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The World of Mocking Jay:

In a post-apocalyptic America, thirteen districts exist purely to serve the capital city of the country, named ‘The Capitol’. Every district is poor; people struggle to survive on small amounts of food and minimum wages, while they work to provide coal, technology, food, power,and other services to the Capitol.

There is a vital ideological element to the way the main district is run; those in power control ideas, as well as resources. The world is caught under the dictatorship of President Snow, a man who believes more in his own supreme leadership than the people of his country. He invests his creativity into The Games, he smells of blood and roses, and he purposefully aims to obliterate any hopes of rebellion. He believes that hope is the ‘only thing stronger than fear’, and he deals with rebels by spreading fear among the districts. 

He mainly does this through propaganda and the media, using constant repeats of previous ‘Hunger Games’ and airing the current ones live on TV to distract the masses from organising a revolution.

Using Marxist theory to assess this representation, we can see that the ruling class keep the poor under control through civic means; armies of ‘Peacekeepers’ are sent to control each district and to punish anyone who tries to defy the authority, whilst providing them with so little money that many are forced to break the strict laws to find means of keeping their families alive. 

According to Marxist theory, the people will always find a way to rebel and to resist power, often not through civic means such as voting and campaigning within the political system as it is, but through organising and connecting in other ways, such as citizen journalism, social media and the use of symbols – which is what the story of Mocking Jay revolves around.

They Live: 

The ideas that make up the dominant ideology in Britain do not remain static – they change as new ideas develop, people discuss them, and they enter the mainstream. Here, for example, are three features that are generally agreed to be part of the dominant ideology in Britain: People should put their families first, people should work hard for their money, women should behave in feminine ways, and look after their appearance.You may not entirely agree with all of these ideas, but they are nevertheless part of our dominant ideology. They appear ‘natural’ and accepted without question or argument.

They Live is a film that shows the media student just that – how we are controlled and manipulated by ideology. This is not ideology in the sense of some fascist or Marxist doctrine that is shoved down our throats like propaganda, but an exploration of the ways the signs and messages surrounding us through the media, in advertising and films/print/web media etc, cleverly control us and manipulate our behaviour. In a world where the dominant ideology is to consume and ‘fulfil’ ourselves, arguably we want and desire to be controlled. This is a potentially controversial thing to say, but the ideas in this film may help us to understand ideology more clearly.