Thursday, June 22, 2006

New Age--Rhymes with Sewage: The Enneagram at the Movies

A web search for Debunking the Enneagram led one reader to my link to friend Chris Rees' excellent essay. Following through on his search, I discover that there is a discussion board dedicated to analyzing films through the funhouse mirror-lens that is enneagram analysis. Johnny Mnemonic, whose Jabootu.com MST3K treatment was excerpted here, receives an analysis from trained enneagram practitioners. The Keanu Reeves vehicle was a cyberpunk sci-fi failure remarkable for its utter lack of redeeming qualities. The Enneagram movie analysis website suggests the monumental failures of the faddish pop-psychoanalytic system.

The Enneagram Analysis of Johnny Mnemonic is an abominable pantomime of thought. It endangers the proper functioning of the mind as the absence of gravity withers the muscles. It affects reason as tear gas affects the nasal cavity: overloaded by one singular, putrid sensation, the mind seizes like a fuel-deprived engine, shut down by the pure irrationality it has encountered.

In short: Caveat Lector. Here are some mind-crippling excerpts:
Keanu Reeves plays Johnny Mnemonic/Mr.Smith - E9 character
Everything seems to happen to him (passive) and he's stuck in it. He's unpretentious, distracted and forgetfull. When his bored E3 girlfriend ('Just getting some ice') asks him 'so where is home Johnny?' he answers 'Would you believe?I don't even know?we've got?.ice?.' He plays himself; a mildly narcotized stubborn E9 character. In the movie he's also relativating situations 'Double cheese, ansovis' when all guns are pointed to him by the E5 bunch of Chinese nerdy ('Your storage capacity?') computer R&D scientists. (same as Hugh Grant's E9-ish 'minimizing' movie humor). When he's with Spider he's also minimizing; 'This is a full service shop'


Ice-T (a very secretive real life person with regard to his biography) plays J-Bone - E6 character He's alert, vigilant for potential dangers; xenofobic. Also loyal to his Lotek group/company. Over-armed for protection against dangers. About Jones: 'He's a friend'. 'Watch your ass man..'

Dolph Lundgren plays Street Preacher/Karl - extreme E4
The hateful neurotic freak , spiritual fantasy; imagining himself as Jesus: 'And who is this lost soul--this sinner unrepentend behold your savior!?' J-Bone said about Street Preacher; 'He doesn't have one natural bone in his body'. Anybody's having the opinion he's a megalomanic E8?

The immigrant scanning computer at Newark - E5 'character'
Objective diagonosis - analysing robot/computer; clinical voice; 'Implant detected--neural failure within 24 hours?'


The Horror, the Horror...

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