Irony as Anesthetic in Robert Altman’s “M.A.S.H” (1970)

It begins with the “stupidest song ever written,” as Robert Altman called it, and ends with a self-referential jab at the very idea of finding comic relief in the tragedy of war. But it is equally unserious, the film “M.A.S.H” seem to suggest, to take seriously the authority of war-making institutions, and their pretense to putting violence in service of an ideal. And so morality succumbs to mockery, love to hedonism, and military rank to the form of authority immanent in the power to save lives. Yet suicide is not in fact painless, if it means robbing others of our presence, or ridding ourselves of the capacities for grief and earnestness. Wes & Erin discuss the 1970 classic “M.A.S.H,” and whether irony ought always to be our anesthetic, when confronted with traumas that are otherwise unspeakable. Upcoming Episodes: Rilke, Rebecca (1940), Dickinson. 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And so morality succumbs to mockery, love, to hedonism and military rank, to the form of authority immanent in the power to save lives. Yet suicide is not in fact painless if it means robbing others of our presence or ridding ourselves of the capacities for grief and earnestness. Today we discuss the 1970 classic MASH and whether irony ought always to be our anesthetic when confronted with traumas that are otherwise unspeakable. This is Wes Alwan and this is Erin O'Luanaigh and you're listening to Subtext. Okay Erin, when I recommended this movie, when I saw your reaction I thought, hmm, this may not be her favorite. You didn't seem that excited about it. Maybe I should have gotten more info from you before we went through with it. And then I started watching it. It is one of my favorite movies, but I haven't seen it in a very long time. And as I watched it I started to think, oh no, this is not good. One of the problems with the movie is that so it has a group of protagonists who are all chauvinists and womanizers and there are lots of complaints one can make about the way women are treated in the film. And I think Robert Altman was asked many times about this over the years and he said, look, it's just a reflection of the times. And I think he meant the 70s, but he might have also meant 1951 when the movie is set, or some combination thereof. But the arc of the film involves this group of surgeons, irreverent anti authority surgeons, defeating two representatives of authority. One of them is Major Burns and one of them is Hot Lips Houlihan. And part of the way the arc for her they get Burns kicked out for they provoke him into attacking Hawkeye, I think, and then he leaves in a straitjacket. But for Hot Lips, she is humiliated in several different ways, including, like, being publicly, you know, having the curtain on the women's shower taken down so she's exposed publicly, and then ultimately, she's integrated into the group. She starts dating Duke, and at the very end of the movie, when there's a football game, she's reduced to the level of a mindless cheerleader. Like. Yeah. So I thought we'd maybe just tackle that up front. What do you. What do you think of all that? 3:29 Erin: Start with the fact that I'm. I'm a feminist scold. Can't have any fun. 3:33 Wes: Well, okay. Well, I'm not meaning to imply that. 3:36 Erin: No, I'm just teasing. 3:38 Wes: I had. Let me just say a little bit more about that. I had. When I probably saw it for the first time in 1990, and it would never have occurred to me to be uncomfortable with any of that. For. I mean, part of it's cultural, and part of it is just my age. And part of it, I think, is still applicable, which is that I looked at it through the lens of protagonists who are not meant to be likable on the one first and second, through the lens of what they're doing to deal with the horrors of war, which is not meant to be pleasant, even though, you know, it's milked for comedy. But then it's. It's satirical, and the film makes much of the fact, which we'll get into that it. There's something more serious going on. But in any case. So I saw it as more local to the conditions of a MASH unit than as a cultural commentary. And I don't think Altman meant it as some. It's not an endorsement. It's also not even really a cultural commentary. It's not really the point. But now, yeah, I can't help but feel disturbed. And I think part of that is just the culture has. Has changed. Thank goodness it's not just about calling you a feminist scold. 4:44 Erin: Yeah. Those are your exact words. I wrote them. No, I'm just kidding. No. You think the protagonists aren't meant to be likable? Because, I mean, here's one of my big problems with the movie is I love Elliott Gould. I love everything he does. So, you know, you want to, I don't know, clarify what you mean by that, because I think that they're being presented as the heroes. 5:04 Wes: Well, they are the protagonists. Although I think thematically, the chaplain might be the kind of dark horse protagonist, like the Alyosha of the movie. And I'll say why later on, but. Right. I get a lot of pleasure out of their irreverence, which I think we are meant to get. But they are cruel and they have kind of a surgeon God complex, which is amplified by their position in the army, where they have no tolerance for what they call, quote, unquote, regular army for people who want to follow the rules or for people who are representatives of any sort of moral authority. And I think part of that is a kind of protest against a war that they've been drafted into. And the contradiction between being part of a war and their role as healers. Right. So we have all sorts of things going on. So I think one's reaction to them can be complicated and you get plenty of pleasure out of them. And, yeah, I love all these actors as well, but I don't think the protagonists themselves could be said to be. I think, likable would be. They're bad boys. And some of it's charming, but some of it is obviously cruel. And I. I don't. I don't think an audience. I don't think any audience, no matter how sympathetic, could escape that. But maybe I'm wrong about that. 6:27 Erin: Hmm. Yeah. Maybe likable is the wrong word. I think the film very much sides with them. I mean, you know, one of the uncomfortable things about not liking the film is that that casts anyone in opposition to the way that it portrays some of the things you're talking about as being sort of pro authority, pro army protocol, pro teetotaling. All of these things that one doesn't want to be aligned with. But it sort of like, you know, annihilates the opposition. My problem with the protagonists themselves, and maybe if I'm seeing the movie as fully aligned with their point of view and endorsing that point of view, then the movie, too, is just incredibly smug. I think that's the biggest problem that I have with it, more even than the chauvinistic material or the cruelty. All of that, I think, is the downstream effect of this extreme smugness. And I think the MASH setup, the fact that they're three miles from the front line, but they're not ever involved in combat. And, you know, it's almost like there are civilians just that just happen to be three miles from the front line. 7:33 Wes: Right. 7:33 Erin: Like, there are so many. There's so many conditions, of course, that make this a set apart kind of place, a kind of moral no man's land. But at the same time, you know, they're not actually. They're only dealing with the result of battle. They're never, it seems, seeing battle. And so in a way, they're just like a bunch of doctors that have just been transposed into a new area and just have to deal with whoever comes in. But they get to keep their. Well, now I kind of want to go back on that. This is very complicated because of course you can argue that a lot of what their attitudes are are response to the conditions that they're seeing. But at the same time, I think there's an element of this in which they're sort of untouched by the reality of like having bullets fly at you and stuff like that. So there's a sort of resistance element to what they're doing. And yet at the same time they're winning. They win at everything. They're always right. They always have the answer. They can usually save the patient. They're good at everything, and therefore they get away with everything. And that as existing both in and kind of separate from the system. That clash really fascinates me. 8:39 Wes: I think the word smug is right. Although I don't attributed to the movie. I attribute to attribute it to the characters. And I would. I think of it in terms of cynicism and I think certainly Robert Altman didn't think he was endorsing their attitude and part of the reason why he disliked the TV series. So it turns out he really didn't like the TV series mash, which is that all this. The harshness of it was toned down and all the characters are just likable and there's still humor, but it's much tamer and people aren't being cruel to each other. And I think he thought he was illustrating kind of extreme behavior under extreme conditions. Which is not to say that who knows how these characters are in civilian life. One would think that, yeah, that some of the arrogance and smugness and all that stuff is there and it's not. Not to paint all doctors with a broad brush, but it's kind of one of the temptations of being a. In a very prestigious position as a surgeon in society. Right. It can go to one's head. Again, I use the phrase God complex and then you transpose that into this situation. The result is people who are used to being the authorities and are going to rebel against the authority, which is the army, in part because it's a hypocritical authority. They're trying to create a pocket of order and sanity in the context of something that is arguably completely insane. Even if you think the war was necessary. There's something insane about war that seems like it should not be honored, even with the formalities of rank. And you treat me this way and call me this and all that. That seems to dishonor the cruel realities of war. That seems hypocritical. And so I think these sorts of characters see themselves as warriors against that kind of hypocrisy, but it's not all positive. Right. So you get. You get these kind of ridiculous characters in Burns and Houlihan, who are their representatives of the moral. Of some sort of moral order, of some sort of impulse towards a moral order. But they are. They go too far. They quote, unquote, regular army. And one of them is religious, but arguably superficially religious. He's also cruel, and that's part of what gets him in. In trouble. He makes one of the younger MASH unit kids cry by blaming a death on him. But on the other hand, the treatment of the chaplain, Dago Red, Is that what they're calling. 11:09 Erin: Yeah, my new. My new nickname. 11:11 Wes: Several. One of several inappropriate nicknames. But they don't have a lot of time for him in the movie. And in many instances, the uselessness of what he's doing spiritually is highlighted. Right. So he's in to give rites to someone, but someone says, come here and hold a clamp or something like that over and over again. His role is kind of minimized, but he doesn't get the same treatment in terms of ridicule as Hot Lips and Burns do. And arguably, in the end. So I think if you thought. If you think there might be a thematic protagonist to this, it would be sadness. And I think the chaplain is representative of that. So at the very end of the movie, they're all playing poker. And I don't know if you saw this. This is the first time I really paid attention to it. But in the background, the chaplain is hauling a body off. 11:58 Erin: I did not see that. 11:59 Wes: Yeah. Is taking a body away. And Hawkeye has this. Does this double take. He's looking behind him at the jeep, taking the body with the chaplain, and has this sad look on his face. And I thought, okay, well, that is really interesting in a way. That's kind of a emotional climax from the movie where you get to see some sort of remorse out of these characters who are covering up some so. Or sadness. I would say not. Not necessarily remorse, but some sort of sadness out of. Out of these characters who are kind of manically covering that up with their behavior. And it turns out in the original, this was Cut out of the movie, but the scenes were shot. That's actually the Korean kid, what's his name? Ho-Jon. 12:39 Erin: Oh, yeah. 12:39 Wes: Who they tried to save from going into the war by faking a physical and it didn't work. And then he's in the war and he ends up killed. And they just try to block that out. So that poker game, they're trying to ignore what's going on behind them, which is that Ho-Jon is being taken away and then Hawkeye can't. So it's subtle, but I think that if one were to defend the film, you would have to say that the manic behavior of these doctors is not actually being endorsed, even if we as an audience enjoy it. And many ways their intelligence, their rapier like wit, as someone makes fun of them in the film is. It's hard to resist. But at a deeper thematic level, it's the antagonist. That's my defense. I know it might sound far fetched, but. 13:30 Erin: No, it's very interesting. It's very interesting. It makes me appreciate the film a little bit more. I mean, there were things about this film I did appreciate it. Don't get me wrong. You know, Pauline Kael is so her long review of the film, I think it's in deeper into movies, which I read a couple months ago, you know, she has this real triumphalist like these. These are her protagonists that obviously reflect her attitudes about, you know, this was a film she really championed. And she was a close personal friend of Altman, too, and like, loved his films. So she sees these men as being fully endorsed by the film. And I think that the cruelty with which someone like Burns is portrayed is also pretty incriminating as far as the attitude of the film goes. Right. He kneels down in front of them and starts praying out loud. You know, it seems to me that one of the reasons why the chaplain is spared is because I think because he doesn't seem to be intrusive. You know, Burns is teaching Ho-Jon to read out of the Bible and this is a bad thing to do. He's praying out loud, and this is an obnoxious thing to do. And these. These characteristics paired with the fact that he seems to be in favor of a certain amount of protocol and also that he's not a good surgeon. That's a big one. He's not competent in his job. The movie has sort of Howard Hawks moral values that if you're good at your job, then you're good. And that's, you know, what we care about. The Most is someone who has extreme competence, especially in these high pressure situations. Right. So doing good work is the most important thing, which is a value system that makes a ton of sense to me. So burn all. All burns needed, you know, to attract my ire would be being a bad surgeon and yelling at that kid, you know, but they. But they make him this really obnoxious, you know, praying out loud, making himself such a huge target in front of these guys. And so he's a hypocrite, whereas the chaplain is not a hypocrite. But of course, what I see as a flaw of the film is that the protagonists are just as stringent. Their moral code and further, they have the power to exert punishment. I mean, they don't have a God complex so much as they are little gods in this environment. I mean, you can make an argument that they're very much like gods. They're very much like pagan gods who get to have their way with the women and do whatever it is that they want and save people's lives at will and administer justice in the form of exacting revenge or dishing out retribution for not fitting in with the moral code of immorality that characterizes their sort of cool kids club. So that bothers me. It's a little bit like a more sophisticated version of Grease where Sandy at the end has to turn bad in order to get with Danny Zuko. That's essentially what they're doing to Houlihan. They're kind of indoctrinating her into, in this instance, a frat house. In the case of Grease, it's more like a mild mannered gang. As far as gang go. 16:37 Wes: It's worse in a way because she doesn't become one of the boys, she becomes a child. 16:41 Erin: Right. She becomes part of the harem. Yeah, yeah. 16:45 Wes: And not even. Not even. I mean, yeah, part of the harem, but. And this is a harem in which. Right, yeah. Everyone's cheating on their spouses back home. Although there is that moment, Right. Duke and Hawkeye learn that they're going home and you see the look on Duke's face and then you see the look on Hot Lip's face and it's very pained for both of their parts, which suggests that there's a real attachment. But. Right. The way she is in the football game at the end, she's traded in her competence. Not just her moral authority or her interest in a moral order or in being rules and being regular army, but also her authority overall and her competence. She's traded that for being this airhead. Hot Lips, you nincompoop. She. What does she get wrong? Or she's singing chants like, kill, kill, kill. And she doesn't know that the other. It's not their team that scored, the other team scored. You know, things like that. She knows nothing about football, women, which doesn't. 17:43 Erin: We're so stupid. 17:46 Wes: So I think you can look at it in two different ways. One of. One of them is more benign. It's that she's not taking herself seriously. But the more sinister and probably at least a bit more accurate way of looking at it is that she's submitted. She's bent the knee, so to speak. To use a phrase that people like to use today, I guess because of Game of Thrones. 18:07 Erin: Oh, is that where that's from? 18:09 Wes: Bending the knee, as in submitting to the higher royal authority? 18:14 Erin: Never mind. Cut that out. 18:15 Wes: I'm offended that you haven't watched Game of Thrones. 18:20 Erin: Yeah. You know, incest is yet another. Another topic I love, and my media consumption. 18:28 Wes: Oh, that's the tip of the iceberg. 18:30 Erin: Yeah, I know. Yeah. No, thank you. I would like to be able to watch it, but I can barely handle certain commercials at this point. So. 18:38 Wes: Yeah. Anyway, so, yeah, Hot Lips, you were saying? She is turned in. It's like having to become one of the. One of the bad boys. But also, she's not even one of the boys. 18:48 Erin: Right. Yeah. I think, more importantly, I'm concerned with the hypocrisy of. You know, they seem desperate to root out Burns. Hypocrisy. And that very action of rooting it out is itself a great expression of hypocrisy. You know, they're sort of like militant atheists being even more dogmatic in their atheism than the religious people that they claim to hate. Right. It would be far less hypocritical for them to simply not care and just let everybody do their thing. And if they feel like praying out loud or. 19:17 Wes: Well, except that they see the moral. The moral of the order and authority in general as something bad. 19:24 Erin: Right, right. 19:25 Wes: So you could see them as anarchists who just. So they are offended. Yes, they're morally offended by someone like Burns. 19:32 Erin: Right. And here we get into the weeds a little bit. I think, about this idea of authority. I mean, how, you know, they get away with everything. The actual authority figures are not. What's the name of the captain or the lieutenant or the colonel? I keep going, the colonel who's in charge with the glasses, what's his name? 19:49 Wes: Blake. 19:50 Erin: Blake, right. You know, Blake is not much of an authority figure. I mean, they. They don't for. For people that are like, down with authority, they don't seem to really suffer the consequences of it. They see people who have suffered the consequences of it. They. They work on people who have suffered the consequences for it. So you could argue perhaps that they're fighting a kind of proxy war on Behal. These bodies that are getting shipped in to their theater. Is that something that. Is that something? 20:17 Wes: Yeah, I mean, I think there's an element of anti war protest here, even though it's never made explicit. And of course, the movie came out in 1970, right? 20:26 Erin: Yeah, during. 20:27 Wes: During the Vietnam War. And I think studio executives were worried that people would not understand that it was the Korean War rather than the Vietnam War. And in fact, it's got a very 70s vibe to it. Right. It's not really like an attempt at a period representation of 1951, or maybe it's even a hybrid. Maybe it's even something weirder. And it's kind of a hybrid of the two different settings and value systems. And I think there's an undercurrent of this is. Yeah, this is meant to be a protest against the absurdity and terribleness of war and the authority figures who bring us into war. Is that what you were getting at? 21:11 Erin: Yeah, I'm just. I'm just interested in how toothless the authority that is directly represented in the film is. This isn't some version of the Great Escape in which they're managing to carry out all these hijinks and have fun in spite of the fact that, like, they're in. I mean, I know the Great Escape took place in a POW camp, but, you know, they're managing to do some sort of massive resistance in the face of the iron fist of authority. One of the things that I think is characteristic of an Altman film is the, in fact, the facelessness of authority. And maybe this is representative of these kinds of wars. Korea and Vietnam are kind of just two expressions of the same type of conflict and the same type of region with the same type of. Generally speaking, Vietnam, I think, is, you know, much more densely jungle than Korea is. I might be wrong about that. But otherwise, in sort of the same scenery, right. Fighting for the sorts of. The same values and everything is imposed from on high. And maybe the facelessness of that iron will of authority that's. That's kind of bearing down on all of them. Maybe that is part of the point. I'm thinking of Nashville, which is probably The Altman film I like best, in which there's a political candidate and a sort of neo fascist mold who we never see. But there are loudspeakers. Loudspeakers are another thing. It has in common with mash, but in Nashville, there are cars going down the street that have these loudspeakers that are blaring these messages from this faceless candidate that's running for office throughout the entire film. We never see him. And I think he's a member of. Oh, it's something really. I think it's called the Replacement Party. And so we get this crazy neo fascist kind of messaging being broadcast throughout the city at various points in the film, adding to the layers of the soundtrack. So that kind of threat, or what that threat represents and the fact that it is faceless, and maybe also the fact that there's quite a disconnect. And I think this is a common theme in the sort of modern war film with a more sort of Vietnam and after kind of sensibility is the utter disconnect between the people at the top that are sending you over there and any sense of order, control, any sense that you're actually working towards a goal. Right. Like, that breakdown seems to be indicative of a kind of post Vietnam mentality, even in films made after the Vietnam era about, say, World War II. Like, this is a theme in Saving Private Ryan as well, right? This idea that, I mean, everybody who's in control when Saving Private Ryan is pretty good at their jobs, but the orders that they get to go in and save Ryan are coming from, you know, a clean, white, you know, room in which a bunch of generals are sort of sitting around deciding what's going to look good for PR for the sake of their army, and making these guys that are covered in mud on the ground go in and all risk their lives just to pull out this one kid from behind enemy lines. So I think that's the kind of film that can only be made in a post Vietnam world about World War II. 24:26 Wes: Yeah. I think the interesting twist on that is that, as you pointed out, right, they're not fighting, but also they are not enlisted. They're drafted in as officers. 24:38 Erin: Right. 24:38 Wes: And they're from. We're privileged classes of society. So if you watch a typical Vietnam movie or World War II movie, it's often about people who are. You know, I think you get maybe a diversity of draftees, but a lot of them are working class. And people get exceptions, right, for being in college or something like that. So I think it's true that it falls. That the brunt of this falls on lower classes. Maybe that's just my uneducated impression, but in this case, yeah, you get people who are drafted in immediately as officers, which is a much different thing. And so. And they are catered to. Actually. In a former career, I had to make a recruiting video for Army National Guard to recruit officers. 25:19 Erin: Oh, my goodness. 25:21 Wes: And I interviewed a lot of officers and basically what they wanted is doctors and lawyers. Right. They just. They need certain professions. And I was told, you know, make. Do not show like typical, like a tank coming over a hill and all kinds of like military stuff. That's not what they want. They don't. They don't want to see that in a recruiting video. These are people who are professionals and if they're going to be volunteer for this sort of thing, it's got to be. It's got to be sold in a much different way. 25:48 Erin: Wow. 25:48 Wes: Of course, in this film they don't have any choice, but. But you get the idea, right? This is a. 25:54 Erin: It's a different class distinction. 25:55 Wes: Yeah, yeah. What. 25:57 Erin: What did they have in the videos for the officers? 25:59 Wes: Well, I lost control over the process. So I. What was supposed to happen? I was a strategist and I was supposed to be basically managing the film as a product from start to finish, which means. So I wrote the concept for the film, for the video. Film for the video, wrote the concept, and then passed it on to a writing team. And then it was supposed to come back to me. And then I would, you know, we'd work. I'd work on it with the writing team and then it would go to the video team, hire actors, do all that stuff. It got all the way through rough cut of the film before I saw it, after I produced the concept. And what's the first frame? You know, what's the first sequence in the video? Tank coming over a hill, got our guns. Yep. Precisely the thing that I explicitly said not to do. You know, in the concept made its way in. 26:48 Erin: That's so funny. They are men after all. I guess. You know, that cuts across class lines. Big tank come over hill. 26:58 Wes: And a lot of it was terrible. I think I can say this since I'm not naming names, but we had. I got a. I got one. So in the screening, I think people were unhappy with me because I was unhappy with the film, but I had a whole. I cut out a whole sequence having to do with hiring medical officers because. Hiring doctors or trying to appeal to doctors. And it involved a doctor going to his Superior and saying, hey, I've been called up. Right. 27:25 Erin: So. 27:25 Wes: As if this is the way offices like hospitals work. You go into your boss's office and you're both wearing the white gowns. 27:34 Erin: You're both like this. 27:36 Wes: He sits in his office all day at his computer, and you go in to talk to and to ask him permission. Oh, I got called up. And then the boss is very unhappy. What? You can't go. We need you here. As if the boss didn't. Doesn't understand it's like a federal requirement or whatever. 27:51 Erin: And then you're my number one guy on the chest spreader. What are you talking about? 27:57 Wes: And so he has to persuade the boss to let him go. And that happens very unconvincingly and quickly. And then suddenly they're buddies and they're walking arm in arm down the hallway. And it's shot in a way, it almost looks like a scene from the Shining. So it's, like, creepy but also homoerotic at the same time. Yeah, I made fun of that scene in the meeting. And then people were not happy with me anyway. So I don't know how much of that is relevant to this, but except for the fact that. 28:24 Erin: Oh, it's relevant. 28:26 Wes: Yeah. These are officers from more privileged elements of society here. So it's not your typical war film. And so beyond the fact that they're not fighting and dying, they are trying to take care of people who are doing that. And of course, it's in one sense much easier, but in one sense, you could say psychologically much harder. And it's much harder to believe in the cause. I mean, there's a lot of nihilism and cynicism in Vietnam war movies, but in this case, they don't get the satisfaction of being able to say, I fought for my country, for instance. 29:01 Erin: Well, yes, but at the same time, they don't have to say that they shot someone who they looked straight into their eyes and had to pull the trigger. You know, like, they didn't. They don't have any of that kind of. They're not as embroiled in consequences. So they didn't fight for their country. But that means that that doesn't come with the stuff you have to do in order to fight for it. 29:23 Wes: True. I'm thinking of this from the standpoint of prestige. So there's a time when it would have been shameful. I'm thinking of a scene from Gosford park, actually, right now where someone is shamed for the fact that they didn't end up Fighting for their country. So that you're in this kind of middle. You did and you didn't. You know, you're. You're in this kind of netherworld. I don't know what the right. Right world is, where it is, but, right, they're medics, they're not fighters. 29:48 Erin: Right. 29:48 Wes: So there's something weird going on with the status and prestige element of film in the way, in one sense they're higher status people, but in another sense their status is under attack because they're not principal actors in the war. And so in a way, they don't have the right to protest. And I think that's why it comes out in the way that it does. They don't have the right to say, oh, you know, this horrible war that I'm being subjected to. They don't have the right to complain, but they still have to look at dead bodies coming in, and they still have to be in people's guts and taking care of them, which is a horrific and traumatizing thing to have to do. So it's like much of the trauma, not all of it, but a lot of it, without any right to complain. 30:29 Erin: Yeah, that's interesting. I was thinking about what you were saying in terms of being able to get out of it if you were a college. I think this is also the difference too between the mentality in World War II and Vietnam. From what I understand about World War II, it was like everybody tried to get into the war. My grandfather left college to go to the war. He had tried getting into the war when he was too young, tried fudging his age. They were all trying to do that to get in. And then you have the fact that, you know, though he was tapped to go to, whatever it's called, officer school, he asked specifically to be sent to regular army camp, basic training, because he wanted to be. He didn't want to be. You know, there's this attitude about regular enlisted men versus officers, and officers are uppity and you don't want to be like one of them. You want to be somebody who's on the front lines being sent in to really fight for your country. So there's a. You know, there are all these divisions, even when you get into the army, you know, about who really is, and my brother has told me this too, who's in the National Guard, that there's this real culture clash and, you know, attitude that the enlisted men actually know what's going on and the officers are all very kind of, you know, full of themselves. Right. And they don't actually know anything. And there's huge. 31:38 Wes: It's always, always been that way. Yeah. 31:40 Erin: Right, right. And so there are all of these different power dynamics which often kind of upend the actual, like, chain of command, you know, in the army anyway. This is making me think of all of that. But of course, in Vietnam it was more respectable. It seems at that point to be a draft dodger versus, you know, I used to talking to some of my grandfather's friends, like, they remember the name of like the one guy who tried to dodge the draft and his name was mud for. For the rest of his life because of the fact, you know, and it was one guy, you know, everybody else was like 4F and trying to get in and 45 years old and trying to get in, you know. 32:15 Wes: Yeah. So we don't get a lot of, I think, overt social commentary about the war in this. There's no discussion of whether is this a good war or a bad war? There's no discussion of how traumatic it is. There's everything. All of that stuff is behind the scenes. 32:33 Erin: Slightly. Just at the beginning with the words on the screen, the quotes from MacArthur and Eisenhower. And I noted that that was displayed over an image of the latrine. So there's like the latrine sign and then the words of MacArthur saying that he just went to Korea and he'll now fade away as an old soldier. And then Eisenhower's I will go to Korea. So, you know, this idea that, like, this is just a product of the war machine and it keeps chugging along and it needs more food to eat to keep going. That was a bit of commentary for me, but other than that, yeah, not much. 33:07 Wes: So one can be critical of war in general and the human stupidity and folly. The fact that we engage in these wars, that's one level of commentary. And then there's a. This war, this particular war is bad because it's not necessary for self defense or however you want to critique it. And I see those as two different levels. So, for instance, does the film have a particular opinion on the Korean War? I don't know. It's certainly anti war in the general sense. And then as I was just thinking of, as far as particular characters, as far as the characters in the film in particular, you know, what's going on internally to the film. I don't think we get any direct talk about war either, you know, criticism of war either in the general sense or in the specific sense. But correct me if I'm Wrong. 33:52 Erin: No, I think that's right. Yeah. 33:54 Wes: So that's all left out of it. Even though the general tenor of it, I think. Yes. Is very. Is very anti war, at least in the general sense. And then maybe, you know, maybe it's. The Korean War is considered a bad war as well. 34:05 Erin: Well, I know so little about. About the Korean War, frankly, that, you know, I had to remind myself who the belligerents were. Exactly. I mean, who. Who was on our side? You know, it was mostly, it seems, the UN thing that, you know, we as leaders of the UN got into. But I was trying to figure out if Japan was actually fighting with us in the Korean War. They were not listed as one of the Allies, so I was just surprised. You know the scene where they go over to Japan, I don't know how realistic that would have been if they were going to Japan for holidays and stuff like that. But that's another. You could argue, that's another tiny, subtle form of commentary that in 51 they're going over to Japan to hang out. 34:42 Wes: Yeah, well, after World War II, I think we thoroughly occupied that country and we still have military bases, right? 34:49 Erin: Yeah, definitely. Yeah, that's. I guess that's true. Yeah. I get the friendliness of the sort of like post war, just hanging out in Japan kind of attitude was something that struck me. I had to keep reminding myself that this was supposed to be Korea in 51. So it's, you know, the quick bedfellow switching out is interesting. 35:11 Wes: I think it's. Yeah, it's worth noting the Japanese and. Right. This is six years after World War II and where Japan did horrible things all over the Pacific, but including to Korea. And it still is a sore spot even to this day. But where should we go next? 35:25 Erin: Should we go straight to how Hot Lips gets her name or should we. Should we go to the. The Suicide tableau first? 35:33 Wes: You want to start before we go, why don't we start with the song Speaking of the Suicide Table tableau. 35:39 Erin: Sure. 35:40 Wes: It's a really weird song, isn't it? It was written. The lyrics are written by Robert Altman's 15 year old son. Did you know that? 35:46 Erin: I did not know that, but then I looked it up and was not surprised. 35:52 Wes: So he wanted to write the stupidest song ever. 35:55 Erin: The stupidest song ever? Yeah, like that. 35:57 Wes: And he couldn't think of good lyrics for that. And apparently his son was able to do it very quickly. And then I forget who did the music to this. It was unfamous. But I don't know Because I grew up with mash, the TV series. I think the song is kind of, you know, in my blood, in a way. 36:12 Erin: Sure. 36:12 Wes: When I hear it, it's kind of touching in a way. 36:14 Erin: Yeah. 36:15 Wes: And I think. I didn't know that. I'd never thought about the lyrics. But I associated suicide with the suicidality of war, I think. Which is interesting in light of the vignette where that sequence where we get painless. How do you pronounce his last name? Waldowski? 36:34 Erin: Yes, I think so. 36:35 Wes: It's the Polish dentist. In light of his desire to kill himself, there seems to be a connection. 36:41 Erin: Yeah. The words always surprise me a little bit. I'm, of course, much more familiar with the TV show than the film. I've only ever seen bits and pieces of the film. I never saw it all the way through until now. So I had no idea that there was an instrumental version that played in the middle of the. I'd never seen that before. So I don't know. It's pretty funny. 36:59 Wes: And then the last. The Last Supper. 37:01 Erin: Yeah. And the reason why is pretty. Pretty wild, I guess, in a place like that. You would have to kill yourself if you were homosexual. There's no other way. 37:11 Wes: Yeah. So he has a. He has a problem with impotence and then decides that he might be a fairy, as he puts it. 37:20 Erin: Latent. So latent that he had no idea. 37:23 Wes: Homosexual. 37:26 Erin: Nearly imperceptible. 37:30 Wes: And so they stay. They have this elaborate farewell party where they're gonna give him the impression that they're helping him kill himself. 37:40 Erin: Up until the point when the Lieutenant Dish. Intervention is made. 37:45 Wes: Lieutenant Dish. 37:47 Erin: Yeah. 37:48 Wes: Forrest Gump down 37:51 Erin: until her intervention is made. I found this to be, like, pretty profound and kind of fascinating. And the chaplain sort of getting on board with it. I mean, it's difficult to say how much of it was told to the chaplain, but if it's just this idea that, like, oh, we're gonna make him think that he's killing himself, and then we just put him to sleep or something, and he wakes up the next morning and thinks that he survived the suicide attempt. And it might give him, you know, a sense of, like, I'm imagining this is the way that it was explained to the chaplain that the sexual intervention was not expressed to him. And if this were kind of the culmination of the whole thing, and he wakes up because I don't know what it is that they actually give him. I'm assuming it's just a placebo. But if it was a sleeping pill, Sleep or. 38:35 Wes: Yeah, maybe a Quaalude or something, right? 38:37 Erin: And then were he to wake up and feel as though his life was miraculously spared, that would be kind of an amazing moment. 38:45 Wes: They convince the chaplain by. They say, okay. He says, I cannot give absolution to a man who's about to commit suicide. It's a mortal sin. They say, look, dago, he's not committing suicide. He's only intending to commit suicide. So you're not dealing with an act. You're dealing with an intention. And if it works, if what we're doing works, then he will not commit suicide. So therefore you're preventing. So therefore, you're preventing a mortal sin. Okay? And then he says, well, I should check. And they're like, yeah, you check on it. So it's interesting because we do this sometimes as therapists. We'll do something called joining. We'll join some sort of sentiment that the patient has, even if it's not a sentiment that we agree with, or even if it's not a sentiment that we think that's particularly healthy. It might even be a resistance quote, unquote. It might even be something that's keeping them from interacting authentically with therapy and maybe with other people in their lives. But the idea is, if you can't beat it, you can't beat them, join them. And you start out by becoming an ally to that. It's almost a little bit like reverse psychology. It actually works very well. So you give them the sense that the intention. They can fully inhabit the intention and have the feeling, have the sentiment, and that actually makes it easier to not act on it. Like acting on it in some ways is a feature of the fact that the sentiment is not. Okay. 40:10 Erin: You know what I mean? 40:12 Wes: So I thought, wow, that's very interesting, because they're doing something actually that might be considered genuinely therapeutic, even though in a way it's just a product of their Seemingly a product of their sense of humor, their irony, their cynicism, their satirizing suicide, and they're satirizing death. They don't take his concerns seriously. They don't say, oh, my God, we got to get you to a psychiatrist or to a therapist. Right? We. We need to get you help. They take it on themselves. Or even that we have to get you to the chaplain. We need to get you spiritual help. They take it on themselves. Right. And there is a spiritual element which the whole Last Supper scene makes very clear. 40:48 Erin: Yes. 40:48 Wes: Which is which I love that portrayal. Right. So they take it on themselves. Not they're not just lifesavers as surgeons. They're going to do it with their particular. They're. They're going to put their irreverence to use as a spiritual cure. They're gonna not take it seriously and take it seriously at the same time. Take it seriously as a sentiment, but not take it seriously as a. As an action. I don't know if I'm getting that right, but do you see what I mean? 41:15 Erin: Yes. Yeah. Of course. It's because of the chaplain that they know that he's struggling with this. So rather than going to the chaplain, the chaplain has come to them for the intervention, right? 41:24 Wes: Oh, yeah. 41:25 Erin: And the fact they use the Last Supper as a visual for this is, you know, sort of interesting. I mean, if Christ could at any moment, in the process of his passion, decide he's had enough, he could get out of it. Right. But he doesn't. 41:42 Wes: Is that true? 41:43 Erin: Of course. Seen irreverently, change. I change my mind. Yeah, but he's not going to do that. But the point is that seen in a really irreverent way, the dentist does have something in common. The circumstances do have something in common with Christ's circumstances. 41:59 Wes: Yeah, actually. Yeah, let's think about that. Yeah. Can we make sense of Painless as a Christ figure? Yeah. As an ironic Christ figure, sure. 42:10 Erin: Okay, so let's think through this. I mean, this is pretty blasphemous, but saying that Painless can no longer be one of these men. His time has come because he's realized that he can no longer participate in their sort of antics and needs to. Well, I mean, it's not a. It's not a perfect analogy. Obviously, what needs to. Needs to take himself out of the game. Because I think part of what their skill is about or part of the way that they have of blowing off steam, obviously, is this womanizing. So because he can't do one half of it, the idea is maybe he can't fully participate even in. He can't be competent anymore as a medical professional and therefore he needs to take himself out of the game. Is that right? 42:53 Wes: Well, yeah, I mean, I think that is. I think you're pointing to something really interesting. 42:58 Erin: So he's sacrificing himself. Yeah. 43:00 Wes: Right. We're trying to think about how we might see him as sacrificing himself. He's pointing in a way to the fragility of the defense that they're using. Right. They are very dependent on their power, whether as surgeons or sexual power, as a way to cope and if that fails ever. And it doesn't, you know. Right. As you pointed out, it doesn't really fail for these guys in the movie. It always seems to work even under pretty like, risky circumstances where they're like gassing a general or was he a general that they gassed or is he just a colonel or something? But they, you know, and sticking him in the chest with a golf club and just doing all kinds of crazy stuff where you think, okay, these guys would in real life probably get court martialed, but in the movie they get away with it. Their way of coping with things is actually very imperfect. And I think Painless, he's like a little crack in the armor or something like that. He kind of shows that there's some fragility. And to the extent that they are recruited into helping him, even though it's through their cynicism, there's something a little bit more compassionate than usual about that. I don't know, can he sacrifice himself for their sins? Can they be redeemed through Painless's sacrifice? I don't know. 44:17 Erin: Yeah. I mean, thinking through what you said about the deleted scene with Ho-Jon at the end, it sounds like it's. That's not, that's not an effective way to go. But maybe it would strike them differently if it were someone who's on their staff, as it were. Yeah. So I think talking about this tableau and Painless makes me want to explore more about the other prank that they play on Burns and the erstwhile Hot Lips. So maybe we'll transition to that and talk about it in part two. 44:47 Wes: Okay, thank you. 44:48 Erin: Thank you, and thanks to everyone who listened. For an easy way to do that, go to subtextpodcast.com patreon.com subtextpodcast please send your questions, feedback and episode requests to [email protected] if we get enough questions, we'll do some bonus Q and A shows for subscribers. 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