Alan J. Pakula was a versatile
writer, producer and director of cinema of the 1970’s through the 1990’s.
Unfortunately, like his fellow overshadowed contemporary,
John Sayles,
Pakula was eclipsed by the light of the New Hollywood golden children of Lucas,
Scorsese, Coppola, and Spielberg in the public consciousness. Adept at many
genres, Pakula made a name for himself with the suspenseful political thriller.
While his work may not have coined the term, it certainly redefined it. Three of
Pakula’s films emphasize this genre mastery: Klute, The Parallax View, and
All the President’s Men. These three films loosely encompass what has
been deemed Pakula’s “Paranoid Trilogy” and it is the next focus of the blog’s
continuous director deep-dives.
BRIEF BACKGROUND
Born in 1928 in the Bronx, Pakula, a life-long New
Yorker, eventually studied drama at Yale (graduating in 1948) before moving to
Hollywood, using his father’s contacts at the Warner Bros. cartoon department to
get into the industry. He got his first break as an assistant to Don Hartman at
Paramount, while simultaneously producing plays for the New York Stage. This
eventually led to forming a Production company with director Robert Mulligan
aptly named Pakula-Mulligan Productions.
The first big hit of this
partnership was the stage version and eventual film adaptation of Harper Lee’s
classic American Novel, To Kill a Mockingbird. This producing and
directing partnership, from this collaboration alone, garnered multiple academy
award nominations and three wins: one for each of the pair. This lucrative
partnership would last through the 1960’s, with Pakula first stepping behind
the camera to direct Liza Minelli in The Sterile Cuckoo.
Pakula made a name for himself among actors, earning
their respect and the coveted title of “an actor’s director.” Throughout his
career he directed 8 Academy Award Nominated performances, three of them
winning Oscar Gold, with two of those wins coming from “The Paranoid Trilogy”
itself (Jane Fonda for Klute, and Jason Robards in All the
President’s Men). Pakula was one of the directors that believed that
casting was one of the most important jobs, indicating that if you cast the
film correctly, you do not have to worry about the actor’s performance. This
might be one of the reasons that even outside of the acclaimed ‘trilogy’, actors
flocked to his films for the trust and faith he had in them, especially for the
way he was able to direct female actors.
Even though he only directed 16 films across
three decades, because of affinity for the craft and professionalism of acting,
he was able to secure several A-list actors. This had a differing effect
depending on where the actor was in their career. This “Pakula bump” made up-and-coming
actors a household name (Fonda in Klute), made established actors’ leaders
in the field (Harrison Ford in Presumed Innocent and Denzel Washington
in The Pelican Brief) or reminded the public of older actor’s greatness
(Robards in All the President’s Men).
The films culturally dubbed “The Paranoid
Trilogy” include three films early in Pakula’s career from the 1970’s. While each film was constructed independently,
without the intention of linking the films through the narrative or similar
characters; film historians, critics and cinema scholars have connected these
films together because of their similarity of tone and themes which include the
representation of the 1970’s and the general distrust of the government. This
similarity could also be explained by Pakula himself and the ways that he
approaches the political thriller subgenre. The Films of this “loose trilogy”
of political thrillers are Klute, The Parallax View, and All
the President’s Men.
Klute
(1971)
The
first film in this unofficial trilogy involves a call girl to the wealthy (Jane
Fonda) helping a detective (Donald Sutherland) with a missing person case of
one of her Johns who may have been stalking her. Klute captures the
ambiance and the cultural mood of the 1970’s. Its eerie foreboding is
accentuated by Gordon Willis’s cinematography with grainy shot composition and wide-angle
shots. For as much space is shown in every frame, Pakula and Willis have the
remarkable ability to make each shot feel claustrophobic through editing and tight
cutting. Fonda, originally hesitant to take the role, eventually went on to win
the Academy Award for her portrayal of Bree. Less political than the other
films in this triptych, Klute, like a brilliantly crafted three-course
meal, appetizes.
The
Parallax View (1974)
According
to the description on the Criterion Blu-ray:
“Three Years after
the murder of a leading senator atop Seattle’s Space needle, reporter Joseph Fardy
(Warren Beatty) begins to dig into the mysterious circumstances surrounding the
killing-and stumbles into a labyrinthine conspiracy far more sinister than he
could have imagined.”
Based on
the dime store novel of the same name by Loren Singer, Pakula’s cinematic center
of the trilogy reinforces the political mistrust of the government and the
public’s monopolistic control by shadowy corporations. Their existence, let
alone their operation, filling people with dread.
While
this film was critically reviewed more favorably by established film
journalists than the public at large, the upcoming analysis hopes to recontextualize
the film as we look at it from the vantage point of the last 50 years and under
the current Socio-political context. Perhaps the film has gained more relevance
over the last ½ century.
All
the President’s Men (1976)
The final film in the series is also
the most famous. It garnered the most praise, and collected the greatest number
of nominations, awards, and other accolades. Based on the book of the same name
by journalists Bob Woodward and Carl Bernstein, who in 1972, broke the
political scandal that would come to be known as “Watergate”; culminating in
the resignation of then President Richard M. Nixon in 1974.
This film was elevated over the
other films in the trilogy because of its depiction of real-life events, at a
time when the public was still trying to grapple with the reality of it. Before
the book came out, Robert Redford (who would go on to play Bob Woodward in the
adaptation) purchased the film rights to the book and was in active
pre-production when the book was released. Filmed in 75’ and released in 76’ All
the President’s Men traded on the public’s curiosity and insatiable hunger
for information on this historical moment. Because of the timing of the event,
being a part of the public consciousness of the time, and constructing a riveting
drama around those events, the third film in this loose trilogy is often
thought to be a complete standalone film.
THEMES
The title given to Pakula’s trilogy is evocative and
thematically self-explanatory. The “paranoia” in question is historically
specific to the time-period post the civil rights movement of the 50’s and 60’s
in the US. By the 1970’s we started to see the fruits of that labor (particularly
with the creation of Title IX, the Roe v. Wade decision, and The Rehabilitation
Act of 1973). Yet, because the US had fought and struggled for these gains for
nearly three decades, this was a time to make sure that these policies were not
only enacted but enforced. There was an increase in the resistance from the
Government to implementing these changes and a concerted effort by social
institutions to minimize Civil Rights legislation’s effectiveness. This is what
led to the measured skepticism and distrust of the government apparatus during
this time; an emotional collective consciousness that Pakula’s films tap into.
All three films in the trilogy
illustrate the dangers of various mechanisms of government control, feeding conspiracies
in the wake of irrational events and a lack of institutional credibility. Whether
through depictions of surveillance, indoctrination, bribery, or murder, there
was a concerted effort in Pakula’s films for the audience to maintain a justifiable
suspicion of Government agents. To clarify, this was not a concerted effort on
the part of Pakula to shape public opinion, but rather to capture the feeling
of uncertainty and unease that followed these unprecedented historical events.
All three films came out during, or in the immediate wake of the Watergate
investigation and directly after the era of rampant political assassinations
which clearly informed these three thrillers. Conversely, the fundamental
success of these films shaped the way that the 1970’s was perceived both by those
who lived through it, and those that came after. Pakula’s ‘Paranoid Trilogy’
joins films like Coppola’s The Conversation, and Scorsese’s Mean
Streets in shaping the cinematic perception of the 1970’s in the populace; despite
dramatic license and the heightened reality depicted.
These three films ask foundational sociological
questions about institutions and organizational systems. Through this trilogy,
Pakula is interested in the fundamental tension between Agency (free non-coerced
choice) and Structure (the institutional mechanism, usually in the form of a bureaucracy,
with a goal of establishing and maintaining order) that is at the core of
Sociology as a discipline. While some have called this Pakula’s interest in “The Architecture of
Power”, within Sociology, these power dynamics can be understood through
the work of classical theorists like C. Wright Mills and Max Weber.
Weber, and Mills’ work on
institutional structures and the relationships within them are unparalleled. The
following essays on each film will be drawing from Mills’ work on “The Power
Elite” and Weber’s understanding of bureaucracy found in Economy and Society.
These essays will also draw on more contemporary scholars in various areas;
namely, Niklas Luhmann’s work on “Social Systems” and Shoshana Zuboff’s explanation
of “Surveillance Capitalism”. The forthcoming analysis plans to also make
allusive parallels to the contemporary political moment in the US; where we are
seeing a similar level of mistrust and even greater hostile resistance from the
government toward its people.
CONCLUSION
Alan
J. Pakula’s “Paranoid Trilogy” embodies the cultural and cinematic flavor of
the 1970’s. These films became the quintessential vision of what it was like to
work in films, as well as crystalize the public opinion of the government at
the time. As the trilogy gained in popularity throughout the decades, they have
inadvertently fueled the conspiratorially addle-brained into an irrational
spiral that has culminated in the Quanon sect of the dark web; thereby
tangentially contributing to the rise of our current fascistic-forward and
equally hostile government. Thus, through the analysis of these films, not only
will we see current socio-political parallels, but perhaps we can find the same
inspirational spark of resistance displayed in Pakula’s Protagonists; regardless
of the outcome.
We are currently living through a synergistic
cultural moment of the rapid birth, maturity and dominance of algorithmic
software, touted as “artificial intelligence”. Many of its uses can be
subjectively perceived as more benevolent than others. The use in the
Healthcare industry in screening for earlier cancer detection seems more universally embraced;
while its use in screening job applicants less so due to the reinforcement of
racist and misogynistic stereotypes (Noble 2018, Bates 2025). In film, and the process of filmmaking, there
is this same dichotomy of acceptable and unacceptable uses throughout every
stage of the filmmaking process (pre-production, production, and post). Yet unsurprisingly,
that embrace or rejection has been typically divided across social class status,
and whether someone has the ability to hold and exercise power.[1] The higher the status,
which correlates to an increased likelihood that an individual has the ability
to hold and exercise power in some form or another (aided by their other intersecting
privileges of whiteness or maleness) tends to embrace the algorithm as a tool
to increase profit, productivity and (perceived) convenience, and reducing
cost. While those that reject it and see potential calamity in its use are
those without either status, wealth or power. In the filmmaking industry, this
divide is typically oversimplified between the financiers (studio heads, producers,
other corporate executives) and the creatives (filmmakers: actors, directors, production
designers, cinematographers, key grips, boom operators etc.). While there is
some validity to this clean bifurcation, the reality is a bit more muddled.
This paper will briefly go over the history of using technology in films, and the
cultural shifts that happened because of them. Then, contemplate the many
social ills that lead to AI’s generation and others with it at the epicenter.
HISTORICAL
CONTEXT
Filmmaking
is an artform made possible through technology. This can be said of every artistic
expression regardless of time-period, and like those other art forms, film builds
around it a culture and a lucrative identity steeped in the norms and rituals
of the time. As these technologies change, often falsely framed as strictly an
improvement, the culture reforms around it. Every era of film saw this
transition. Silent film finally spoke with “The talkies”, black and white
screens became Technicolor*, and filmstock transformed into digital.
These are periods of transition that brought
with it monumental change. Subjectively, each of these periods in film history
were met with scoff, skepticism, and outright disdain; some founded and others
not. Granted, things always got lost in the interim. Several silent movie
actors found that they could not easily make the transition into spoken film.
When film started presenting in color- Cinematographers and Costume designers
lost the ability to light and use darkness. Digital films lose texture and a sense
of verisimilitude to the image because it is shot and presented at a higher
frame rate than our eyes take in and our brain can process information. Whether
you mark these losses as trivial, a travesty or triumph of technology, there
are those skills and people that will always be left behind when technology
leaps forward. The difference with algorithms, and using AI software for a
creative outlet, is there is a relinquishing of agency and autonomy in its use.
Like
any of the other gorge leaping feats of technological advancement, AI has been
embraced and reviled. Currently, algorithmic software is being used in all part
of the film production process. In pre-production, many types of
software are now being used in brainstorming script ideas, make box office predictions,
story boarding, location scouting and 3-D modeling. In production: algorithmic
software is used in art departments and production design. Shots are being
built by computer models with only text-based prompts. In post-production, the
use of algorithmic software in visual effects reduces both labor costs and time.
These are already being used in films with bigger budgets; and regardless of the
(justifiably understandable) vitriol films receive who use “AI” (in this way),
it does not stop it forward momentum from implementation to integration. But
before we can look at the social ramifications of this, we need to understand
the Sociological context.
Some
Relevant Sociological Basics:
Sociologically,
the social relationship/dependence on a particular piece of technology can be
measured through the understanding of cultural lag and cultural diffusion. Cultural
lag is the difference in time between when a piece of technology is
invented and when it is integrated into social norms and the social order (Jary
and Jary 1991). Basically, technology is always created before the behaviors
and cultural rituals that allow it to become a necessity for daily living.
Every piece of technology goes through a
cultural lag process. It is that which determines its broader use. Sometimes
that use becomes something way beyond its original scope, such as the internet.
This is because due to our (US) lopsided value system (motivated by profit
driven capitalism) much of our technology is developed for governmental
and military application
first, and then redesigned for civilian use after for the purposes of profit.
Thus, the cultural lag is motivated by profit; private companies determining
how they can get civilians to consume their (usually, at the time, unnecessary)
gadget by convincing/conditioning them through marketing that their contraption
will make consumers’ lives convenient. With that, the piece of technology
becomes more ubiquitous, through the process of cultural diffusion.
Cultural Diffusion is the spread of
cultural traits or social practices from one society or group to another. Globalization
and particularly imperialism often causes the spread of these cultural traits.
For over a century the Unites States’ main export was our culture through the
creation of the globalized marketplace. In the case of technology, the more
available that technology is the more likely people are going to use it.
Additionally, if you make that piece of tech necessary by changing the way necessary
social behaviors are performed (applying for a job, acquiring necessary
government documentation etc.); you have both a fundamental consumer base and a
captive audience.
This
diffusion and integration are still capitalist forward with the understanding
of consumer engineering and planned obsolescence which perpetuates the cycle of
cultural lag and diffusion. By making products with a designed shelf life and
then constructing a barrier to object repair through the legalese of “proprietary
technology”, allows Corporations that control this technology to update, change
and (inevitably) make worse the technology and service you are using while
discontinuing the diffused product in favor of the new one. So, we engineer
consumers into a product’s planned obsolescence- effectively dragging people across
the cultural threshold of new technology; and making a profit while doing
it.
Those
that have the money, ability and cultural context to shift with the cycle of
lag and diffusion have an easier time existing in this social order. Those with
money can purchase the knowledge or hire someone to keep up with the cycle as
it happens. Younger generations who are digital natives to the newer forms of
technology than the older generation’s digital immigrants will have an easier
time integrating and adapting; and those who understand the cycle’s context shift
are more likely to have an easier transition. The rest, however, may be dragged
kicking and screaming[2] over that cultural
threshold.
The Arbitrary beginning (of the End):
George Lucas, Peter Jackson and Dominance of CGI
As
stated earlier, the filmmaking artform is made possible only through the advent
of both photography and the development of “moving pictures”. The ability to
record movement through the capturing of consecutive still frames that, when
played back at a particular speed (24 frames per second) gives the illusion of
movement. Since there has been a variety of advance technologies that have
fundamentally reshaped how the filmmaking process works, especially in the US,
it is relatively arbitrary where a researcher stakes their claim as to what is
the source of our current predicament with algorithmic “AI”. This paper could
have easily gone back to the invention of the camera and moved forward; but in
the interest of time, and the author’s own specialty and interest; This paper
is arbitrarily starting with two directors, George Lucas and Peter Jackson and
their impact on the subgroup of visual effects within the filmmaking industry.
There
is a lot that could be (and has been) said/written about George Lucas: unjustifiably
deified “God” of a Sci-fi Universe, Independent filmmaking renegade turned vapid power-hungry megalomaniacal
CEO in his older age.
And an innovator of visual and special effects. Focusing on the latter, being a
youthful cinephilic brigand, George Lucas created companies that specialized in
parts of the filmmaking process with which he wanted to experiment. By
controlling his own companies there was less resistance to his ideas, thereby
less rejection, and no one to tell him “No.” (This became a problem later in
his career). In the 1970’s Lucas either singularly founded or Co-founded several
companies specializing in one or more aspects of the filmmaking process.
The
companies (and it’s scions) that George Lucas founded which served as a
precursor to the current algorithmic apocalypse in filmmaking are Lucasfilm, and
its subsidiaries: Industrial Light and Magic (ILM) and Skywalker Sound. Through these companies, Lucas
could experiment and push the boundaries of the filmmaking process;
transforming the theatrical experience and how films are made.[3]
These revolutionary leaps in visual effects through
the decades began to consistently rely on computers as tools to create the
feast of visual feats on film. Lucas leaned into computers being able to tell a
better visual story than was done traditionally through models, miniatures, and
animatronics (a bread-and-butter staple of Lucas based effects work of the late
70’s early 80’s). ILM was one of the first companies to create a completely
computer generated sequence, a completely computer generated character, morphing,
digital composition, computer generated 3-D effects, computer generated
composite of human skin, realistic computer generated dinosaurs, first fully computer-generated
character in a live-action film using motion-capture, and founded what would
become the Mo-cap system. ILM was one of the founders of CGI visual effects. Since
its inception, almost every film with remotely any visual effects have been touched
by ILM. For decades, this company has monopolistically forged the track of
visual effects right into our current cultural moment with the use of AI. In
2025, Rob Bredow unveiled Star Wars test
footage using a text-to-video model to generate fictional creatures. This was
ILM's first implementation of generative artificial intelligence. This is not to say that George
Lucas and his corporate progeny are singularly at fault for the development of
AI in filmmaking, but they did forge a path allowing us to reach the precipice
of creative and moral bankruptcy of AI use in the Industry.
On
the heels of Lucas, Peter Jackson was another principled indie horror director
that became the head of his own studio, and a significant data point in the
genealogy of AI use in film. Jackson’s historical significance to this
development is Weta Digital, a company he co-founded to create the visual
effects on his feature Heavenly Creatures in 1994; and would later gain
recognition in the late 90’s early 2000’s for the company’s work on Jackson’s
adaptation of The Lord of the Rings(LOTHR). It was through the production
process that the Weta team developed the software to create a computer-generated
background actor. This allowed the battle sequences to achieve an epic scale.
In addition to human extras in suits, makeup and prosthetics, there were
additional “background extras” that were painted in in post. Digital people
moving as determined by a programmable algorithmic sequence. The existence of
which would grow in contention for the next 25 years.
After LOTR, Jackson guided Weta to
continue to push the boundaries of creative algorithmic software. When the
Imperial War Museum approached him to create a tribute to WWI veterans by using
hours of archived footage from the time, Jackson, through Weta, slowed down the
film, colorized it, and reconstructed audio from the
archive approximating what these soldiers might have sounded like. The documentary They Will
Never Grow Old was met with high praise, which encouraged Jackson to go
further. In his latest Documentary about The Beatles, Jackson apocryphally
“brings the band back together” (read as from the dead) for a new song: “Now
and Then”. This was achieved by Algorithmic software. The AI scoured through demo tapes of John
Lennon to extract his vocals and place them with the rest of the Beatles who
recorded the song back in the 90’s for their Anthology album. This calls
into question the value of entertainers, legacy, agency and autonomy. An
argument that came to a head in 2023.
During
the nearly 4-month strike from July to November 2023, the division and rhetoric
used got ugly. One unnamed executive was alleged to have revealed the studio’s
tactic: to draw out the strike long enough
until writers and actors start losing their homes to force more favorable
negotiating positions. The struggle became real for many writers and actors, as
many who were not award winning or “on the A list” struggled to pay rent. Yet, through a commitment to
solidarity, the Writers and Actors, with support from the Directors and
Producers Guild and many high-profile politicians, transformed the industry in
regard to the use of Generative AI.
·Consent
must be given for any digital replication or alteration of performers. Consent
must be clear and conspicuous and may be obtained through an endorsement or statement
in the performer’s employment contract that is separately signed or initialed
by the performer or in separate writing that is signed by the performer.
·48
hrs. notice before being scanned
·A
separate written agreement in all contracts regarding digital likeness creation
and use
·The
process of scanning is to be considered work, and they need to be compensated
·Must
include a reasonably specific description of how the digital likeness will be
used
·Consent
is obtained per job. If the likeness is used in another project a separate consent
must be given.
This was a
landmark negotiation that closes a gap in Copyright Law that did not protect actor’s face
or voice. Thus, in 2024, using the 2023 strike as a foundation, voice actors
struck against the videogame industry for some of the same provisions. Yet,
even with these provisions to make the integration of AI more equitable, it
does not thwart the use of AI in filmmaking and the dangers it poses.
SOCIAL
ANALYSIS
The sad irony of the continued expansion of AI is that
through its learning process, and the more it is fed already published content,
the software becomes a cultural and social mirror that can be held up to
society. According to Bates (2025) AI lifts the veil on institutional
inequality of every variety as these Language Learning Models (LLM) are not
deliberately trained with a racist/sexist/ableist/classists agenda. Instead,
the sexism, racism and anti-humanism displayed by AI algorithmic software
content exposes the deeply inequitable discrimination the permeates every
aspect of American culture and every institutional mechanism it uses.
It’s Capitalism’s Fault
When looking at the continued encroachment
of AI into creative spaces of film and popular culture, there needs to be an
acknowledgement of the driving force of its generation: Capitalism. Granted,
this is an easy thing to blame, due to capitalism’s basic function of dehumanization
and alienation of those that are trapped within it. Which is everyone. Marx (1992)
calls this commodification: the ability for anything in society, including
humans, to be bought, sold, traded or exchanged. Weber (2019) identified how maintenance
of routines results in complacency to the exploitation that people experience
allowing capitalism to continue unfettered. While conditioning individuals to
be a better fit for this exploitative bureaucratic capitalist system.
A
culturally learned behavior that contributes to capitalism’s continuation and
generational reproduction is the belief that advancing technology leads to
progress. Since the birth of the digital age, we have had this belief that technology
makes our lives “better”. This techno futurism has been in cultural lock step
with capitalism. Advances in technology are advanced by the profit motive, but often,
it is not for the betterment of people more than it is the deepening of
pockets. Thus, the intimacy of technology and capitalism may make our lives
more convenient (once we are integrated), but it also ushers us into a new age
of digital feudalism (Arditi 2023).
According to Arditi (2023):
The term digital
feudalism connects to the moment of primitive accumulation as feudalism
transitioned to capitalism. Just how peasants were kicked off the land to go to
work in new positions [in the factories] without a social safety net today
workers lose their jobs and go to work as gig workers (4)
Digital feudalism thrives on debt, precarious
labor and unending consumption (Arditi 2023). Unending Consumption is
the driving force that has motivated the development of AI and algorithmic
software. Arditi (2021) pinpoints the rise and dominance of streaming that
fundamentally changed how we consume content. The term “streaming” being an apt
description because it invokes a flow that is endless.
In the digital age, capitalism sped
up- expanding the means of consumption into the liminal space of the internet-which
promptly turned into a giant shopping mall (Agger 2004). But for companies,
consumers are the product. Not only do they provide these services that vie for
customer attention and their engagement. Now, even consumer information is
monetized under the paper-thin guise of free access. The internet and social
media provide companies with a marketplace of data on which to harvest. In this
space, we are then conditioned to endlessly consume: “…we subscribe to music,
video, software, or news services we provide companies with constant and
consistent consumption. It is unending because once we subscribe there is no
out.” (Arditi 2021:17). This ultimately makes transactions more transient. Therefore,
there is an unwillingness to connect, resulting in alienation.
Desires do not desire
satisfaction; desire, desires desire… The ideal consumer (Saarinen and Taylor:
1994)
Zygmunt Bauman (2007) discusses this
transition to transience in his critique of the consumer economy. Stating that nothing is
embraced by individuals in a consumer economy for very long.There is no ultimate desire, no point of full
satisfaction. What this means is that individuals in a consumer society are in
a state of perpetual un-fulfillment (Bauman 2007).
This creates
consumers who:
Are Impatient, impetuous, restive and
excitable
Lose
interest quickly
Their momentary satisfaction does not require
learning or skill to obtain (Instant Gratification)
The promise and hope of satisfaction precede
the need promise to be satisfied
Are roped into consuming by the sensations and
experiences certain products promise. Which is why product acquisition
always seems hollow
Believe that having no more desires is equated
to having no more prospects in the world
Now,
with these consumers, this unending consumption is liquified and so are our
identities (Arditi 2021, Binkley 2008).
Under traditional consumption
practices, there is a fetishizing of commodities as they are used to represent
identity (Marx 1992). Much of who we are is determined and represented by the
products that we consume. In the era of streaming, Liquid Consumption is
defined as the
consumption of the 21st century, one of liquid Modernity (the
contemporary social and cultural
condition of radicalized ambivalence) where a person’s identity is not
fixed by an imposed order or shared group affiliation.[4]
The practice of this is one of anti-consumerism in the traditional sense, and
yet they still consume. As the title of “liquid” implies, we have shifted to
consume an increased number of
experiences (the intangible) rather
than just things (tangible). But this is false. It is more accurate that through
streaming, we have “liquified” our culture transforming art, literature,
theater, and film into “content.”
The
internet has exacerbated this liquification of culture into “content” through
the decline of physical media. Endless consumption is easier, and possible,
because we no longer need tangible space to store it (Brutlag 2021). This
socially conditions the public to seamlessly transition into an unending liquid
consumption of content where we experience the content rather than acquire it. Because
we often do not see the spatial cost of the content we consume[5]. Digital
storage is amorphous. Arbitrary capitalist barriers are in place to allow for socially
constructed levels of exclusivity. How much storage you want is determined by
how much you are willing to pay. Once you pay, there is no lengthy home renovation
needed, you don’t have to purchase bookshelves or tubs for storage; you are
just granted access to more. Almost every digital storage service reinforces
the same nebulous imagery (e.g. “the cloud”) as if it doesn’t take up any
physical space at all. This too is false. The storage of data has tangible
consequences in the form of social and environmental impacts.
The Social
and Environmental Impact of Data Centers
The term
“The Cloud” purposefully evokes ethereal imagery. Designed to conjure a mental
picture of a liminal emptiness that is akin to the public perception of cosmic
space. However, as cosmic space is not the vacuous hollow many have perceived
(consisting most of dark matter and dark energy), “The Cloud” has a tangible
representation in the form of data centers. Data centers are buildings that house the
infrastructure needed to run computers, including servers, network equipment
and data storage drives. The more reliance we have on digital storage and
unending consumption through streaming, the more social and natural resources these
centers consume. Which results in outrageously dangerous environmental impacts
on land, water use and consumption of electricity.
“According to Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory, [Data Centers] can range from smaller
centers—integrated into larger buildings for internal use by companies—that are
on average less than 150 square feet, to hyperscale centers which are operated
off-site by large tech companies to facilitate large-scale internet services. On
average, hyperscale data centers are 30,000 square feet, although the largest
of these data centers can reach sizes of well over one million square feet. As
of 2024, more than half of the world’s hyperscale data centers were owned by
tech giants Amazon, Microsoft and Google.” (Chen 2025).
·Data centers increase local electric utility rates
by driving up overall energy demand, which can strain grid capacity and force
utilities to invest in costly infrastructure upgrades. These costs are passed
on to residents through higher rates
·A single data center can consume up to 2 megawatt
hours of power, equivalent to the power used by 2,000 homes
·Tax breaks for data centers do not deliver the
promised economic benefits, such as high-paying jobs, and they reduce local tax
revenues, while shifting financial burdens onto communities and schools
·Data centers’ massive energy demands are prolonging
the operation of fossil fuel plants and undermining state renewable energy
goals
·While advanced cooling methods like liquid
immersion and direct-to-chip cooling offer energy efficiency improvements,
current technologies force a tradeoff between energy and water efficiency,
limiting sustainable solutions.
The construction of AI and algorithmic software
both makes these problems worse and is the next step in the logistical
exploitation of capitalism’s unending consumption.
A
standard Marxian analysis of capitalism is the understanding that as the
economic system expands there is a finite number of markets it can reach, which
is to say all of them. Once all the markets have been acquired, refined and synthesized
for efficiency, the source of exponential profit comes back to labor. Companies
can always reduce labor costs to increase profits. One mechanism by which to
reduce labor costs is automation. AI and algorithmic software are forms of
digital automation. AI and algorithmic software exploit labor in two keyways: job
replacement, and product theft. According to MIT, current AI has the
capacity to 11.7% of the workforce by the digital automation of customer service,
computer coding, data analysis and collection. AI is also changing the way that
jobs are traditionally done; skills are lost in favor of algorithmic analysis
and diagnostics; and those in the workforce have to prepare for the impending
transformation[7]Secondly, already published material
whether that be entertainment products like art, film, music, and other forms
of popular culture, or Science based research and analysis, becomes food for
the algorithm. AI scours the internet for material to learn and copy from. It
is an unwilling digital apprenticeship that results in human creative
obsolescence. AI generated pop culture has become so ubiquitous that it is
increasingly difficult to spot.
Additionally,
AI has made all the social and environmental impacts of Data centers worse,
because they require vastly more resources than data centers were using prior. In
2024, NPR
reported
that each ChatGPT search uses ten times more electricity than a Google
search. In March 2024, Forbes
reported
that the water consumption associated with a single conversation with ChatGPT
was comparable to that of a standard plastic water bottle. This is due to
the training (feeding) of AI, and the required linguistic breakdown and
learning that has to happen in order for the algorithm to understand a query.
As our current administration leans into AI
and its use, we are seeing drastic impacts of land and housing. Most data
centers operate in rural areas. Therefore, the existence of a data center takes
up a lot of space which can affect the availability of housing. Last year, The
Trump Administration declared Abaline, TX
as the epicenter for AI’s future with a $500 billion infrastructure project to
build data centers for future AI products run by Stargate.[8] But as
thousands of construction workers descended on the town, rent prices increased the
Abilene average rent per month is $2,395, up $1,000 from the year before (2024).
Even before the data center, the city faced a housing shortage of about 5,600
units. Now even the Data center employees are living out of their cars, because
they had nowhere else to go. The more our unending consumption continues in
perpetuity, the more likely many of us won’t have a place to store ourselves
regardless of how many terabytes of storage we have access to.
Outside
of a direct personal level of harm, and the use of micro aggressive language
used in social media, in a broader context, as these algorithms get ported
into various social institutions and put in charge of various organizational
tasks and distributions, their learned discrimination will perpetuate the
stereotypes they were built on. This could affect marginalized people’s
access to healthcare and job opportunities while also having the potential to
erase their existence entirely. Laura Bates (2025) points out that because AI
algorithms are taught to categorize sex and gender into a binary (and not the
properly understood spectrum) this will either cause people who don’t fit into
that binary be organized by their sex assignment rather than their preferred
gender identity. Thereby misgendering trans folk. While potentially erasing nonbinary
people as simply outliers. AI consumption and framing are organized by gender
to reinforce the patriarchy. The computer has a voice, and it sounds metaphorically
masculine (Faber,2020). Siri, Alexa and other LLM’s are
feminized because of the sexist culture of female assistants in business, and
the gender socialization that teaches girls to be mediators, placaters and
helpers for men. This trend will
continue so long as women remain 22 % of AI data professionals, only 18% of AI
users while 45% of AI Ph. D graduates are white and 80% are male (Bates 2025).
The continuation of this is more
than just a “reap-what-you-sow” reflection of the intersectionally vile ableist,
heterosexist, wealthy white supremacist capitalist patriarchy (hooks 2000).
There is a purpose for its reproduction, and that purpose is profit. Misinformation
is profitable, and political and economic institutions have been financially enriched
by trafficking in it (Noble 2018). Misinformation has been politically
weaponized to be a pathway to power; and currently used to implement
authoritarian style policies ( Project 2025,
NSPM-7). AI is not just regurgitating
conspiracies and falsities; they are also generating them. Recently, scholars
discovered that AI would fabricate academic articles by real
people. This got
so sophisticated that some scholars ended up citing the fake article as
evidence.
Desensitizing
the Masses
Unfortunately, as much as film and
popular culture has been negatively impacted by the creation and implementation
of AI into creative fields, it has also assisted in the desensitization of AI’s
threat through misdirection. For generations, there have been Sci-fi stories in
books, television and film that have depicted the integration of AI into human
societies as a catalyst for the apocalypse. At the core of this conflict is
usually a small band of human resistance fighting self-aware machines.We’ve seen versions of this same story for
the last 30-40 years. Blade Runner, The Terminator Franchise, and The Matrix all have presented the evolution
of AI to be a threat to human existence. A direct militaristic annihilation.
While these films as cultural products were talking about other eras and
drawing upon history and culture to say something about the human condition
(Faber, 2020). It also creates an explicit and hyperbolic threat of AI in the
public consciousness. Thus, every time someone discusses their fear of AI, they
invoke one of these well-known Sci-fi franchises: “Do you want Skynet? Because
this is how you get Skynet.” “This is how Ultron became a problem.” Did you even
see The Matrix?!”. The public fears AI only through the lens of
“malevolent humanoid machines taking over the world. As a result, we often tend
to think of the term AI as futuristic, distant and improbable.” (Bates
2025:230). We use film as a cultural touchtone, a lens by which we can
understand the world. Therefore, anything less than “The Rise of the Machines”
to overthrow humanity will seem bearable, manageable, and better than the
alternative. Which we will always use as a reference to how bad AI could be,
regardless of its fiction.
The
hyperbole around the fear of AI also conceals the real labor exploitation at
its core. The necessity of AI to have a reserve army of technicians and data
workers that collect annotate, curate and verify data sets (Bates 2025:265).
Classically, in the Marxian sense, this work is outsourced to call centers in
poorer developing countries of color. Unsurprisingly, the work is inconsistent,
it has grueling hours (12-20 hr. shifts), low wages, is tightly disciplined, involving
gender-based harassment, and psychological trauma. As with the textile
sweatshop labor before them, these workers are invisible to the western
consumers whose convenience is generated by their unseen labor.
CONCLUSION
Profit
driven capitalism has led us to this space of unending consumption fueled by a
techno-futurism that insists that LLM’s and algorithmic software will always be
considered progressive. Film and popular culture have been victims, accomplices,
and perpetrators in this venture that has led to the continued alienation and
isolation of the workforce; another way to disenfranchise and traumatize women
and people of color through this liminal digital space. Yet it cannot be
overlooked that convenience is used as a shield, a justification for this
exploitation that alienates us from the human rights abuses felt by others and
motivates us to be complacent uncritical lemmings intrenched in individualized
obedience.
REFERENCES
Agger, Ben 2004. Speeding Up
Fast Capitalism (1st ed) New York: Routledge
Arditi, David 2021. Streaming
Culture: Subscription Platforms and the Unending Consumption of Culture. United
Kingdom: Emerald Publishing
__________ 2023. Digital Feudalism:
Creators Credit, Consumption and Capitalism United Kingdom: Emerald
Publishing.
Bates, Laura 2025. The New Age
of Sexism: How AI and Emerging Technologies are Reinventing Misogyny Naperville:
Sourcebooks
Bauman, Zygmunt 2007. Consuming
Life Cambridge: Polity
Marx, Karl 1992. “Capital: A
Critique of Political Economy, Volume 1” New York: Penguin Classics.
Noble, Safiya Umoja 2018. Algorithms
of Oppression: How Search Engines Reinforce Racism New York: New York
University Press
Saarinen, Esa and Mark C. Taylor
1994. Imagologies: Media Philosophy 1st ed. New York: Routledge
Weber, Max 2019. Economy and
Society: A New Translation Keith Tribe (eds) Cambridge Harvard University
Press
[1]
Thus, due to an understanding of Intersectionality this also means that the
division is also across racial, gender, sexuality and disability lines as well
as social class
[2] It
should be noted that those with money, ability and generational context for one
type of technology; that does not translate to others. Somone may know howe to
navigate Spotify and download apps, but they do not know the application
apparatus of LinkedIn or People Admin
[4]
Our society, especially the current youth generation, has moved away from
defining the self as any one thing. Many in the youth culture use certain
phrases to illustrate this, such as: “I don’t like labels”, “Rebrand Yourself”
“You do You.” “Be a better You” and “Be who you want to be.”
[6]
This might be a great incentive to get back into physical media. Finite space
limits consumption and when you put a blu-ray on a shelf it does not threaten
to poison the water supply of an entire town.
[7]
The profession of teaching has changed as AI can provide test questions and
answers within seconds Making any actual learning immaterial.
