Contemporary Conspiracy as Social Critic: Narratives and Function of Conspiracy in Spotlight (McCarthy, 2015) and The Report (Burns, 2019)

NTNU Norwegian University of Science and Technology Faculty of Humanities Department of Art and Media Studies

Emil Wengård

Contemporary Conspiracy as Social Critic

Narratives and Function of Conspiracy in Spotlight (McCarthy, 2015) and The Report (Burns, 2019)

Master’s thesis in Film and Media Studies Supervisor: Eva Bakøy

May 2021

The Report (Burns, 2019)

Master ’s thesis

Emil Wengård

Contemporary Conspiracy as Social Critic

Narratives and Function of Conspiracy in Spotlight (McCarthy, 2015) and The Report (Burns, 2019)

Master’s thesis in Film and Media Studies Supervisor: Eva Bakøy

May 2021

Norwegian University of Science and Technology Faculty of Humanities

Department of Art and Media Studies

i Abstract

The first conspiracy films emerged in the 1970s following the Watergate scandal, the never- ending Vietnam War, and the assassination of John F. Kennedy in 1963. Today, conspiracy rhetoric is more relevant than ever with the effortless proliferation of information in the new Information Age. Similarly, conspiratorial themes are still a mainstay in the contemporary Hollywood film as they were during the 1970s. This master’s thesis aims to examine the narratives the contemporary conspiracy film can construct about the flaws of the American system and central institutions, as well as how the contemporary conspiracy film can function as didactic and socially critical. In doing so, the thesis will outline some central characteristics of the conspiracy film and the contemporary conspiracy film, as well as the surrounding discourse and relevant history leading up to the 2000s. What constitutes the contemporary conspiracy film, and what narratives can they construct? And in what way does the contemporary conspiracy film operate as didactic and as societal critic in its depiction of conspiracy?

To examine the conspiracy films’ function as social critic the films Spotlight (McCarthy, 2015) and The Report (Burns, 2019) will be analyzed within a theoretical analytic framework outlined throughout the thesis, focusing on the representation of the conspiracy and the institutions in the films, specifically the Roman Catholic Church in Spotlight and the system of bureaucracy and the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) in The Report.

ii Sammendrag

De første konspirasjonsfilmene dukket opp på 1970-tallet i vaken av Watergate-skandalen, den endeløse Vietnamkrigen og attentatet på John F. Kennedy i 1963. Konspirasjonsretorikk er om mulig enda mer relevant i dag med utviklinger i informasjonsteknologier som muliggjør å uanstrengt spre informasjon hvor enn man er. Også i det moderne Hollywood har konspirasjonsnarrativer blitt en sentral tematikk som på 1970-tallet. Denne masteroppgaven ønsker å granske narrativene den moderne konspirasjonsfilmen kan konstruere om det amerikanske politiske systemet og sentrale samfunnsinstitusjoner, samt hvordan konspirasjonsfilmen kan fungere som didaktisk og samfunnskritisk. For å gjøre dette vil oppgaven skissere noen sentrale kjennetegn for konspirasjonsfilmen og den moderne konspirasjonsfilmen, samt omkringliggende diskurs og relevant historie opp til 2000-tallet. Hva utgjør den moderne konspirasjonsfilmen og hvilken narrativ kan den konstruere? Og på hvilken måte kan samtidskonspirasjonsfilmen fungere som informativ og samfunnskritisk i dens fremstilling av konspirasjon?

For å undersøke konspirasjonsfilmens funksjon som samfunnskritisk vil filmene Spotlight (McCarthy, 2015) og The Report (Burns, 2019) bli analysert innenfor et analytisk rammeverk baser på teorien lagt frem med søkelys på fremstillingen av konspirasjon and institusjonene i filmene, spesifikt den katolske kirken i Spotlight og byråkratiet og the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) in The Report.

iii Acknowledgements

I would like to thank my project supervisor, Eva Bakøy, for sticking with me and this thesis despite me not always doing exactly what I am told. Without your insight and knowledge I would have never finished!

I would also like to thank all my friends here in Trondheim. You know who you are! Thank you for the many, many too long lunch breaks and countless laughs, and for always being up for a little party.

And lastly, of course, I would like to thank my wonderful girlfriend, Selma. It is always good to know I have someone to unwind with, whether that is to make some kick-ass food or binge watch Iskrigerne. Oslo here we come!

Word count: 32889 Emil Wengård – May 2021

iv Table of Contents

1.0. Introduction ... 1

1.1. Problem Statement ... 2

1.2. Thesis Structure ... 2

1.3. Terminology ... 3

Chapter 1: Theory and Early History ... 7

2.1. The Conspiracy Film ... 7

2.2. The Classical Conspiracy Narrative ... 9

2.3. Conspiracy Culture ... 11

2.4. Why Conspiracy? ... 17

2.5. Early Paranoid Cinema ... 18

2.6. The 1970s Conspiracy Films ... 20

Chapter 2: Contemporary Conspiracy and the Function of Conspiracy ... 25

3.1. Post-9/11 Conspiracy ... 25

3.2. The Contemporary Conspiracy Film ... 30

3.3. The Function of Conspiracy ... 34

Chapter 3: Analysis ... 39

4.1. Analytic approach ... 39

4.2. Analysis of Spotlight ... 39

4.2.1. Context and Reception ... 39

4.2.2. Synopsis ... 40

4.2.3. Anachronistic Characteristics ... 41

4.2.4. All-encompassing Conspiracy ... 43

4.2.5. Faith and Allegiance ... 46

4.2.6. Technical Expertise ... 48

4.2.7. “Everybody knew something was going on” - Regaining Agency ... 49

4.2.8. Churches and Imagined Transparency ... 52

4.2.9. Resisting an Ending ... 53

4.3. Analysis of The Report ... 55

4.3.1. Context and Reception ... 55

4.3.2. Synopsis ... 56

4.3.3. Contemporary Characteristics ... 57

4.3.4. Dichotomy of Power ... 58

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4.3.5. A System of Political Bureaucracy ... 61

4.3.6. Controlling the Narrative ... 63

4.3.7. Allegorical Secrecy ... 65

4.3.8. “A just and lawful society” – The Question of Accountability ... 66

4.4. Analysis Conclusion ... 68

Chapter 4: Conclusory Remarks ... 71

Bibliography ... 76

Filmography ... 79

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1 1.0. Introduction

It seems like conspiracy theorizing and narratives are more relevant than ever, with conspiracy narratives making their way into most of our everyday lives, whether that is on the news, when listening to a podcast or even just talking to friends. On January 6^th of 2021, the possible consequences of conspiracy theories and fake news became crystal clear with the storming of the Capitol Building in Washington D.C. However, in their book Routledge Handbook of Conspiracy Handbook of Conspiracy Theories (2020) Peter Knight and Michael Butter posit that it is not that simple to define conspiracy theory, and that it takes a multifaceted approach to understand the different aspects of it, something their book aims to do, by looking at conspiracy from different academic perspectives, from history to psychology. At best, conspiracy theory can be a way of understanding historical causality, but at its worst it can lead to incidents akin to the aforementioned storming of the Capitol. But what happens when conspiracy narratives are a part of mainstream entertainment, like a Hollywood film or a popular TV show? What function can the conspiracy narrative then provide?

Conspiracy film first piqued my interest when I was an exchange student in the United States, attending the University of Washington in Seattle. While there I took a few of the classes a Cinema and Media professor by the name of Stephen Groening held, one of which being

“Paranoia and Conspiracy in US Film and Television”. I remember being captivated by the subject matter early on, despite some rather complex literature at the time, mostly because it was a whole new take on film for me. Paranoia and conspiracy as a motivator for action within the diegesis, and outside of it, was interesting and frankly not something I had read about previously, especially positioning conspiracy thinking and film within a broader conspiratorial discourse. The class was also focused on another kinds of conspiracy that I had not previously considered. Most of us affiliate the word “conspiracy theory” with things like the Bavarian Illuminati, the Flat Earth Society or the somewhat recently emerging QAnon, while the class focused on politics, history and socioeconomic factors that lead to an emerging sense of paranoia at large, a conspiracy culture (Knight, 2000) if you will, highlighting the fact that conspiracy culture was not limited to any political ideology in and of itself, but was widely utilized by both the right and the left, highly adaptable to any political orientation (Melley, 2000). It therefore felt natural to continue this interesting field of study in my bachelor’s thesis when I returned to Norway. In my thesis I examined the conspiracy films of the 1970s in the United States as a symptom of its time, analyzing Alan J. Pakula’s classic conspiracy thriller All the President’s Men (1976) as a mode of representation of the political shifts of the century

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and ensuing conspiracy culture with a broader sense of unease and suspicion towards authorities and the status quo. With the research I did for my bachelor’s in mind I wanted to expand on what I learned and look at the contemporary conspiracy film with the films of the 1970s in mind.

1.1. Problem Statement

In this thesis I want to examine the narratives contemporary conspiracy film can construct about the flaws of the American political system and institutions, and to discuss to what extent the films function as a critique of American society by revealing the machinations of conspiracy. I will do this by analyzing two contemporary conspiracy films, and to narrow the field of study to some extent I will be focusing the film analysis on the representation of the conspiracies and certain given institutions, namely the Catholic Church as represented in Spotlight (McCarthy, 2015), and CIA cover-ups and political bureaucracy in The Report (Burns, 2019). In doing so I will draw some overarching parallels to the pivotal conspiracy films of the 1970s, as well as exploring the history of the conspiracy film. That being said I will not exhaustively scrutinize the development over the last five decades, but rather comment on the characteristics of the contemporary conspiracy film bearing comparison to the conspiracy films of the 1970s. I will also be looking at what makes up the contemporary conspiracy film, and its’ function as social critic. What constitutes the contemporary conspiracy film, and what narratives can they construct? And in what way does the contemporary conspiracy film operate as didactic and as societal critic in its depiction of conspiracy?

1.2. Thesis Structure

The following chapter, Chapter 1, after looking at some relevant terminology, will outline the theoretical framework for the thesis by defining and examining aspects of the conspiracy film, as well as looking at some of the history leading up to the emergence the conspiracy films in the 1970s. In Chapter 2 I will be outlining the recent history surrounding the contemporary conspiracy film, before overviewing central aspects of the contemporary conspiracy film, drawing on the theoretical and historical notions of the first chapter. Before delving into my analyses in Chapter 3 I will first outline my analytical framework and approach, rooted in the theory I have presented in Chapter 1 and 2. I will then be analyzing two films within that framework, specifically Spotlight (McCarthy, 2015) and The Report (Burns, 2019). In the final chapter, Chapter 4, I will be concluding the thesis by summarizing my findings throughout, as

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well as briefly discussing some of the complications of conspiracy and possible further research areas.

1.3. Terminology

Before we get into the theory and history surrounding conspiracy film it can be useful to note a few distinctions, namely, and most importantly, the use of the word “conspiracy” when talking about conspiracy film - for the purposes of this thesis I will for the most part be using the term

“conspiracy film”. When talking about conspiracy, I am not necessarily referring to conspiracy theory as the term is widely understood and used, and what most likely pops up in one’s mind when heard, being for instance that the moon landing is faked or that the world is secretly run by the Bavarian Illuminati. If one is to look at the definition of “conspiracy” according to the Oxford English Dictionary, it is “[t]he action of conspiring; combination of persons for an evil or unlawful purpose” (Conspiracy, n.d.). The word’s definition alone does not necessarily connote to world domination by an archaic, German order, and while the notion of conspiracy theory is an interesting subject to examine in and of itself, it will not be the sole purpose of this study, though it is natural to include conspiracy theory to some degree, especially when looking at the history of the conspiracy film. When talking about conspiracy film I am referring to what Donovan (2011) defines as a category of film that deals with and reflects a particular interest in paranoia, abuse of power, wrongdoing in high places to achieve power, and a distrust in leadership and authorities. Nevertheless, it will be natural to sometimes also use “conspiracy theory” or “conspiracy theorizing” throughout the thesis, but the focus of the theory and analysis will for the most part revolve around the notion of the above-mentioned definition of conspiracy.

That being said representations of conspiracy can be brought to the extreme also in film as conspiracy is especially suited for fictional narratives, according to Butter (2020); who states that conspiracies outside of fiction are limited to what one can prove with conclusive evidence, while in a fiction there is no limit to the conspiracy’s reach. We are able to “… witness the evildoings of the conspirators directly” (Butter, 2020, p. 457), therefore establishing the conspiracy as fact within the diegetic world. This is where I would argue that conspiracy in the sense that I wish to use it in “conspiracy film” differs from that of conspiracy theory in the more well-known and “straight-forward” sense. Because of the way conspiracy can be brought to the extreme in film and that there is a certain connection to the more commonly understood definition of the word, it is however still important to be able to consider conspiracy theory at large and the surrounding discourse. Especially when going through the underlying motivations

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for the conspiracy film, as a cultural phenomenon or otherwise, particularly now that conspiracy theory is in the forefront in, for instance, contemporary American politics with the current divisive political landscape and the emergence of conspiracy theories like QAnon and the like.

While not the focus of this thesis, it is still worthwhile to point out.

Additionally, the word “conspiracy” (and of course “conspiracy theory”) is often associated with something negative, and therefore warrants some explanation. Words like

“paranoia” and “conspiracy” connote to something inherently negative, but I would posit that the words themselves do not have to be entirely negatively charged. While mentioning conspiracy theory (like QAnon and the like) is natural, this thesis’ focus will remain mostly on conspiracy film and surrounding history and discourse. I would like to suggest that conspiracy film can (and does) have a socially critical potential and cannot therefore simply be rejected because of its conspiratorial implications. The way conspiracy is portrayed can of course vary vastly from film to film, for example if one is to compare All the President’s Men (Pakula, 1974) to The X-files (Carter, 1993-2018), where the latter is highly fictionalized while All the President’s Men is of course based on the investigation of the Watergate scandal by following the two Washington Post journalists that were part of uncovering it. By being able to visualize the machinations of conspiracy like posited by Butter (2020), the conspiracy film can both inform and criticize. Conspiracy film’s critical potential lies also in the prevalence of and easy access to conspiracy in daily life. To quote Peter Knight: “We’re all conspiracy theorists now:

you can hear it, read it, watch it, play it, and buy it everywhere – without having to necessarily buying into it” (2002, p. 6). The amount of readily available conspiracy material points to a self-consciousness and self-reflectivity, and, I would argue, criticism towards one’s own culture.

Furthermore, when referring to “paranoia”, it does not necessarily have to refer to paranoia in the strictly clinical sense, but as a way of emphasizing the feeling of distrust and suspicion towards a conceived conspiracy within the diegesis of a given film, though the use of the word varies some from author to author. Some theorists tend to lean towards the more clinical sense, but it can be seen as more of a critical process, what Peter Knight to as a “…

broad sense of suspiciousness” (2002, p. 17) not necessarily akin to that of conspiracy theorizing, but rather a critical approach. That being said, to mitigate the connotations of the word “paranoia” it will not be used all that much in the analyses in Chapter 3, but will rather be central to explaining the theory and history throughout Chapter 1 and 2.

Like Coale (2005, p. 5-6), this thesis will attempt utilize the notion of paranoia as a critical instrument as the paranoia appears in a fictionalized film. In film the protagonist is often

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dropped in the middle of a vast conspiracy instead of it being something abstract, unknown, and sometimes unprovable, like with the case of conspiracy theories in the real world. Ergo, the representation of conspiracy in conspiracy narratives is a central tenet to this text, rather than examining particular, supposed real-life conspiracy theories. The paranoia exhibited by characters in conspiracy film can then be seen as a critical process in order to make sense of structure in agency in a perceived apparent conspiracy, rather than being a process to easily dismiss as simply delusion or irrational thinking. I believe it is possible to separate “paranoia”

from the strictly clinical sense of the world (i.e., delusion, irrationality) and rather see it in the context of conspiracy culture, and consequently the context of conspiracy film.

This thesis, in other words, does not aim to comprehensively go through all conspiracy theory narratives and communities out there, and explain what it is that motives any specific movement within the many conspiracy communities (especially in the current Information Age), but rather provide an analysis of the possible role of conspiracy, legitimized or otherwise, in contemporary culture by the means of modern conspiracy films, while keeping in mind the preceding decades of conspiracy narratives.

That is not to say that we are to accept any and all conspiracy narratives as truth or a result of healthy skepticism and suspiciousness. In its most extreme form conspiracy theory could be detrimental to democracy itself, as evident in the storming of the Capitol Building in Washington this year (2021). Rather, I would argue that paranoia and conspiracy in film can be legitimate criticism of key institutions in society. It is important to remember that the films that I will analyze also want to entertain, and therefore the represented conspiracy can be exaggerated. Likewise, elements of conspiracy can be added simply to add to the excitement or emotional attachment of the narrative, but I will get back to this in my analyses in Chapter 3.

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7 Chapter 1: Theory and Early History

2.1. The Conspiracy Film

There are several approaches to defining conspiracy film, depending on the theorist in question, but there seems to be at least some consensus around the notion that a conspiracy film historically involves a narrative which dramatizes a relatively small-scale and clearly delineated conspiracy, which focuses both on the machinations of and the fight against said conspiracy (Thalmann, 2019). Some of the conspiracy films of the 1970s can exemplify this, like Three Days of the Condor (Pollack, 1975) and The Conversation (Coppola, 1974), to name a few.

However, this definition is somewhat limiting, as it seems to only include those films where the conspiracy is clearly defined, as well as being a central and near observable part of the diegesis.

The notion of it being “small-scale”, as presented by Thalmann (2019), is similarly somewhat limiting as it infers there is some spatial boundary to the depicted conspiracy for it to be considered part of a conspiracy film category, in addition to it being hard to define in and of itself.

Donovan, on the other hand, goes on to, in broad strokes, define the conspiracy film as being about the “… hidden manipulation of the political, economic or legal systems, [and] the manipulation of the entire country and culture, in effect” (2011, p. 13). With conspirators able to manipulate social mores, conventions, and customs in order to maintain their power and influence with the ultimate goal of “… [redefining] reality for its victims” (Donovan, 2011, p.13). Though this broad way of defining the conspiracy film can lead to even more confusion, Donovan takes it a step further in an apparent attempt to narrow down his definition by presenting three kinds of conspiracy film, namely; the government or military conspiracy, corporate conspiracy, and science fiction and fantasy conspiracy. All three are rather self- evident, with some entity, organization or governmental agency being behind a vast covert operation or manipulation, usually to acquire or to maintain power; political, economic, or otherwise. Donovan interestingly includes the rather specific science fiction and fantasy conspiracy as a category of conspiracy film in his theorizing, which is more about the covering up of alien contact, the supernatural, and the like, though there is usually some overlap with the governmental conspiracy, as obvious in for example the TV show The X-Files (Carter, 1993- 2018).

That being said, it would be hard to define conspiracy film as being a genre, simply because it seems to arch over so many genres, though some stand by that notion (see Donovan,

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2011). It can, however, be more productive to look at certain commonalities across film genres in which the conspiracy tradition and culture comes to fruition. For instance, the abuse of political power, as evident in films like All the President’s Men (Pakula, 1976) or even more contemporary films like the action thriller Shooter (Fuqua) from 2007, the latter being a little more on the nose, in which the retired Marine Corps sniper Gunnery Sergeant Bob Lee (Mark Wahlberg) is framed for killing an Ethiopian archbishop to cover up a consortium of US oil interests in the country of Eritrea. While Shooter is undoubtably somewhat more explicit in its depiction of political abuse of power, both films have some overlapping commonalities despite being very different films. The point then is that it is the commonalities across genre that makes up conspiracy film, rather than a set, defined “new” genre. For the purposes of this thesis, it might not even be strictly relevant to see and discuss conspiracy film as a genre at all, but rather as a thematic approach associated with many different genres (such as thriller, drama or even action) in which the abuse of power for one’s own nefarious, motivated gain is central.

According to professor of American literature and culture, Michael Butter (2020), conspiracy narratives are especially suited for fictional films, as opposed to their allegedly

“factual” counterparts, because they are not bound to what one can prove with conclusive evidence, thus able to produce boundless conspiracies with no apparent end, while also allowing its viewers, as I alluded to in my introduction, to witness the evildoing of the conspirators directly, becoming established facts within the diegetic world. Additionally, in the conspiracy film the protagonist is more often than not able to defeat the conspirators, as opposed to the real world where there is no telling what is real and not if we are to look at conspiracy theories the likes of QAnon et cetera. With this in mind it can be somewhat comfortably stated that there are some overarching similarities within the conspiracy film “category”, if you will. At the very core of conspiracy film, much like conspiracy theory, lies the seemingly omnipotent elite of some variation, whether it is the government in some capacity, the military, a corporation, and so on, with a motivated will to manipulate and misuse power in an attempt to either cling on to existing power (or acquire more power), obtain wealth or influence, or to cover up wrongdoing to avoid persecution - entirely dependent on the ulterior motive of the conspirator in question.

In the conspiracy everything is seemingly connected (Knight, 2000), where every minute detail can unravel a bigger piece of the conspiracy, and the conspirator’s agenda varies greatly, depending on the ultimate goal of the conspirators. The protagonist is often caught up in vast labyrinthine bureaucracies and global forces in her effort to subvert, expose or dismantle the conspiracy.

9 2.2. The Classical Conspiracy Narrative

In his book Conspiracy Theories: Secrecy and Power in American Culture (2008) Mark Fenster, a legal scholar and professor at the University of Florida Law School, writes about the role of conspiracy theory in American political discourse, conspiracy as cultural practice, and about conspiratorial communities. When writing about conspiracy theory as a narrative practice Fenster uses the term: “… the classical conspiracy narrative” (2008, p. 122). Fenster is, too, under the persuasion that conspiracy in film does not constitute its own genre but is rather a subset a part of other genres, more often than not thriller films, and the classical conspiracy narrative is a way of defining the part of the conspiracy in a film narrative in greater detail.

Additionally, Fenster notes he is using the term “… ‘classical’ in this context to refer to the formal structures and system of production and distribution that constitute the framework within which conspiracy narratives are produced” (2008, p. 122). Relying on concepts from narratology (among other disciplines) Fenster outlines central aspects of the makings of a conspiracy narrative and pinning some terminology to it, both fictional and non-fictional, though the fictional conspiracy narrative is more pertinent to the discussion in question.

The conspiracy narrative in itself is used as a recurring explanatory and organizational logic, having the role of cause and effect pushing the plot forward, as well as offering challenges to the protagonist. A tragic present and possibility for a resolution is central to the conspiracy theory’s mode of representation and politics, and the classical conspiracy narrative tries to remedy the frustration of the protagonist, either by exposing the conspiracy, or (as in fiction) defeating it to varying extent. The protagonist collects, sorts, and interprets information and can only begin to act as soon as the right pieces of information have been identified and correctly unraveled, often supported by the technical expertise of the protagonist. According to Fenster (2008) the acts of the protagonist are mostly cognitive (sorting, interpreting etc.) and the viewer’s cognitive awareness is inline with that of the protagonist as the plot progresses. Both the protagonist and the viewer go through the cognitive act of interpretation to reestablish an agency “taken away” by the conspiracy, and the protagonist (in the fictional conspiracy narrative) has to restore the political and social order in a “… totalizing representation of the current state of society and power” (Fenster, 2008, p. 128). And the protagonist (and the viewer by proxy) is propelled forward by the desire to make sense of the conspiracy and uncover the driving force behind the conspiracy.

Fenster also introduces the notion of a “narrative pivot”, based in narratology, which is the moment when the protagonist find, uncovers, or stumbles upon the single piece of information or evidence that enables her to realize the true nature of the conspiracy at hand that

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opposes her. This is when the momentum shifts and the protagonist (and the audience) can move towards resolution (Fenster, 2008). Fenster later points out, in his analysis of JFK (Stone, 1992), there are usually two narrative pivots throughout a given film where the narrative turns and changes the action of the protagonist, also dependent on how deep into the conspiracy the protagonist has gotten. The narrative pivot is also directly related to the “state of emergency”

of the conspiracy, that is to the extent that the conspiracy has “… penetrated the social, political, and moral order, [and] constitutes an omnipresent threat of total apocalyptic destruction”

(Fenster, 2008, p. 134). The first narrative pivot constitutes the initial unveiling of the crucial piece of evidence that makes the protagonist realize the scope of the conspiracy, and the second pivot when the protagonist finds the vital information to ultimately defeat the conspiracy and restore some sense of social order.

And finally, Fenster outlines the classical conspiracy narrative’s resistance to a ending, stating that “… closure always comes, but an entirely satisfactory resolution rarely arrives”

(2008, p. 142). The classical conspiracy narrative in a film will eventually come to an end, but to what extent that ending resolves the conspiracy is varying, and dependent on the given conspiracy. Like in the case of Pakula’s All the President’s Men where the narrative eventually comes to an end and journalists Woodward (Robert Redford) and Bernstein (Dustin Hoffman) are told by Ben Bradlee (Jason Robards) that “half the country never even heard of the word Watergate, nobody gives a shit”, and that “nothing’s riding on this except the 1^st amendment of the constitution, the freedom of the press, and maybe the future of the country”. And while we are show at the very end that certain politicians got jail sentences and Nixon himself, who according to the film approved the cover-up of Watergate, eventually resigns, we are not really given complete convergence and closure. The protagonists are often, according to Fenster (2008), given some sort of agency back by “defeating” the conspiracy and restoring some sense of order, like in the case of Woodward and Bernstein, but the conspiracy narrative itself does not provide any solution or emergent politics to replace the conspiracy it so intricately covers and explains. In the case of All the President’s Men the conspiracy is not necessarily over, even if Nixon has resigned. The conspiracy arguably continues as long as the status quo remains, though possibly in a different form, the underlying problem continues. Fenster explains in somewhat grandiose terms, and I would posit that conspiracy narratives do not necessarily have to be all-encompassing and total, engulfing the entire social, political, and moral fiber of a nation. Or the world for that matter. Especially in the case of fiction film. But the conspiracy can, perhaps, overwhelm a given sphere or locality’s totality, if you will, entirely dependent on the locale and scope of the conspiracy.

11 2.3. Conspiracy Culture

The conspiratorial sentiment in the United States government and citizenry at large may have become the breeding ground for a conspiracy culture, according to American historian Richard Hofstadter, who in his 1967 essay The Conspiratorial Style in American Politics coined much of the discourse surrounding conspiracy in American Politics (Knight, 2000). Hofstadter posited that there was a particularly paranoid mindset and rhetoric in American politics, especially among the political right, pointing to the ubiquitous McCarthyism and Red Scare, thus alluding to a culture of paranoia and conspiracy that has been present in the United States since as far back as the 1800s (1967). According to Hofstadter there had been a tendency to think that there has continuously been varying unknown forces out to destroy the capitalist way of life, breeding a mindset in which “… America has been largely taken away from them and their kind” has been prevalent, “… though they are determined to try and repossess it and to prevent the final destructive act of subversion” (Hofstadter, 1967). The enemy is often represented as a perfect, omnipresent entity with total control over the press, immeasurable wealth, and with the ability to brainwash and seduce the innocent victims in its gaze. According to Jones and Soderlund (2017) Hofstadter recognized deep conspiratorial roots in the United States that dates back a long way, and even though Hofstadter posited that conspiratorial thinking was highly prevalent on the right side of the political spectrum, other epistemic- cultural scholars viewed and recognized conspiracy theory as “… a form of explaining power and as a practice of interpreting the world” (Jones & Soderlund, 2017, p. 838), not necessarily bound to one particular side of the political spectrum. Though Hofstadters “… vast and sinister conspiracy” out to “… destroy a way of life” (1967) was mainly focused on what he called “the paranoid style” in Right-wing politics and government bodies’ rhetoric, it sparked a certain interest among scholars to further look into the language and culture of conspiracy (Melley, 2000).

This notion of a “conspiracy culture” was further explored in the more contemporary Conspiracy Culture: From Kennedy to the X-Files by Peter Knight (2000), in which Knight suggests that conspiracy is no longer a phenomenon necessarily reserved to the political right but has become a critical process in the cultural landscape as a whole. It touches all Americans, no matter political affiliation (Knight, 2000). Starting roughly in the 1970s, the focus shifted from external forces out to destroy the American way of life to the American government itself becoming the perceived enemy, and conspiracy became a mode to be able to explain and understand aspects of society that did not make sense. According to Knight, “… certainty has given way to doubt, and conspiracy has become the default assumption in an age which has

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learned to distrust everything and everyone” (2000, p. 3). Furthermore, conspiracy is no longer limited to the political sphere alone but touches the American everyday life for the everyday American. Knight continues, stating that a lot of the conspiratorial thinking stems from the assassination of John F. Kennedy in 1963, an event that has been regarded one of the most conspiracy-ridden events in modern history (see Knight 2000, Donovan 2011), often combined with the pop-culture catchphrase “the moment America lost its innocence” (Donovan, 2011).

To Knight (2000), those seven seconds in downtown Dallas laid the foundation for modern conspiracy culture, as well as inspiring several films, like Executive Action (Miller, 1973) and later JFK (Stone, 1991), the latter being rather explicit in its depictions of conspiracy surrounding the assassination. The enormous doubt surrounding the Warren investigation of the assassination in its wake sparked a widespread doubt about the authority of the American government, “… making the assassination a fitting fountainhead for a widespread sense of paranoia” (Knight, 2000, p. 116).

Moreover, Knight (2000) posits that paranoia and conspiracy is no longer confined strictly to the political realm alone, but in recent decades has started to flourish in popular culture. Whether or not one buys into the notion of “cultural paranoia”, as proposed by some theorists, there is according to Knight still little doubt that paranoia and conspiracy has made its way into the popular culture, if only as thematic framework. Conspiratorial rhetoric saturates a lot of popular culture, from rap to Hollywood, where The X-Files is a prominent, semi-modern example of the latter, thus becoming part of everyday American culture, “… no doubt part of the much lamented general cultural turn in US politics, in which substance is replaced by style”

(Knight, 2000, p. 44). Not to mention literature, with writers like Thomas Pynchon, William Burroughs, Joseph Heller, and Ishmael Reed. Additionally, conspiracy narratives are now less a result of “… an inflexible faith” (Knight, 2000, p. 44) than a result of an unease and doubt in the governing powers – less a specific scapegoat to blame, but rather an imprecise sense that some powerful and inexplainable force beyond one’s control is conspiring to shape historical events. Based, of course, on the political scandals and untrustworthy actors in that sphere in decades past. That being said, this sort of argumentation can at times seem to excuse the suspension of disbelief and mental gymnastics an individual would have to go through to reach some of the more far-fetched of conspiracies, again, like the more recent QAnon “movement”

that is flourishing online. Is this just a result of “unease and doubt”? What is interesting however, is the evolution that conspiracy narratives have gone through since the days of Hofstadters paranoid style where now the public is arguably more susceptible to conspiracy narratives, enabling the creation of popular media about not only far-fetched alien cover-ups of

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the likes in The X-Files, but also conspiracy narratives that a rooted in real life conspiracy, for example the covering up the use of “enhanced interrogation techniques” by the CIA inspiring The Report (Burns, 2019). Given a little suspension of disbelief as a result of decades of dodgy politics and a readiness to entertain mad notions of abuse of power or miscarriages of justice, it opens for a wider possibility for conspiracy narratives rooted in reality in film, consequently making it possible for film to put on an informational or educational function, infotainment if you will, based on actual miscarriages of justice and/or abuses of power in society. Wielding a significant social power and influence, given Hollywood’s undoubtable mainstream popularity.

A conspiracy culture can, to put it another way, propel the production of films that deal with a specific set of conspiratorial themes, enabling the spread of conspiracy narratives rooted in reality – in real life events.

Much like Knight, English and American Studies professor Timothy Melley (2000), too, suggests that conspiracy has moved away from the private into becoming a mainstream cultural phenomenon, adding that “… conspiratorial explanation have become a central feature of American political discourse, a way of understanding power that appeals to both marginalized groups and the power elite” (Melley, 2000, p. 7), as well as being a fundamental organizing principle in American film, television, and fiction, in which there is often a vague organization controlling everything (especially in the postwar narratives). Unlike some of the others, Melley does not buy into the notion that a sort of conspiracy culture can be explained as a response to a particular political issue, event, or social organization because of paranoia and conspiracies’

inherent use to both the powerless and the powerful – the latter to further one’s own interests even more. Instead of it being a response to an event, like the John F. Kennedy assassination, Melley posits is stems from a diminishing sense of human agency, “… a feeling that individuals cannot affect meaningful social action, and, in extreme cases, may not be able to control their own behavior” (Melley, 2000, p. 11), what Melley refers to as “agency panic”. As conspiracy theory and paranoia as terminology falls short because of their connections to mental illness and hysteria, agency panic can, according to Melley, be a way of imagining social control, which shines through in conspiracy narratives. Additionally, Melley views “paranoia” in postmodern conspiracy narratives as being more of a healthy suspicion rather than pathological hysteria. Thus, in a conspiracy narrative, the protagonists’ apparent loss of agency (agency panic) fuels the paranoia and need to uncover and obtain information to then reveal the conspiracy, making it a question about “… the access to information and the production of knowledge” (Melley, 2000, p. 16), and in turn to gain some degree of agency through unveiling

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the conspiracy. To Melley (2000), these sorts of narratives mimic a certain loss of individuality in postwar America.

While Melley’s assessment of a postwar America void of individuality and access to information in the modern conspiracy culture can be somewhat extreme, he raises some interesting points about the characters in conspiracy narratives, namely the loss of agency and the ensuing will to “win” that agency back by uncovering and sometimes defeating the conspiracy. Or that the paranoia itself is fueled in part by a lack of access to information that has for instance been hidden in order to conceal a given conspiracy, pointing to that knowledge and power is inextricably linked. If we are to look at Pakula’s All the President’s Men (1976) for example, much of what fuels the two journalists’ investigation is arguably the lack of information, though Bob Woodward (Robert Redford) and Carl Bernstein (Dustin Hoffman) are lucky enough to have a direct connection to the production of knowledge through the character Deep Throat (Hal Holbrook). Not only that, but Melley’s agency panic can go further that just the conspiracy narratives itself and also allude to the way the public reacted to the uncovering of conspiracies within the American government in the 1970s. Because of abuse of power in the Nixon administration, coupled with the Vietnam War, the JFK assassination in 1963, and the uncovering of scandals within the CIA and more, one could argue that the general public would be left disenchanted and suspicious. This sentiment is arguably as relevant today as it was in the 1970s, as it is hardly a stretch to say that contemporary politics is too riddled with scandals, especially in the United States, and importantly critical and conspiratorial attitudes can flourish even more freely today with the information technology at our disposal at any given time, drastically contrasting the conspiracy culture of modern times to that of the 1970s.

There has, to put it simply, been a drastic change in conspiracy thinking from the 1960s and onward. It can arguably no longer be characterized as a delusional, quasi-paranoid mentality, or naïve and unmediated symptoms of a confused mind, but rather a way of plausibly explaining things we do not understand (in general, I am not alluding to specific conspiracy theories), from academics to the everyday American (Knight, 2000). As Knight points out:

“Even if a particular conspiracy theory turns out to be wildly unfounded, for many people it is nevertheless a reasonable assumption that a conspiracy theory is an initially viable explanation for strange events and coincidences” (Knight, 2000, p. 25). As scandals of misconduct appear, it seems more and more likely that similar things can happen again. Conspiracy has taken on a new lingua franca, and contemporary conspiracy culture is shaped by the dichotomy of too little information and too much information simultaneously, because of the easy access to

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information through the Internet. We cannot be entirely sure about what is objectively right or wrong at any given time. At the same time conspiracy culture can go too far, perhaps even further that before, continually pushing the limits of logic and reason, thus also making it a potentially dangerous phenomenon (Knight, 2000). In our current Information Age the notion that “everything is connected”, “… one of the guiding principles of conspiracy theory” (Knight, 2000, p. 204), can be pushed even further, drawing outlandish conclusions based of vague and unproven information found online. This is also what some conspiracy critics see as conspiracy’s biggest logical and factual fallacy.

As evident in the 1970s the conspiracy culture of the time allowed the production and release of films that dealt with conspiracy based on real life events, whether proven (Watergate in All the President’s Men) or not (general vague notions of corporate malfeasance, like in Executive Action), often in the form of a thriller (or conspiracy-thriller if you will). While we will get back to contemporary conspiracy later on, it can arguably point to an openness to conspiracy narratives, even today. Especially when considering that conspiracy narratives are just as prevalent, or perhaps even more, today than before, much because of the easy access to increasingly more information in the modern Information Age. Additionally, I would like to argue that conspiracy film can also serve an informational purpose through their depiction, exposé, and critique of proven conspiratorial events (albeit fictionalized versions of these events), arguably having an impact on the viewing public given the obvious popularity of Hollywood productions. That is not to say that a fiction film can have a similar representation of real-life events like documentaries, for instance, but the grey area that conspiracy film as docufiction examines can be interesting to look into.

With that in mind, it is still important to look at conspiracy narratives and conspiratorial discourse with somewhat of a distance and not to buy into hyperbolic tales at face value. While the narratives this thesis wants to look into (and representations thereof) are based in reality to different extents, the intention is not to legitimize far-fetched conspiracy theories and conspiracy theorists en masse, as there is no denying the potential dangers of extreme beliefs of any convention or nature. As Fenster writes:

Conspiracy theory’s ability to captivate in turn has significant effects: it causes people to believe in falsehoods, to trust duplicitous or unprincipled sources, and to become alienated from prevailing orthodoxies and institutions. Underlying these accounts is the sense that some essential aspects of conspiracy theory and conspiracy theorists is not merely wrong, but pathologically wrong (2008, p. 8).

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Even though the word “paranoia” is not used in the pathological sense, there are still some underlying connotations of an unhealthy approach to politics (and otherwise), evident too in how the aforementioned Hofstadter referred to the turn in cultural and political discourse in the United States, namely the “paranoid style”. One can infer that the dangerous fringe of far-right politics as posited by Hofstadter making its way into mainstream media and culture to be a serious matter, therefore warranting some care. It is no secret that conspiracy theories can in many cases take dizzying leaps of logic without much substantive proof, which can in extreme cases lead to hostility, violence, and hate. It is still arguably possible, however, to comment on certain shifts in cultural discourse and the following cultural texts without necessarily taking on the entirety of conspiracy theory. “The suspicion that conspiracies occur does not necessarily make one crazy or paranoid”, also in the words of Fenster (2008, p. 9), who continues to point to the importance of the hidden collaborative and collusive behavior that goes into governance and politics, fueling potential warranted or unwarranted thoughts of conspiracy. And ultimately, conspiracy theory does not necessarily have to be an item of inflexible faith than a more uncoordinated expression of mistrust and suspicion (Knight, 2000).

And finally, as has been alluded to several times to far, significant illegal conspiracies do occur, from the CIA and Contra scandal (see Boyle, 2004) to Jim Crow, and certain politicians and political institutions have engaged in conspiratorial efforts to suppress peoples or maintain power, so “… the notion that conspiracy theory necessarily expresses a political pathology ignores the fact that it can correctly identify present and historical wrongs” (Fenster, 2008, p. 11). Conspiracy is historical and might possibly be a central part of modern capitalism and democracy. According to Fenster (2008), what many conspiracy critics fail to realize or consider is how one of the basic tenets of contemporary conspiratorial narratives is the longing for a better and more transparent governance, and not simply pathological beliefs in extreme narratives for the sake of believing in something extreme.

To summarize, there are many ways of approaching the hows and whys of contemporary conspiracy culture, whether a result of too little or too much information, a loss of a sense of agency perceived as a result of state or corporate interests, conspiracy within reason, and so on.

While there is a need to understand what exactly that instigates conspiratorial thinking, one can argue that there are many factors coming into play, and not necessarily one thing in and of itself.

It can therefore be wise and interesting to take several approaches into account, thus providing a varied foundation on which to analyze and discuss later on. Conspiracy theory is a multifaceted and complicated matter on its own, warranting a multifaceted approach.

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We have looked at the Hows and the Whys of conspiracy culture and subsequent conspiracy film - how societal change (often by the means of scandals or misconduct by those in power) can affect a collective consciousness in the general public and therefore also lead to the production of films with conspiratorial themes. These films were often rooted in real incidents, especially those of the 1970s. However, we have not really looked into why paranoia and conspiracy remain a staple in suspicious discourse. The agency panic as explained by Melley in his book Empire of Conspiracy (2000) gives some insight, whereby and individual feels a loss of individual autonomy in the face of perceived social control (whether real or not), and thus resort to paranoia and conspiracy theorizing. Melley goes on to explain that conspiracy offers a highly adaptable and flexible way to see causality, explaining that conspiracy can be

“… a grand scheme capable of explaining numerous complex events” (Melley, 2000, p. 8). The mere fact that conspiracy theories are nearly impossible to explain simply furthers their significance and points to why they are able to flourish like they do, requiring a sort of quasi- religious conviction and belief, unbound by any rules or laws. It is important to note, however, that Melley also views conspiratorial discourse in itself as a kind of social control, where politicians are able to point the finger to another politician (or institution or what have you) and make them the enemy for doing nothing more devious than the accuser, consequently trapping the public in a ping pong of aggressive and suspicious rhetoric (Melley, 2000), further underlining an “us against them” mentality. This also alludes to part of Peter Knight’s (2000) conspiracy culture, where the way of using conspiracy as a means of explaining and conspiracy as a political mode meets.

Similarly, Coale (2005) presents conspiracy as a way of making the world easier to explain and therefore more comfortable. Paranoia fuels conspiracy, and conspiracy provides to the need for an overriding structure to explain the world totally and rationally, acting as a metanarrative. To Coale, conspiracy theorizing, and rhetoric has always been a part of the American psyche, from the fear of the Bavarian Illuminati long ago, to the fear of certain religions and peoples (which resonates with modern times too), therefore it is a part of the American identity to be different and demonize “others”. This generalized suspicion about conspiring forces coupled with conspiracies about government and American institutions being proven to be right then further gives rise to more theorizing, generating “… an infinite regress of suspicion” (Coale, 2005, p. 15). Trifonova (2014) goes even further than Coale, stating that conspiracy culture, and therefore cultural paranoia, is inherent in the very structure of the new global economy as a rational response. The conspiracy turned inwards towards one’s own

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institutions making conspiracy a “… textual [resolution] for inadequately explained socio- historical traumas, thematizing the individual’s powerlessness in the face of ubiquitous institutional control” (Trifonova, 2014, p. 207), and the emergence of more conspiracy films is a statement to the continual unease and suspicion in the broader public.

It is easy to label conspiracy theorizing as simply overtly paranoid and simplistic at first glance, especially when you keep in mind the many outlandish theories of child trafficking sex rings running out of Washington D.C., or that the Earth is in fact flat. Continuing on the notions discussed where conspiracy is a product of justifiable events, you find what Holm (2009) calls

“paranoia within reason”, within the overarching umbrella of a conspiracy culture. In his essay on the emerging surveillance culture in the world, with focus on the United States and the United Kingdom in particular, Holm proposes that as a result of these aforementioned justifiable events, like the exposing of Watergate or revelations of misconduct within the CIA seemingly every so often, what was once seen as ludicrous and baseless can become legitimate suspicion and then sparking a shift in the public mentality. The unthinkable has happened, making the unthinkable probable, therefore not so unthinkable anymore (Knight, 2000). That is not to say that this way of thinking, and conspiracy theory in general, has not been criticized. As conspiracy theory became more mainstream and a part of counterculture in a sense, there were those who say it as damaging and even more paranoid than before, leading to doubt and suspicion spreading too far, according to sociologist John Carroll (referred to in Knight, 2000).

That being said, Holm’s (2009) notion of “paranoia within reason” is an interesting perspective that fits into the definition of conspiracy culture, and that will be highly relevant for the analysis chapter later on.

2.5. Early Paranoid Cinema

Much of the foundation for conspiratorial rhetoric and discourse goes as far back as the 1940s and the post-war era. In the wake of the Second World War a disenchanted and pessimistic United States became increasingly suspicious of outside influence out to destroy American ideals and way of life, probably best exemplified by the country’s containment policy from the end of the 1940s onward. Senator Joseph McCarthy’s containment policy under the Truman administration wanted to effectively understand Soviet influence around the world to be able to resist foreign interference in the United States and its’ allied countries, a mindset that prevailed until the end of the Cold War (Nadel, 1995). The containment policy lead with it a sort of “us versus them” mentality where the American life and governance was under supposed constant attack from outside agitators. The McCarthyism and its containment policy also eventually

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made its way into Hollywood, where in the 1940s there was established a committee that was to find and weed out communists, communist sympathizers, and fascists by blacklisting actors, producers, directors, and so on in an attempt to prevent any foreign interference in the American cultural sphere. This process, through the ensuing HUAC (House Un-American Activities Committee) hearings, would continue to leave its mark on Hollywood well into the 1950s and 1960s (Powers, Rothman & Rothman, 1996). A very distinct paranoid tendency can be seen in these post-war decades, laying the groundwork for the paranoid conspiracy film, though at the time this paranoia was directed at outside agitators out to, allegedly, destroy the very American way of life itself. This mindset also percolated into Hollywood, with many films concerning the “Red Menace to the East”, essentially catching Hollywood within the political storm that was fueled by the McCarthyistic policies of the government, further propagandizing the Red Scare with film being a somewhat easily accessible entertainment medium. The Red Scare seeped into many film, for example Diplomatic Courier (Hathaway, 1952) and Atomic City (Hopper, 1952), the latter being about how the communists infiltrate and get ordinary people to betray their own government.

However, despite the McCarthyism and its clear-cut anti-communist agenda of the time there emerged a socially conscious film trend where realism and melodrama were utilized to assess the impact and effects of the Second World War on society. Film noir especially started to examine the individual’s consciousness and reaction to power and control, often with a darker and cynical approach (Scott, 2011). There were also certain reactions to the American-Soviet relationship in Hollywood with films questioning the motives for the Cold War on either side, such as Stanley Kramer’s On the Beach from 1959. The film looked at the arms race between the two superpowers and was favorably received by audiences at the time (Scott, 2011), opening for broader questioning of the government’s motives through public debates, op-eds in newspapers, and so on. According to Ian Scott (2011) this more critical sentiment in the American public made way for activist filmmakers to include differing points of view in their films, namely that it wasn’t just the USSR that was the enemy, but that it was okay to also question one’s own government. John Frankenheimer’s The Manchurian Candidate from 1962 was one such film, building the foundation for political film and conspiracy film in the following decades. Scott (2011) further posits that the film was a reaction to the McCarthyian government and the HUAC hearings. In the film Raymond Shaw (Laurence Harvey) is captured as a POW in the Korean War and brainwashed by communists and turned into a hitman for an international communist conspiracy out to overthrow the American government.

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The 1970s was in many ways the producing decade of the conspiracy film, that being said the conspiracy film has roots going back even further. Based in politically themed thrillers, the conspiracy film can be traced all the way back to the 1940s, with films like Mr. Smith Goes to Hollywood (Capra, 1939) and All the King’s Men (Rossen, 1949), the latter being a title rather reminiscent of another film of the 1970s that proved defining to the conspiracy film conventions (Donovan, 2011). While these films had a sense of a covert back-room culture in which a politician subverts democracy for personal gain or fights the politically corrupt system in the case of Mr. Smith Goes to Hollywood, there is a reason as to why true conspiracy in film was rarer at the time than in the following decades, mainly because of self-imposed rules in Hollywood that forbade filmmakers to make films about political conspiracy within the United States (Butter, 2020). Film was at the time considered pure entertainment, not deemed worthy to fall under the First Amendment of the American Constitution, an amendment that would potentially protect films about controversial subject matter. Instead, filmmakers had to follow the Production Code, and would more often than not avoid any content included in it. The Production Code of 1934 stated explicitly that “[t]he history, institutions, prominent people and citizenry of other nations be treated fairly” (quoted in Butter, 2020, p. 458), prompting filmmakers to only portray conspiracy at the hands of an enemy the mainstream labelled fair game, ergo films about the evil communist Russians attempting to destroy the American way of life. However, as films went under the First Amendment in the 1950s onwards, filmmakers could more safely include internal governmental conspiracy in their films, though the trend of foreign conspirators trying to undermine America remained popular. Butter (2011) posits that another reason for the lack of conspiracy film leading up the 1970s, aside of the Production Code inhibiting those kinds of themes, was because many films at the time largely plot driven and focused on a particular main character, following a narrative scheme of causality.

2.6. The 1970s Conspiracy Films

Though the 1970s was a decade well known as the time of the blockbusters, with huge titles like Jaws (Spilberg, 1975) and Star Wars (Lucas, 1977) dominating the box offices, it similarly marked the resurgence of the clean genre films, reminiscent of the Golden Age of Hollywood in the 1920s, and the westerns and musicals of the 1950s. Historically the genre films proved to be both cost efficient and lucrative for the Hollywood studios, as creative personnel and props could be reused from production to production, from script writers to actors and directors. To put this into numbers, between the 1943 and 1944, for instance, 397 films were made in Hollywood, whereof 62 were western films (Cook, 2000). According to Cook, what made the

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genre films of the time so effective at drawing audiences and making money was “… their ability to provide an audience with consistently familiar and repeatable experiences” (2000, p.

161). Where the films of the 1960s and 70s however deviated was in how they combined genres and borrowed genre conventions, therefore providing the audience with new narratives, though in a format they were familiar with. For example, in the above-mentioned Star Wars director George Lucas drew from science fiction, western and war movies in a sort of genre pastiche, something that would prove central to the blockbusters that captivated the world (Cook, 2000).

A film convention, for lack of a better word, that made a comeback during the 1970s was the postwar film noir. In the postwar years film noir¸ “… a cinema of moral anxiety” (Cook, 2000, p. 188), embodied alienation, fatalism, and pessimism, a mindset that made its way back onto the big screen in the 1970s, probably as a result of the never-ending war in Vietnam and the Watergate scandal in the early part of the decade. Though film noir arguably is not a genre in an of itself, it stood as a mode of representation where sex, violence, and nihilism draw a weary audience in the wake of World War II, but its’ pessimism about the war replaced with consumerism, wealth, and a fear of nuclear war in the 1970s (Cook, 2000). Similar to the postwar years, the noir of the 1970s drew an audience in a time when the American social and political landscape was as confusing and alienating as in the postwar years. Where the 1940s noir often was about a rough and resourceful protagonist disaffected from one’s own society, like Humphrey Bogart’s character in The Maltese Falcon (Huston, 1941), the resuscitated noir of a few decades later took a different approach. The hardened detective was switched out with a faltering, vulnerable, and somewhat incompetent protagonist who is a part of a world he or she no longer understands, and is therefore powerless in it (Cook, 2000), like J. J. Gittes (Jack Nicholson) in Roman Polanski’s Chinatown (1974), who unknowingly ends up helping the police murder the woman he loves as he stumbles through his investigation. According to Cook (2000) the resurgence of film noir signaled the death of liberal politics, and though this is a tough statement, one could at the very least argue that it points at certain sense of helplessness in the changing economic reality in the United States, combined with a mistrust in the government as a result of Watergate and the Vietnam War.

Though not strictly noir, the difficult economic reality of the time also started to show up in film with films concerning big business subverting laws in order to get rich and increase the reach of their empires, by threatening, intimidating, or killing anyone who tried to expose their large-scale corporate malfeasance (Donovan, 2011). Despite corporate figures having been used as antagonists in films prior to the 1960s and 1970s, these kinds of corporate conspiratorial plots started to emerge trailing the consumer movements and increased ethical

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concerns in business, in effect making corporate America Hollywood’s favorite villain for a while, further fueled by the gas and oil shortages and the crash of savings and loans in the 1980s. As Donovan writes:

“The raw, unchecked greed of those that are already wealthy beyond comprehension can be the most offensive to any moviegoing audience and plots about big business conspiracies can easily be the most successful variation of the genre” (2011, p. 19).

The relatability of the “big bad business” after sensational corporate outrages like the collapse of the loans and savings industry and illegal trading on Wall Street, the evil corporation continued to be an effective antagonist.

The resurgence of noir was, according to Cook (2000), one of the main reasons for the appearance of the conspiracy film in the 1970s, as it opened for another grim look at one’s own society, like in the postwar years. In the wake of the John F. Kennedy Assassination in 1963 and the subsequent Warren Commission investigation the murder, David Miller’s Executive Action (1973) was released, marking the beginning of the more explicitly depicted conspiracy in film. In it, John F. Kennedy’s assassination is portrayed as being a conspiracy at the hands of rightwing politicians, businessmen, assassins, and intelligence agents. The screenplay was written by Dalton Trumbo, a victim of the blacklisting of supposed communists and communist sympathizers in the aforementioned HUAC Hearings. Alan J. Pakula’s The Parallax View from 1974 continued the same trend, in which an American senator is assassinated by the omnipotent Parallax Corporation, a vast corporation who controls the entirety of the United States from the shadows. In the mid-1970s it surfaced that the CIA had had a substantial part in several attempted and successful assassinations around the world (se Cook 2000 and Boyle 2004), prompting the CIA to be portrayed as a web of conspiracies in Syndey Pollack’s Three Days of the Condor (1975). There was a shift in the enemy portrayed in the conspiracy film – it was no longer a necessity that the agitator or conspirator was an outside agent seeking to destroy the American way of life. Rather, American institutions and corporations themselves were portrayed as the evildoers. Though perhaps the best example for conspiracy at the hands of one’s own government is Pakula’s All the President’s Men from 1973, in which the Watergate scandal is slowly unraveled by two Washington Post journalists; Bob Woodward (Robert Redford) and Carl Bernstein (Dustin Hoffman).

The widespread paranoia and conspiratorial mindset in the wake of the John F. Kennedy assassination, coupled with the Vietnam War and Watergate scandal, created a substantial backdrop for conspiracy film to flourish, making them a sort of mode of representation for the

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increasingly doubtful American public, and therefore sparking the emergence of the conspiracy films of the 1970s. Though, importantly, the 1970s was not the first time themes of conspiracy made its way onto the big screen, the time marked a change in how the public perceived its’

own institutions. As Peter Knight writes:

To many minds already disenchanted with the powers that be, it seemed improbable that the assassinations of John and Robert Kennedy, and Martin Luther King (as well as Malcolm X) could be merely isolated incidents of misguided violence. Only a generation before, a conspiracy theory might have been the mark of a right-wing fanatic, but by the end of the 1960s it became the identifying style and posture of significant numbers of those in tune with the New Left and the counterculture (Knight, 2000, p. 33).

There was in other words a significant change in rhetoric surrounding conspiratorial discourse, mainly because conspiracy became more mainstream and less “on the fringe” than before. It was apparent that it was possible that the system could in fact be deeply flawed, and that those in power could in fact abuse their position for their own gain, and possibly regularly did, dealing a blow to the “American innocence”. Not only did the death of John F. Kennedy led to a plethora of conspiracy theories around the assassination, but the death also led to an increased American presence in Vietnam, further pushing the conspiratorial discourse (Donovan, 2011).

Eventually, the conspiracy film tradition ended as a result of two things. Firstly, there was a slow and steady stigmatization of conspiracy narratives in American culture and the more

“traditional” Hollywood films became more popular again. And secondly, the waning of the New Hollywood at the end of the decade made it so that Hollywood moved back to the more goal-oriented narratives of old, and the interest in conspiratorial narratives in mainstream culture halted (Butter, 2020). Conspiracy was to have a bigger place in Hollywood narratives later on, though in somewhat of a different form, reacting to the cultural shifts in the US at the turn of the century.

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