Modernity is ultimately the rejection of tradition. The metropolis is a sea of superstructure composed to a crescendo of hustle and bustle; a place of progression, sophistication and modernity. The cinematic city encapsulates a similar vibrancy where hopes and dreams are achievable. MGM’s iconic musical The Wizard of Oz (1939) is a tale of two places (the country and city). Dorothy, a young day-dreamer from Kansas, longs for a better life “over the rainbow.” (The Wizard of Oz, 1939) Desirée J. Garcia argues in her essay There’s No Place Like Home: The Hollywood Musical that although the film “contains a substantial dose of fantasy” it should ultimately be considered a folk musical because of its “rural and small-town settings that harbour strong families and insular communities.” (Garcia, 2012, 324) Thus the film conjures subtext worth exploiting. This essay will be exploring the representation of the cinematic city in The Wizard of Oz and comparing it to the metropolis characterised in David Fincher’s sinister neo-noir crime thriller Se7en (1995).
Birthed amongst the golden age of moviemaking at MGM, The Wizard of Oz obtains positive connotations of the city towards its start. The opening presents a dead, dry Kansas with sepia photography setting a dull tone and atmosphere in which our protagonist is trapped; “the Kansas sequence, therefore, is meant to be a realistic portrait of Midwestern farm life” which is later cast in a harsh opposition to “the vibrant and plentiful land of Oz.” (Garcia, 2012, 324) The dusty sands of Kansas mirror the freak weather conditions and economic depression which caused distress in rural America: an example being the Dust Bowl – “Hundreds of thousands of farmers and their families had left the land for the cities for good.” (Brogan, 2001) Dorothy sings “Over the Rainbow”, she speaks of a “land I heard of once in a lullaby” where “skies are blue” and “dreams you dare to dream come true.” (The Wizard of Oz, 1939) This ballad embodies the attraction of the unknown – that place beyond the rainbow. “Skies are blue” directly references colour, she is suffocated in a monochrome world and longs for a utopia which she thinks the city manifests. Dorothy’s dream comes true when a violent tornado transports her aunt and uncle’s farmhouse and deposits it in the magical Land of Oz, however her journey through Oz is a “bewildering and at times dangerous one”, consequently her profound desire is to return to Kansas and reunite with her family on the farm. (Garcia, 2012, 324-25) Therefore by the end of the story the city has developed a negative connotation, “Dorothy longs for a life “over the rainbow,” but once there, she realizes that “there’s no place like home.” (Garcia, 2012, 319)
Arthur Freed, the MGM producer of numerous folk musicals, The Wizard of Oz and Meet Me in St. Louis (1944), use home as a “powerful weapon to be wielded against the forces of change” and the challenging of traditional values. (Garcia, 2012, 319) When Dorothy arrives in Oz we are thrusted into a highly-saturated and sickening Technicolour, although it seems seductive at a glance it is actually just hyperreal and artificial. Later when she arrives at Emerald City with her companions and Toto, similar negative connotations exist. For example, its architecture resembles actual Emerald stone suggesting riches and materialism, but it is interesting to note its visual resemblance to Kryptonite – a green, crystalline material which weakens Superman. His story is similar to Dorothy’s in that he grew up in the American countryside. Clark Kent later resides in the fictional American city called Metropolis fighting crime – showing that in both formats, film and comics, the city can generate pessimistic attributes. Additionally, when Dorothy steps inside Emerald City all the city folk are dressed in green, signifying conformity as well as lack of identity as an individual. Oz is not the land of promise and opportunity Dorothy hoped it would be. Take Jordan Belfort in The Wolf of Wall Street, even though the stock markets offer economic opportunity, he inevitably finds out that success can corrupt his family life; New York is in fact a web of sin which with the help of greed and prosperity lure him into sex and drugs. Ultimately the The Wizard of Oz frames the metropolis as disillusionment; and therefore rejects modernity.
Desirée J. Garcia suggests that at first glance the Scarecrow, Tin Man, and Cowardly Lion appear to be premodern characters “due to their associations with farm and nature” (Garcia, 2012, 326); however they are ultimately revealed to be products of modernity:
“The Scarecrow is missing brains. He is a rube who does not know anything and is bewildered and confused by everything he encounters. Like the shock with which urbanity confronts the rural dweller, the wonders of Oz and the Emerald City mystify and assault the Scarecrow. Similarly, the Tin Man is a hollow man made of metal. He has lost his heart, that which makes him human and able to feel. Born of industry, the Tin Man is adrift from the natural world of living things. Lastly, the Cowardly Lion cannot be king of the forest because of his timidity and effeminacy. Even the wild beasts of the forest have become overcivilized by modern society to the point that they cannot fulfil their natural function as rulers and predators.”(Garcia, 2012, 326)
At the core of this tale is the “powerful symbol of home”; Dorothy realises that the “fulfilment of her dreams is not to be found over the rainbow, but in her own backyard.” (Garcia 2012, 324) The construction of home provides familiarity, belonging and safety which the metropolis cannot provide. Freed believed that the folk musical could “resonate across cultures and communicate universal values of cherishing family and home.” (Garcia, 2012, 336) Consequently The Wizard of Oz dismisses any ideas that the country represents premodern values or naivety; instead it projects the alienating effects of modernity and establishes family as paramount. Although a journey is taken, “the experience of staying/returning home is achieved.” (Garcia, 2012, 319)
Another film which depicts a negative city image is David Fincher’s gory tale of sin – Se7en. Written by Andrew Kevin Walker and based on his miserable time spent in New York – “Walker wrote Seven when he was desperately unhappy, working at Tower Records in New York.” (Salisbury, 1999) Fincher creates an unfathomable ugliness in an unnamed city which houses rotting and crumbling environments that threaten to consume its inhabitants. A retiring police detective, William Somerset and a newly transferred David Mills embark upon a number of elaborate and gruesome murders. Both detectives soon come to realise that they are dealing with a serial killer who is intending to target people he thinks best represent one of the seven deadly sins. On the city streets just shortly after the two protagonists have introduced themselves, sirens, thunder and torrential rain can be heard, immediately confirming itself as an anti-city picture. The “murky, rain-soaked metropolis” conjures a certain similarity to Gotham city – “Batman’s Gotham City is a sunless, brooding playground for muggers and super-criminals”, both use “well-worn conventions of film noir” such as: the tired trench coat; the detective; slick streets as well as dark and bleak coloured tones. (Macek, 1999)
The characters in Se7en are very interesting; Somerset is an old-fashioned, premodern moral compass. While all the other detectives work on computers, he uses a typewriter; he wants to retire on his farm and move away from modernity. Steve Macek states “no one exhibits the strain of life in the metropolis as clearly as Detective William Somerset”, he goes on to reference Kevin McNamara who has argued that the detective in film noir, from Philip Marlowe to Blade Runner’s Rick Deckard is “a man who has seen everything but is powerless to change much of anything” and Somerset certainly fits this description. (Macek, 1999) Mills however is impulsive and naïve, he arrives to the city excited to uphold the law and make it a better place. Mills and his wife Tracy believed they were not going to get scammed into buying an apartment; however end up getting one where the subway rides by frequently, a sinister foreshadow as the city outside shakes the foundations of their home. Instead of being a promising place of opportunity, the “allegorical Hell” and oppressive decay of the metropolis ultimately changes and deteriorates Mills. (Macek, 1999) Even sixty years later since The Wizard of Oz, urban landscapes still shroud negative connotations within cinema.
John Doe’s character is significant because he disapproves of elements of the contemporary culture and feels as though society would be better if certain ideas or people were obliterated. Doe’s murders, as Somerset states in the film, are a form of “preaching” and the film’s big mystery is whether he will get a chance to finish his sermon. (Macek, 1999) Finally it is important to address Tracy’s emotions about moving to a place of never-ending downpour which implements Fincher’s signature grunge aesthetic. When she meets with Somerset because she needs someone to talk to, she tells him that she used to teach fifth grade, Tracy states “I’ve been going around looking for schools but the conditions here are terrible” and later states “I hate this city.” (Seven, 1995) When she confesses that she is pregnant with Mills’ child, Tracy is grappling with moral conflict over bringing her child into the dark, overbearing world Fincher has created onscreen. Somerset tells her he was once in the same situation with a previous lover – “how can I bring a child into a world like this, how can a person grow up with all this around them.” (Seven, 1995)
In terms of mise-en-scene, “every frame seems saturated with despair” and his “concrete sense of place is the cornerstone of his directing talent” for “its director is an aesthetician of rot and entropy.” (Taubin, 1996) The setting itself is the antagonist for the majority of the film, its dark sets are metaphorical for Somerset and Mills, who are always being left in the dark when it comes to Doe’s case; however when they find out some crucial information they appear in lighter set-ups and environments. For example, when Somerset makes the link between the Greed and Gluttony murders, he is in the well-lit office floor. By constricting his characters to constant darkness, Fincher generates a distinct claustrophobic feeling and labyrinth which threatens to engulf and overwhelm the heroes. The framing of several shots from low angles looking up to the ceiling imply that the walls of Hell are closing in on our characters. Another film which utilises low-key lighting is The Godfather (1972) where bad people linger in dark corners, however in Se7en, good people are trapped in dark places suggesting the inevitable entrapment that the metropolis houses.
Amy Taubin states that “Fincher brings forth an acid vision of post-industrial decay” by filtering the light through the “pelting rain and smog so yellow you can taste it.” She continues to describe that “the walls are peeling, the dust is thick, the clutter is out of control” which mimics the mise-en-scene of a “30s depression picture or 40s noir” (Taubin, 1996) whilst Chris Darke discusses the “fungal greens, filthy browns and inky blacks that dominate the film.” (Darke, 1996) When Somerset hails a taxi, the driver asks “where are you heading?” to which the detective responds “far from here.” (Seven, 1995) Additionally the film places a subtle yet strong emphasis on architecture to build a “filthy, weathered, crumbling, and mouldy” metropolis where “piles of overflowing black plastic garbage bags” fester and “abandoned pieces of furniture crowd the streets.” (Macek, 1999) A blend of classic art deco and old New York buildings that are primarily seen in film noir, are used in Se7en. Finally the camera movement, which uses cranes, echoes John Doe’s precise and predetermined nature; at times the camera seems to perch over the protagonists like a shoulder angel or devil. The two times that Fincher goes handheld is during the chase sequence through the apartment building and in the desert during the finale. Both are the only moments that the balance of control is tipped out of any one person’s favour, leaving only chaos to determine what happens next. Consequently Fincher uses strong imagery to exploit his rejection of modernity, whereas Fleming passively implements it through themes of the narrative.
In conclusion both films frame a negative image of the metropolis. Dorothy is trapped in a monochrome world longing for escape. When her dream comes true she realises her journey is wild and dangerous, ultimately wishing to go home. The highly-saturated colours of Oz do not seduce the protagonist and the lack of identity in Emerald City confirms to Dorothy that this place is in fact disillusionment. Consequently the core of the story is the powerful symbol of home. Although Dorothy considers the idea of a place over the rainbow, she comes to realise that the fulfilment of her dreams are in her backyard, only the family unit can provide protection. The city may offer modernity and encompass the urban but it cannot satisfy everyone; this is also the case for Somerset and Mills. As soon as Mills’ arrives in the grotesque metropolis the foundations of his home are shaken. Meanwhile Somerset does everything in his power to prevent the city from consuming him or changing his pre-modern methods; as well as Tracy having to question bringing her own child into Fincher’s underworld. Ultimately the filmic vision of the metropolis is portrayed merely as a web of sin and seduction. While Fleming portrays this through the narrative, Fincher does not hold back illustrating the negative city through outrageous imagery. As Detective William Somerset states “Ernest Hemingway once wrote, “The world is a fine place and worth fighting for.” I agree with the second part.” (Seven, 1995)
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