"Motivating" speeches that are (unintentionally) depressing

[skykiii]

Has anyone else but me noticed that a lot of times when movie, TV, books, games, etc. have a speech that's supposed to be empowering or motivating, but it instead comes off as backhanded and makes you miserable?

Here's an example:

How it parsed to me: "All your beliefs are retarded copes because if you didn't have them you would have slit your wrist by now." (Note: I have not seen the full miniseries--nor read the book--that scene is from, so let me know if its better in context).

Another example I'm aware of is the movie "Saving Mr. Banks," a biopic about the making of Disney's Mary Poppins. At some point Disney (played by Tom Hanks) gives a speech which is apparently about "forgiveness," but near the end of it Walt talks about how the role of storytellers is... well, the words he uses basically amount to "we bullshit audiences so that people can stop being miserable."

Like... am I the only person here who thinks these kinds of scenes are rather back-handed? There can be an appeal to admitting a harsh truth, but these things often miss the mark and end up instead sounding like "really I'm a nihilist who doesn't see the point in anything but I'm trying my best to sound motivating because its what you want to hear."

Anyone else notice that?

 

[invisibult plus+]

Another example I'm aware of is the movie "Saving Mr. Banks," a biopic about the making of Disney's Mary Poppins. At some point Disney (played by Tom Hanks) gives a speech which is apparently about "forgiveness," but near the end of it Walt talks about how the role of storytellers is... well, the words he uses basically amount to "we bullshit audiences so that people can stop being miserable."

I can see it, honestly. When Hanks was talking about Banks, and, how people would feel for him and his family for generations to come, I remembered OPL. Mary Poppins was his favorite movie, and I don't have to go into how OPL's story ended. Granted, he didn't exactly understand it, and the movie itself was partially about the suffragette movement. However, I think what you were thinking, with the nihilism kneecapping any emotional impact these scenes would've had, was that the connection wasn't really there. The Disney scene implied that his films were made to both inspire hope in a better future, and forgiveness for those who grew up in harsher times and treated their children accordingly.

I think the missing connection, through Banks and to a lesser extent Travers, was that they needed to be shown that better ways are possible. Maybe it's because Walt Disney's vision gave way to The Walt Disney Company as it is today, but it feels fake because the magic has worn off. People know what those "better ways" actually lead to. The corporation itself is a good example of this. Its parks, once a window into a prosperous future, are now incredibly expensive, run-down, and often full of trash and ghetto fights. The company is a poster child for everything wrong with Current Year + 10.

The Death scene relies on a similar logic. That we have to believe in fantasies and hold up ideals that wouldn't show up "if you grinded down the universe and put it through the finest sieve" to make those ideals come true. Except, ideals have their own functions. They act as software, like energies do in the universe. Just because you can't grind and show atoms of them doesn't mean they aren't there. They're not as easy to quantify or measure as energies are in physics, but they still exist. It also doesn't help that in both scenes, they're more soliloquies or lectures. Writers can't think of everything, but the problem with acknowledging harsh truths is that sometimes they're not the entire truth.

 

[ToroidalBoat]

"Soulstorm - Blood Ravens Stronghold Intro"

Does this count?

 

[skykiii]

"Soulstorm - Blood Ravens Stronghold Intro"

Does this count?

I would have to know the full context to know for sure. I've never played this game.

When I clicked I was worried that it would be an intentional parody, like in that one episode of Animaniacs, but that's not what I'm talking about--I'm talking about scenes and speeches that are supposed to be inspiring to the viewer/reader/player, but aren't (in my case, usually because of poor word choices).

Maybe it's because Walt Disney's vision gave way to The Walt Disney Company as it is today, but it feels fake because the magic has worn off. People know what those "better ways" actually lead to. The corporation itself is a good example of this. Its parks, once a window into a prosperous future, are now incredibly expensive, run-down, and often full of trash and ghetto fights. The company is a poster child for everything wrong with Current Year + 10.

I feel like this is getting a little bit afield, because this is less "the movie fucked up its emotional inspiring message" and more just us remembering that the message is coming from a cynical corporation that's quick to jump on social fads. Which I tend to see as a separate issue.

Taken entirely at face value, Walt's speech fails because he ends up describing storytelling as basically manufacturing an opiate. But the movie clearly wants us to think he said something inspiring.

 

[Milkshake Sniffer]

For a motivating speech to work it has to resonate (or at at least appear to long enough not to be seriously questioned) with some basic understood truth. If it doesn't those who hear it just think that the impassioned speaker is a cretin unless of course the listeners are also cretins as well in which case they can just seal clap their appreciation for shared cretinhood.

Happens all the time in the real world a prime example being the change monkeys. They come in many guises but the recurrent theme is change is good, it's fresh, dynamic, invigourating, positive. Does it effect an improvement over the existing? Doesn't matter. These carpetbaggers are everywhere the king of the change monkeys being Obama who exposed just how many cretins there are out there. Pro tip - anyone who used the non-word "proactive" with anything other than derision should be treated with extreme suspicion.

The failed motivational speech is endemic in modern media at the moment because the creators have no understanding of or interest in basic understood truth. Specifically they cannot comprehend fundamental human desires and behaviours and, to that extent, they are literally subhuman.

As a prime example;

 

[Judge Holden]

When I clicked I was worried that it would be an intentional parody, like in that one episode of Animaniacs, but that's not what I'm talking about--I'm talking about scenes and speeches that are supposed to be inspiring to the viewer/reader/player, but aren't (in my case, usually because of poor word choices).

Its a long, long story but this speech wound up becoming the cornerstone of like 10%-20% of all warhammer 40k shitposts either directly or indirectly because of how badly it was written and how hilariously shit the lines were spoken

With regards to the intentional parody, here is a near 20 year old YTP

 

[Tasty Tatty]

"the hardest thing in this world is to live in it".

Buffy has good dialogue when it needs to be deep and important. This one line is odd because she tells so before she's gonna sacrifice herself to safe the world, earning her "gift" of resting in peace now she's fulfilled her destiny. This was written when they didn't know for sure the show would return, so it was a fitting final line for her.

It's then used again by Dawn to snap Buffy out of her depression. Not only it didn't work, but this just reminded her that she was brought back to suffer after earning going to Heaven.

 

[FatR]

(Note: I have not seen the full miniseries--nor read the book--that scene is from, so let me know if its better in context).

No, it isn't. Pratchett is a classic case of a leftie materialist who worships the Leviathan of state, while clutching at copes to avoid admitting to himself that according to his belief system, life is fleeting, absurd and meaningless, while death is final and also meaningless.

 

[invisibult plus+]

If we're going to post WH, then I'll toss in the greatest-best speech-speech from a Skaven.

In any case, this is a sort of counterexample. It's trying to be motivating for Skaven, which, for us, works so poorly it becomes funny. Instead of a proud SPESS MEHREN rallying his men into battle, we have crazed Rat-Mengele out to make himself stop starving.

"the hardest thing in this world is to live in it".

It's then used again by Dawn to snap Buffy out of her depression. Not only it didn't work, but this just reminded her that she was brought back to suffer after earning going to Heaven.

At least the writers were honest enough for it to not work in that context.

 

[wtfNeedSignUp]

Lots of Fantasy films are guilty of speeches that focus too much on the dying part.

No, it isn't. Pratchett is a classic case of a leftie materialist who worships the Leviathan of state, while clutching at copes to avoid admitting to himself that according to his belief system, life is fleeting, absurd and meaningless, while death is final and also meaningless.

I like his books, but that's the big issue with any nihilistic take on life. Being meat automatons removes every facet of morality and higher purpose. Unless you are already at a good position, it boils down to yelling at a clown to smile.

 

[ShittlerNiggler]

Napoleons speech from the awful Ridley Scott movie is just an absolute joke if you watched Waterloo

If you haven't watched Waterloo, go watch that movie to see the scene for yourself, don't look it up on youtube first. Even an absolute Napoleon hater like me has to admit, that it was really inspiring.

Here's an example:

How it parsed to me: "All your beliefs are retarded copes because if you didn't have them you would have slit your wrist by now." (Note: I have not seen the full miniseries--nor read the book--that scene is from, so let me know if its better in context).

People who write stuff like these are onethe worst type of people you'll ever meet. Smug, self-obsessed cunts who get mad when they see a person with actual values and beliefs, who want to make the world a better place instead of filling it with childish escapist fantasies.

 

[Xarpho's Return]

Another example I'm aware of is the movie "Saving Mr. Banks," a biopic about the making of Disney's Mary Poppins. At some point Disney (played by Tom Hanks) gives a speech which is apparently about "forgiveness," but near the end of it Walt talks about how the role of storytellers is... well, the words he uses basically amount to "we bullshit audiences so that people can stop being miserable."

Saving Mr. Banks is basically fiction. The whole thing about Travers' father dying of tuberculosis and her hatred of pears was fictionalized, as well as being a controlling biddy who was rude to anyone who she perceived was beneath her. You could make an argument that Disney fucked over three times--once a movie that robbed her of creative control, next a movie to make her like an asshole, and finally making a second Mary Poppins movie anyway.

 

[skykiii]

Saving Mr. Banks is basically fiction. The whole thing about Travers' father dying of tuberculosis and her hatred of pears was fictionalized, as well as being a controlling biddy who was rude to anyone who she perceived was beneath her. You could make an argument that Disney fucked over three times--once a movie that robbed her of creative control, next a movie to make her like an asshole, and finally making a second Mary Poppins movie anyway.

Yeah I'm aware that Saving Mr Banks has a reputation as basically being "Disney Apologism" (especially since they produced it). That probably doesn't help any of its attempts to be inspiring, even beyond just the words themselves at face value.