexuality) and/or in need of correcting. Then, doubles down on the reproduction of the “traditional family” through the construction of typical romantic traditions and the elimination of “the other”, in this case, the “immigrant other” of Irena. The image and representation of cats are used as an allegorical cautionary tale against these progressive ideas. The cat is the other, so “the other” is represented by a cat; thereby sealing their fate for their perceived transgressions. The wildness and violence that Irena displays as a shape shifted feline beast, speaks volumes about the fear of female sexuality as something that needs to be contained, controlled or destroyed. At the same time, this solidifies the feminization of cats and masculinization of dogs, that linguistically is still hard to shake. Colloquially, we often use the pronouns of she/her for cats and he/him for dogs regardless of the sex of the actual animal.[3]

This cautionary tale of female sexuality becomes even more crystalized when viewed through a queer lens. The struggle that Irena has with understanding a secret side of herself that she’s had since she was born, can be an easy stand in for the Queer communities coming out process. From this perspective, the stalking of Oliver’s co-worker, Alice, takes on a new dimension. Gone is the simplistically traditional reverberation of the scorned wife, in its place is a delectably juicy subversion of Irena trying to contain her animalistic lust for another woman. Unfortunately, the film still centers itself in the reproduction of the traditionally Christian ideas that results in an early example of the “bury your gays” trope.

Years later, Japanese filmmaker Kaneto Shindo reappropriated the perceived diabolical nature of [black] cats into a horror revenge fantasy with Kuroneko. The film is part of the kaibyo “Demon Cat/Ghost Cat subgenre of Japanese horror films that originated from Kabuki theater; but gained popularity prior to WWII and again in the 1960’s. Kuroneko is unique among its contemporaries as that the demon death dealt by the cat, has a vengefully noble purpose. In the film, a mother and her daughter-in-law are raped and murdered by a troop of Samurai before their house is burned down. After they are brought back by a demon cat as vengeful spirits, they seduce and murder Samurai that wander in the woods, tearing their throats out. This becomes such a problem that, in a twist of fateful irony, the mother/ daughter-in-law’s son/husband is sent to destroy them. With each unable to destroy the other, one of the ghosts becomes damned and the Samurai, realizing what he’s done, wastes away to nothing.    

The subversion of western tropes in Kuroneko is notable both in its storytelling and its depiction of cats. The Japanese onryo (feminine vengeful spirit) has become an easy allegory for feminist respite and revolution in modern and postmodern filmmaking[4]. The anger and desire for retribution is compellingly understood due to the ubiquity of misogynistic western Patriarchal rule that has become so conventional that it is actually a trope. Additionally, Japanese folklore does not see the cat as demonic, or the spawn of Satan as Pope Gregory did. Instead, cats in Japan can have an interesting duality. They can either be seen as benevolent creatures of good fortune (manekineko)[5] or they can be precocious shape shifting tricksters (bakeneko) which garner them a more malevolent moniker and reputation. In Kuroneko, the black cat spirit could be seen as balancing the scales towards justice; for the pain and rage felt by the two women deserves rectifying retribution.

Unfortunately, there is also a debilitating gender double standard that goes on within these narratives. As often happens within these stories, when men seek retributive violence for the death and loss of a loved one, their orgiastic orgasm of violence is a tempestuous tapestry of glorifyingly gory images to the point that it is considered artful. Think of the work of Eric Draven in The Crow (the good version) or the titular John Wick. Yet, when women seek retribution, arguably for something more devastating, and sadly commonplace, their vengeance usually comes at the cost of their own life.  This is a part of The Rape Culture that is rarely discussed: when women are allowed to be saviors or vengeance demons, they must also be punished for it. Too much feminine independence threatens the masculine structures of the oligarchic patriarchy. Women in these stories are always being “rained in”, they have “gone too far”, or are shown to have remorse for their actions. Meanwhile, men will carve whole bloody paths through entire civilizations with little introspection, consequence or comeuppance. They are singularly focused and when they have had their fill, they often die because there was nothing left inside them but rage. When that is gone, there is nothing left. Men are often depicted as an instrument through which that rage worked through.

The impact of myths and superstitions on the Real life of Cats

  The overall impact of the religious persecution of cats by Christianity and the overwhelming durability of cat themed superstitions that are reproduced in popular culture, specifically in film, have an indelibly direct impact into the lives of actual cats. Even though cats are the second largest animal to be adopted in the United States with 26% of household owning at least one cat, this pales in comparison to the number of households that own dogs (45%). The entire pet industry produced a revenue of 157 billion dollars in 2023. This includes nutrition, supplies/medicines, veterinarian care, live animal purchases, and other services.  Of that, it is a 60/40 split between dogs and cats. Fewer cats are housed as pets when compared to dogs, and people spend less on their cats than their dogs. Part of this statistic can be attributed to the simple fact that cats are (typically) smaller animals requiring less maintenance and care.[6] Yet, this does not account for the infrastructure of boarding companies, grooming salons, specialty shops and segregated parks that revolve around dogs. This creates a culture that is consistently more welcoming and understanding to the dog parent, than to the cat parent. There is a level of cultural capital to dog ownership that cat owners have yet to experience (Bourdieu 1984). Dogs have been commodified by our culture as secondary children in ways that cats still are ostracized. This can partially be explained by the subservience that dogs feel when living with a family. Most aim to please and have fierce loyalty. Whereas, while cats are very much social creatures, and enjoy being part of a family, they perceive themselves as being the most important creature in the house, or more generously, see everyone on equal footing with themselves. This is misinterpreted by many pet parents as independence or aloofness. It is neither. Cats aren’t immediately intimidated and subjugated by humans just by our size. In fact, they tend to see us as gangly stupid, big bipedal cats. Thus, unlike dogs in which their service and loyalty was bred into them through generations of domestication from wolves to dogs, cat’s affection, admiration and respect, must be earned by their humans. Any good cat parent will confirm, it is worth it[7]

Additionally, cats have been blamed for a variety of social ills throughout history either as a direct cause or an adjacent accessory. Cats were blamed for the spread of the black plague. Ironically however, it was their annihilation due to this false belief that contributed to the proliferation of the disease since the cats were killing and eating the true carriers…the rats. These negative myths and superstitions also impact cat adoption and euthanasia rates. Black cats are only being adopted at about 10 % of all cats adopted, while they make up 74 % of cat euthanasia. This causes many black cats to live out their lives in shelters. In correlation, many shelters do not adopt out black cats in an around Halloween because of an unsubstantiated sense threat of violence against them, or (more commonly) the likelihood of the cat being returned when the holiday is over.     

 

CONCLUSION

The continuation of these myths and superstitions about black cats that were originally used to reinforce a religiously oligarchic patriarchy which eventually spanned cultures, and infiltrated our popular culture has left an ineradicable effect on the lives of cats. This unfortunately obfuscates the health benefits of cat ownership. In addition to the common factors of pet ownership with its increase in overall health, reducing stress and increasing serotonin and dopamine; purring cat frequencies have been shown to help heal injuries and reduce inflammation. With more accurate testimonials from good cat parents, and a more accurate depiction of Cats in popular media, hopefully these myths and superstitions about black cats can soon be dispelled.

 

Author’s Note: This article was written during the processing of my grief from the loss of my cat Poncho.  He is now with his sister Mia. I love you. My floofy little fascist.   

 

REFERENCES

Bourdieu Pierre 1987. Distinction: A Social Critique of the Judgement of Taste. Massachusetts: Harvard University Press

Durkheim, Emile 2001.  The Elementary Forms of Religious Life New York: Oxxford University Press

Weber Max 2002. The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism and other Writings New York: penguin Publishing

__________2019. Economy and Society: A New Translation Massachusetts Harvard University Press.

Wilde, Layla Morgan 2017. Black Cats Tell All: True Stories and Inspiring Images New York: Cat Wisdom 101  

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[1] This leans into the obvious ongoing misgendering of dogs and cats to be only associated with cisgendered masculine and feminine traits respectively 

[2] https://www.barnesandnoble.com/w/black-cats-tell-all-layla-morgan-wilde/1127199937

[3] Since we typically mislabel the sex assigned category of cats, is it any wonder we are having a difficult time understanding the realities of trans-folk and the importance of their representation?

[4] One of the more recent examples of this is Mizu, the protagonist of the Blue Eye Samurai series  

[5] Think of the “Hello Kitty”esque prosperity figurines that you see in small shops in Japan.

[6] Though these numbers are rising

[7] Most Cat Owners should not have cats

The Sociology of Akira

INTRODUCTION

            Since its release in 1988, Katsuhiro Otomo’s film Akira changed the cultural landscape for animation. A film that showed the possibilities of hand drawn animation at a time when animation itself was not validated, especially in the west. Because of this, many people consider Akira to not only be a seminal work in the genre, but also one of the greatest films ever created[1]. In this essay, I will be taking a more Sociological approach to Otomo’s Magnum Opus, focusing on the historical and cultural impact of the film while trying to wrestle with the complex and sociologically relevant themes the film presents.

PLOT

Set 31 years after WWIII that was sparked by the “Akira Event” in 1988. The 2019 city of Neo Tokyo is beset by biker gangs, civil unrest, and a society that is under military control. We are introduced to Kaneda, the teenage leader of the biker gang known as “The Pills” and his best friend and fellow gang member Tetsuo. During an ensuing battle with their rivals “The Clowns”, Tetsuo is injured when he comes in contact with a fleeing child that is part of a government/military experiment into psychic weapons (called ESPERS). Upon retrieval of the subject, Tetsuo is also taken and experimented on by the Government. As a result of this experimentation, Tetsuo begins to unlock unimaginable power. As that power grows, Tetsuo begins to wreak havoc across the city looking for the answer to the question “Who is Akira”? In the end, it will take Kaneda, a resistance fighter named Kei and the ESPERS to stop him. 

HISTORICAL CONTEXT

 The creation of Akira can be traced back to the cultural and generational responses to WWII, and Japan’s obsession with atomic imagery afterward. After its release, the film takes on a life of its own becoming a source of inspiration as a cultural product.          

 Military and fear of Youth  

            After WWII, the Japanese signed a treaty that forced their army to be disbanded. This lead to the Article 9 Amendment to the Japanese constitution during US occupation.

 It states:

1. .      Aspiring sincerely to an international peace based on justice and order, the Japanese people forever renounce war as a sovereign right of the nation and the threat or use of force as a means of settling international disputes
2. .      In order to accomplish the aim of the proceeding paragraph, land sea and air forces, as well as other war potential, will never be maintained

 The interpretation of this article defined japan as a pacifist nation for several years. However, in 1954 there was an establishment of a regulatory agency and police force that would eventually become The Japanese Ministry of defense and the Japan Self Defense Forces. Slowly, over the second half of the 20^th century and the beginning of the 21^st, the existence and expansion of the military and the police force was rationalized. This came to a head in 2014, when it was ruled that the Japanese Police Force could defend allies and themselves in times of war; effectively ending the idea of a pacifist nation through these broad changes. 

            Created in 1988, Akira is barely one generation removed from WWII. Thus, the depiction of the military is a cautionary tale. Since there were those that still vividly remembered the horrors of war, it makes since that their depiction of a Military totalitarianism in the pop culture future of Akira would be equally bleak. This is illustrated in the film’s first major sequence. As Takashi, #26 is fleeing with his liberator, we learn about protests against military control and the existence of an anti-government resistance movement.  Additionally, we see images and hear passing references to a military curfew through martial law, roadblock checkpoints, and a military style coup ( more on this later). While a lot of this is atmospheric to the overall plot of the film, the viewer understands the palpable fear and an air of mistrust the people have for the military institution and military officers Otomo had, which was shared by other creators at the time (look at the other work by famed animators Takahata and Miyazaki).

            This fear of government authoritarianism was so strong in the generation born in the shadow of WWII (1946-1970) that there was an engrained cultural norm of governmental distrust especially in the youth culture which was strongly anti-nationalistic. Therefore, creators of this generation feature young and or teenage protagonists while the government or some other institution (usually a corporation) is depicted as the antagonist[2]. There is a sense here that within the cultural product, the governmental distrust is refracted, depicting a fear of the youth culture by the government. Thus, a lot of stories from creators of this time show the government suppression of the youth or a lack of understanding of the youth by the government (again through the work of Takahata and Miyazaki)  In Akira, this is clearly visible through the interactions the government and the military have with the teenage bikers. The soldiers are ready to use deadly force when they first encounter them Then, the government interrogates them twice: first through the police, then again through corporal punishment by their vocational school Principal.

Atomic Imagery

A lot of the imagery and state of society (specifically Tokyo) in the opening of AKIRA has its roots in the cultural and social impact of the violence of World War II, specifically the bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki that ended the Japanese involvement in the war. Since Aug 6^th, and August 9^th 1945 the Japanese, in their fiction and popular culture, have been fascinated with the imagery of the atomic bomb as a form of collective coping strategy.

Frank Fuller, political Science professor at Villanova University investigates this in his article “ The Deep influence of the A-Bomb on Anime and Manga.”  In it he mentions that Akira is not the only film to reflect the imagery of the atomic bomb and its fall out, but many creators living through and in the shadow of WWII also were fascinated with the same image.  In fact, the image has permeated the consciousness of Japan so completely that 75 years later creators are still coming back to it. From Direct allegories like Godzilla and Barefoot Gen, to the litany of more subtle imagery that encompasses a lot of  more current anime from Naruto and My Hero Academia to One Punch Man and Demon Slayer all incorporate the same or similar imagery of the atomic bomb.

 However, the importance of the A-bomb in Japanese popular culture extends beyond just the visuals of the explosion. Often Japanese works of fiction deal with the social, economic, and political fallout of the bomb in addition to its radioactive tendencies. The subjects of orphans, radiation mutation of plants, animals, and people, a lack of trust of technology and hope being born out of tragedy.  The atomic bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki transformed popular culture of Japan and through global distribution has allowed other cultures to understand the enormity of such an event, and the strength one needs to have to survive it.

Cultural Relativity

   Any piece of media that is created carries with it the cultural, social, and historical context in which it was created. These products then become a measurement for several social, political and social issues at the time of creation, regardless of the themes each work has, or the meaning they are trying to convey. Therefore, the standards by which we judge these cultural products should take this into account. In Sociology, we call this process cultural relativity. This is the process by which individuals evaluate a piece of media (or other cultural products) by the standards at the time it was created without judging it by the standards of the current or different (international) culture.

While the process of cultural relativity is important there is a strong criticism that needs mentioning. If one fully adopts cultural relativity completely, without exception, then an individual could explain away any behavior, regardless of the type of behavior, or what it represents. We see this type of rationalization in all parts of society especially around people’s behaviors. Someone will say “Oh, it was a different time, back then.” Or “They are just a product of their times.” Usually these rationalizations are not being culturally relative, but instead are using it as a shield against criticism.  A specific example of this is when the public attempt to use this to rationalize individual behavior. Unlike media, individuals are not trapped in amber, sealed as a relic of history. As humans we have the ability to grow and change as we learn and accept new realities and truths that we did not before Thus, trying to use this to explain away behavior (that is usually racist and sexist) of people is at the very least problematic, and at most, tacitly accepting bigotry. Additionally, even while there is a separation between behavior and product when invoking cultural relativity that does not mean that the product is free from historical scrutiny.

While cultural relativity is important to understand a product’s cultural place in history, the cultural product can be scrutinized by “not aging well” or to be downright canceled[3] as social and political values have shifted and even progressed. This is a debate that has continued into our contemporary culture. The line of acceptable and offensiveness seems to be one of personal taste. However, there is some merit to our ability to resistance cultural norms, and depending how present they are, judging a cultural product on the possibility of inclusiveness at the time.  For example, a film made in the 1970’s that does not have a lot of female representation can be “canceled” because there are several examples of multiple types of female characters in film at that same time.[4] This criticism is warranted as it shows that regardless of the norm(s) of the time period in which it is created, there are always outliers that can be used to identify what was possible regardless of the historical context.   

Akira as a cultural product

.Akira began as a manga (Japanese comic book) first published in 1982-1990 within the pages of Young Magazine. The manga was then collected into a six-volume series. The series went on to critical and commercial success becoming the first Manga to be completely translated into English. It was this work that complete broke the boundaries of what a Manga could be, especially the audience it could reach. Thus, Akira (The manga and the film) a cultural product of Japan, validated anime as a legitimate genre, sparked an artistic movement, and initiated the global profitability and western obsession with Japanese animation.

 As stated, Akira both the manga and the film from which it is adapted are specific cultural products. Yet, due to a difference in media distribution, the manga and the film end up diverging in terms of plot, motivation, and scope. Because the manga is a serialized format: the length, depth and detail of the story can be explored in minute detail. This is the result of market pressure to have to sell the next issue. This is the same reason why there are little stakes in western superhero comic books. You know Batman is not going to die, or if he does, he will come back. Why? Because capitalism deems it so. Whereas, if this same process is this was attempted in a theatrical format, the production would not only be impossibly laborious, but it would be a length that would be ostensibly unwatchable and/or completely unsatisfying. Thus, in its adaptation, the film version of Akira condenses the plot of the manga, removes ancillary characters and changes narrative focus to make sense in the theatrical format.[5] However, I believe both the manga and the film benefit from being created and overseen by Otomo himself. Allowing the aspects of the story that were truncated, being approved by their creator.

The overall impact the film adaptation has on the culture of anime in general can not be overstated. Costing a whopping 10 million (in US dollars) this was the largest budget for an animated film in Japanese history at the time (until it was overtaken by Miyazaki’s Princess Mononoke in 1999). You can see the difference, care and craft in the film compared to other animated films at the time. Many of the sequences, character motivations and even individual shots are referenced, presented as homages, and adored by many in the industry even outside animation. It is because of this care and attention to detail that the film is constantly being cited as an influence on directors and various genres many of which the typical viewer would not expect.

These two Video Essays on the Influence and Impact of the film really illustrate just how monumental the film was and the film’s continuing permeance in entertainment.

The Impact:

The Influence

In the 30+ years since its release, Akira  continues to be a focal point for both inspiration and duplication. Even becoming a seminal work in the style called Cyberpunk. Cyberpunk is a branch of the science fiction genre that is differentiated by a lawless or institutionally oppressive society that is dominated by advanced computer technology.  This extends into the creation of cyborgs and other biotech science fiction. The mood of cyberpunk is both style and substance. It has the neon of the 1980’s punk, dance aesthetic with the grimier world of Noir. This makes the usually pristine imagery of advanced societies/ technology seem more tactile and lived in. A lot of futuristic Neo-Noir films and stories have a cyberpunk edge to them.    

This documentary should shed some light on the genre:  

    

SOCIAL ANALYSIS

            The analysis of such a thematically rich and dense film as Akira, is complex and multifaceted.  There are several ways in which to dissect this film which would be valid interpretations.  In this section I will breakdown the themes and plot of the film from a sociological perspective. To that end, we need to look at the work of C. Wright Mills, Mishel Foucault, Pierre Bourdieu, , Emile Durkheim, Max Weber, and Peter Berger.

Mills and The Military Industrial Complex.

C. Wright Mills (2000) points to a social structural organization of powerful social institutions that sees the collusion and corruption between three structures politics, the economy and the military. According to Mills (2000), individuals that make up these intersecting structures are deemed “The Power Elite” and it is their positions in these institutions of power that give them influence and control.  This eventually develops into what Mills describes, and a term coined by Eisenhower as The Military Industrial Complex.

 This is a social organization and process that reinforces these institutions and expands them. In this system, the government expands military budget and the scope of military actions, while the biggest sectors of pour economy is in the defense industry. Thereby leading to many elected officials having ties to both the military and private industry; making them the prime recipients of the global presence of the military, shaping the global economy and international relations.

In the beginning of Akira, “The Akira Event” causes World War III and out of the ashes of this conflict is Neo-Tokyo controlled by a corrupt group of politicians who fund the mechanization and weaponization of space (SOL) and the Human mind (Tetsuo and The ESPERS). Throughout the course of the film we not only hear references to military checkpoints, but we witness the violent suppression of student protests and the annihilation of revolutionary leaders.  In the film’s climax, this structure implodes into a military style coup resulting in a complete military dictatorship.     

Foucault Madness and Drugs

   The work of Michel Foucault began with a study of The History Madness as his doctoral dissertation, then continued on in one of his first books about the genealogy of the subject titled Madness and Civilization. These texts, along with the lecture series published later (specifically Abnormal and Psychiatric Power) frame madness as an altered state of consciousness that needs to be understood. Unfortunately, these altered states were not conducive to the organizational structure of society that is built around typical consciousness. Thus, through various interpersonal and institutional mechanisms of social control the “othering” of madness took place; forsaking individuals in the name of systemic order which reigns supreme.

Foucault (1999) (2003) states that:

1)      The Human is a monster, and what makes a monster a monster is that it introduces disorder into the legal system.

2)      Organizational emphasis on Science allows for the defining and vilifying of “madness” as “illness” allowing for intervention.

3)      The individual needs to be corrected through the training of bodies, behaviors and abilities of those who have escaped a system of norms

4)      This correction is usually achieved through confinement to get individuals to see the error of their ways and restore their “better feelings” [meaning those more conducive to the structure in place].

5)      “Recovery” is not about truth, self-actualization or health, it is about achieving Normalcy as dictated by the system.  

            Additionally, Foucault believed that you could also glean knowledge from “madness” through the use of (usually psychotropic) drugs.  That, through the experience of drug use (specifically, LSD), one’s consciousness could open reaching a difference plane/perspective which was only afforded to those deemed “mad”. Thus, by illustrating the connection of psychosis and knowledge results in a popular correlation between drug use, madness and genius; many citing that they often exist in tandem.

According to Simeon Wade (2019) it was a drug induced epiphany that eventually lead to some of Foucault’s greatest work, and was, by Foucault’s admission the greatest experience of his life. This then begs the question the role drugs play in reaching a higher plane of existence or an aspect of consciousness that one could not reach on their own.

This is even a subject of a new Documentary on Netflix:

In Akira, these Foucauldian ideas around madness and drug use is embodied in the experiences and fate of Tetsuo.  The Japanese Government/Military, to grasp at untapped potential of the human mind, attempt to weaponize people for their own purposes through experimentation on those with psychic potential and Pharmacology. Realizing that the encounter with Takashi (Esper # 26) unlocked Tetsuo’s psychic potential, The Cornel and The Doctor in charge of the program decide to start him on “level seven capsules” to develop his abilities.  The trauma of the accident with Takashi, and the pharmaceutical drugs used to unlock his latent power, causes Tetsuo to “go mad” and shift into another state of conscious where his power can be fully realized. Towards the end of the film, when Tetsuo loses access to the drugs he has been administered, he turns to illegal narcotics which not only increase his psychosis but expands his psionic capabilities beyond the capacity of his human body.  While he was able to achieve these feats through these means, in the film, it acts as a cautionary tale of Man’s “ability to reach beyond their grasp.”

Symbolic Power within Religion

Modern French Sociologist Pierre Bourdieu (1930-2002), the founder of “The European Center of Sociology had a broad subject area in which he wrote. From culture and social class to language, gender dynamics, and social analysis, Bourdieu was a Sociologist with eclectic “taste” 😉.  However, in regards to the subject of Akira, it is through Bourdieu’s work on Symbolic Power  that we can understand the abilities of Tetsuo and Akira and their impact on the social order.

According to Bourdieu (1991) Symbolic power [soft power] is a transformed and misrecognizable, transfigured and legitimate form of other forms of power. It is an almost magical power which enables one to obtain the equivalent of what is obtained through force. The dominant has this power over the subordinate within a social system. This is a power that is given and maintained not by direct violence but can be achieved through the threat of violence (which that in itself is symbolic). One of the areas in which this soft power is used is through the institution of Religion and the deification of the prophet.

It needs to at least be acknowledged that for generations, Religions (especially western religions) used hard power to maintain control over the social order. As structure of societies have shifted becoming more outwardly secular religions have had to rely on the soft power mechanisms in order to maintain influence.  These soft power influences are usually orchestrated through social and cultural norms established by religion through the power of socialization. Religions therefore create objects and behaviors that are identified as special, which become ritualized to develop soft power (Durkheim 2008).  That soft power is then used to develop the importance of certain institutions, (or a radicalization of those institutions) into achieving hard power in the form of economic and or military control (Weber, 2002).

 Through the various displays of hard power (in the form of massive psionic blasts that destroy Neo Tokyo) both Akira, and Tetsuo after him, become deified and achieve soft power. Akira through his actions prior to the plot of the film, and Tetsuo during his escape from the hospital when a mob forms being driven by the “Cult of Akira” believing Tetsuo to be the literal second coming. Here, the public has relinquished their power and acquiesces in the face of Tetsuo’s abilities; thereby giving him soft power.  Interestingly enough, in this same process, as Tetsuo wreaks havoc across the city, we witness the religiosity of science.

Peter Berger and the Relationship Between Religion and Science

The religiosity and deification of science, or more clearly the use of science to reach a state of deification in Akira, is paralleled in various places in our modern society. First, those that are devoted to science often display behavior that is like religion. This is partly due to science and religion expressing themselves socially and existing within society. Religion and society are not the same thing, but they behave in society similarly; meaning to some, they serve the same social function.

   Sociologist Peter Berger (1996) discusses this in the way he sees religion and science working off each other.  He states that yes, science has replaced religion in explaining the world. However, when science fails to explain reality (when you should have died in a car accident for example) we often fall back on religious explanations (such as guardian angels) as an explanation. Currently, there are other real-world examples of this in society:

1.       The God Particle explaining why something that should not have mass in the Universe but does.

2.       The 21 gram experiment which was an attempt to measure the weight of the human souls

3.      The fact that we are all made up of space dust  

This relationship is again merged at the climax of the film Akira when Tetsuo’s power is growing out of control and Akira comes back to take him away. The Doctor mentions that Akira’s energy enveloping Tetsuo is that like the birth of the Universe as both Tetsuo and Akira vanish to another plane of existence. Then, the final image on screen is one of supernova with the final line in a serine voice over: “I am, Tetsuo” now a god. Science and religion, together.

CONCLUSION

Akira is one of my favorite films of all time. I first saw this film in the basement of my best friend’s house when I was 15.[6] I was overtaken by all the implications of philosophy sociology, psychology and religion that I could not articulate until now. The film has become so important that it has been attempted to be remade and converted into a live action film for decades. The most current of which is a new series based on the Manga.   

In the end, Akira is one of those seminal classic works that everyone should see it at least once. Additionally, if you like it, and you decide to own it, you should have it in the best quality possible. Luckily, it was announced that the film is getting a 4k Blu-ray release based upon the original 35mm print. The film is worth it, and worth multiple viewings to get all of the deep cultural and social nuances of a film which gets better with every presentation.

References:

Berger, Peter L 1996. “Secularism in Retreat” in The National Interests 46 (3) Expanded Academic ASAP. Web. 27 Sep. 2011.

Document URL
http://go.galegroup.com.proxy.library.nd.edu/ps/i.do?&id=GALE%7CA19130142&v=2.1&u=nd_ref&it=r&p=EAIM&sw=w

Bourdieu, Pierre 1991. Language and Symbolic Power Massachusetts: Harvard University Press

Durkheim, Emile 2008. The Elementary Forms of Religious Life New York: Oxford University Press  

Foucault, Michel 1999. Abnormal: Lectures in the College de France 1974-1975 New York: Picador Publishing

Foucault, Michel 2003. Psychiatric Power: Lectures in the College de France 1973-1975 New York: Picador Publishing

Mills, C. Wright 2000. The Power Elite New York: Oxford University Press

Wade, Simeon 2019. Foucault in California: A True story- Wherein the Great French Philosopher Drops Acid in the Valley of Death California: Heyday Publishing

Weber, Max 2002. The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism and other Writings New York: Penguin Publishing

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[1] The film often shows up on the best of animate film lists, many of them at the top

[2] A perfect example of this is in the brilliant Novel Battle Royale by Koshun Takami The Government fear the next generation so much that they force them to kill each other in order to thin out their ranks, create subservience, and maintain resource levels.

[3] This is used as a slang term to mean To dismiss something/somebody. To reject an individual or an idea

[4] For example, if anyone says There weren’t any female assassin movies in the 1970’s and 80’s turn them on to Gloria directed by John Cassavetes starring Gena Rowlands  

[5] Like with any adaptation, there are some detractors and many that say that what was left out of the film is important and minimizes the themes the film is trying to present.

[6] To this day my best friend and I have a pact that if one of us goes crazy with psychokinetic powers it is the job of the other to stop him.  Testuso and Kanada’s relationship became my friendship goals.