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Waiting for the Man
Now I don’t intend to get overly political here. But let’s face it.
Government-run healthcare is one of the “big ideas” frequently explored in science fiction.
With sci fi films often functioning as social commentators, the idea of Big Health has been played out many times before. One of the more fascinating of these Cassandras was George Lucas’s THX 1138. It has all the elements.
Big Government. White pajamas. Severe haircuts. Compulsory drug addiction. Poor décor choices.
Though we’re never certain where THX 1138 takes place, we can deduce that it’s either a dystopia or EDS.
THX 1138 features Bob Duvall in a bravura performance as THX, a Boo Radley getting his “Billy Corgan” on. Coincidentally named after the license plate number on my dad’s puke green Chevy Nova, Bob holds down a gig at Chernobyl, building the android Erik Estradabots™ that provide security for the dystopia (or EDS).
Given the dangerous and mind-numbing rigors of his employ, Bob needs to be dosed on heavy narcotics to be able to function at his job (it must be EDS). To make matters worse, sex is against the law, everyone’s hopped up on libido limpers and, completing the narrative crucible, Bob shares an apartment with a comely young woman named LUH (played by Maggie McOmie).
It doesn’t take long before LUH and Bob decide that things might heat up if they go cold turkey. (Note to self: when you find you’re constantly apologizing to your medicine cabinet, it’s time to call Betty Ford.) Taking Nancy Reagan’s advice to just say no, our young couple discovers that life really is more fun without clothes. For awhile, things are peaches and cream.
But without his prescriptions, Bob finds it that much harder to work at Chernobyl. Compounding matters, enter creepy stalker Donald Pleasence (this was 10 years before Pleasence entered politics, got elected President and subsequently crashed into the New York Maximum Security Penitentiary).
Donald, as LUH’s boss, sabotages Bob and LUH’s sexcapades by assigning LUH to the nightshift. The creep factor is that Donald did it because he wants to take LUH’s place as Bob’s roommate. Yikes! What’s up with that, George Lucas? Keep this guy out of men’s rooms in Idaho, for pete’s sake!
It doesn’t take long for Bob and LUH to get busted for evading their healthcare obligations. Bob is briefly thrown in prison with LUH and they commence to, er, you know, but they are cracked down in mid-canoodle by the Estradabots. Bob is re-located to an area with other male prisoners, including the Donald. (Yikes! Can I get away from this guy?)
Sparing you the details, Bob makes an escape with the Donald and another guy. Chased by the Estradabots through the streets of EDS, they are split up. The Donald attacks a priest and then later is apprehended talking with kids. Goodbye, Uncle Ernie!
Bob and the other guy, doing their best Defiant Ones impression, sneak into EDS’ IT server room, where Bob discovers that LUH has been permanently outsourced. Busting loose, our boys carjack a couple of Mach 5s and make a break for it, Estradabots in hot pursuit.
Though the other guy crashes his car, Bob reaches the EDS city limits and clambers up a ladder to freedom. EDS determines it’s spent too much already for Bob’s apprehension, and the Estradabots are ordered off the case. Bob emerges at the top of the ladder, resume in hand, sober, lonely and gainfully unemployed.
For their part, the Estradabots would re-emerge as Max Von Sydow’s hockey squad in Strange Brew, thanks to their dexterous stickwork.
With all the recent hullabaloo surrounding healthcare, it seemed timely to remind our loyal readers of this film.
From Brave New World to Logan’s Run, and on and on, the idea that your medical requirements are best serviced by the government is an idea that has gained a lot of imaginative speculation over time.
Politically speaking, I suppose the antithesis of big government health care would be mega-corporate private healthcare. But with films like Repo Men and Resident Evil, science fiction shows us that you essentially get the same result: a paucity of genuine human compassion that would make even Blue Cross/Blue Shield cringe.
The moral of today’s column?
If someone wants to size you for government-issued pajamas, run!
Watching THX 1138, I found it particularly chilling when one of the Estradabots said to our man Bob, “Everything will be all right. You are in my hands. I am here to protect you. You have nowhere to go. You have nowhere to go”.
I’m not entirely sure, but I think Nancy Pelosi said the same thing on the House floor.
2 Comments
What a great article! Funny. Good stuff. Thank you. I did not know about THX – well I heard of it but I thought it wasn’t worth my time. Great article, this is definitely going into the NetFlix queue. PSYou are correct, it was Nancy P. who said that.
Thanks for the kind comments… lot of good films out there that we kind of forget about… the funny thing is, I could be wrong but I think George Lucas lives in Nancy Pelosi’s district. Wow, talk about synchronicity!
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