Slavoj Zizek about "Paranoid Android" by Radiohead
1.
"In horror movies, one of the standard procedures for effective nightmare
scenarios is one where the alien is inside oneself. This idea that inside your
body there is a wormlike or other formless creature which dominates you and
later the horrible, nightmarish moment when this thing is forced to come out. The
video clip "Paranoid Android" is crucial for me because of its
cartoon form. The horror lies in the idea that this "undead universe" of
cartoons is transposed
2. into real life. The
nightmare occours I think when a living being, which is dead symbolically,
doesn't fit in our reality. There is a precise english term for being neiter
dead or alive - the
nightmare is the domain of the "living dead". The ultimate paradox. The
true lesson of nightmares is therefore that we are not scared mainly of death
like some philosophers will let you believe, but it is this "radical
obscene immortality".
3. When someone says
"immortal" one always thinks of christian blessings (etc.) of
immortality...but no, immortality is something horrible...it is something that
occurs in Stephen King novels... What I want to emphasise here is how narrow
the line is between nightmare and comedy. Doesn't the same happen in Tom &
Jerry? You know, when the cat is....sliced, overrun by a bulldozer... and in
the next installment the game starts again. "
Translated by mikerino
