Charlie V Moreno                                                                                                    

ENG4674.141F10: Film and Culture

 Completed Version

Killer of Sheep & The Difficulty of Change Theme

    Killer of Sheep is a story about the life of Stan in 1970’s Watts, Los Angeles.  As a result of working long hours at the slaughter house, Stan cannot seem to get anything done at home.  Stan seems numb to all the stressors that come with living in the ghetto and even when it comes to his wife’s sexual advancements.  The only thing that keeps him going is his false belief of being above poverty.  The film also presents several scenes of children playing and fighting on the empty abandoned streets of the Los Angeles ghetto.

(Killer of Sheep trailer)

The 1977 film Killer of Sheep captures the harsh realities of American ghettos and the effect it has on the people that inhabit them.  It reminds us that in a mostly middle-class America there are still several poor neighborhoods that inhibit economic advancement for its inhabitants.  The modern ghetto represents overpopulated schools with overused textbooks and streets infected with gang violence and drug addicted prostitutes who are sometimes teenage single mothers.  It is a community with little to no political voice, or in other words, it is invisible to most of America.  With this understanding of what the ghetto is, we can begin to understand why so many who reside in these slums desire change; therefore, change is what this paper attempts to define, and to be more specific, the difficulty to achieve change.  If change was easy, there would be no ghettos.   

 As I was watching Killer of Sheep I couldn't help but to notice a consistent message of it being hard to change.  If I was to select a scene that best illustrates this theme (of it being difficult to change), I would pick the scene in Killer of Sheep where Stan and his friend Bracy attempt to buy a car engine.  The two characters are careful at transporting there newly purchased car-engine, only to lose it when the engine falls and brakes at the end of the scene.  If we break down this scene we can see Stan's attempt to change (by purchasing a car-engine that would fix his car troubles) and his failure to change (the car-engine brakes after falling).  There are also other examples in Killer of Sheep that relate to the "difficulty to change" theme.  Stan's failure to leave the ghetto despite his claim of not being poor, a cancelled road trip because of a flat tire, and Stan's wife's unsuccessful attempt in being romantic with Stan are all examples of how difficult change is.  I have selected the following YouTube clips to support the theme I have discovered in Killer of Sheep.          

            The first supporting clip I will use to support the “difficulty to change” theme is from Freedom Writers.  Throughout this film we are presented with evidence of an inferior inner-city school system.  The school in this film is full of gang members and students with little to no interest in education.  Freedom Writers allows us as viewers to understand why so many Latino/Black students drop out (relative to the Euro-American students drop-out rates).  So the question that begs to be answered is have we changed from our segregated past?  According to American sociologists, the public display of overt racism has transformed into an equally potent covert racism (Fredrickson, 1990); therefore, the presence of racism is still around, it just wears a different mask.  If we accept the notion that racism is still around, then we must conclude that America has not changed.  Like Killer of Sheep, Freedom Writers can also be used to support the “difficulty of change” theme because despite a belief of change, we really have no change.  The illusion of change observed in Freedom Writer is also seen in Killer of Sheep with Stan's illusion of being above poverty.  In the selected clip we see students separated by ethnic identities.  It is not until the teacher forces the students to participate in a getting-to-know-each-other activity that the students realize that they have a lot more in common than they previously thought.  The students belief of being "different" was an illusion, likewise, Stan's belief of not being poor was also an illusion.  In Freedom Writers change is only possible after the students unite.  The selected Freedom Writers clip tells us that change is impossible when illusions exist.  Stan's inability to change is because of his illusion of being above poverty.  In Killer of Sheep Stan was never able to overcome his illusion (being above poverty) and as a result was unable to change (in the form of improvement in living conditions).

 (A clip of the 2007's Freedom Writers  illustrating a division among minority inner city teens as well as the negative experience they have been exposed to)
Difficulty of change is demonstrated in the YouTube clip Ron Paul to Obama: you offer no change.  The clip I have selected is a good representation of the “difficulty of change” theme because it illustrates how people are willing to force themselves to believe in a much needed change (making the change an illusion), just like Stan’s illusion of not being poor.  What this documentary fails to show is the millions of voters that are bothered by the fact that we still haven’t changed.  Throughout U.S. history there has always been politicians promising “change” (in this case, it is “change” from a previous Bush administration), however, peoples expectation of a revolutionary new world in the form of extreme change, sometimes is completely shattered by the reality of social problems (the recession, immigration, terrorism, and several others) that make it difficult for people to notice change.  Although a lot has changed since Bush, people (42% according to a poll on rasmussenreports.com) are disappointed because the current change means little to nothing when compared to their idea of change.  If Stan was as critical as Americans are (towards Obama's "change"), perhaps he would be able to notice the contradiction of his illusion.  The first step for change ( in the form of improvement) is to acknowledge the problem problem, instead, Stan is stuck in denial.  In the clip Ron Paul (liker many Americans) is being critical of Obama's "change".      

(Ron Paul being critical on Obama's "change")

  The "difficultly to change" theme I observed in Killer of Sheep is supported by a YouTube news clip titled North Korea: peninsula on "brink of war".  In this clip we have a partial view in the growing tensions between North Korea and South Korea.  After the US-Korean war, these two countries have always posed a threat to each other.  The current events between the Korean countries can be understood as being new chapters to a long story of conflicts between the two.  The global desire for world peace is evidence to our desire to change and these recent events are evidence of our failure to do so.  The United Nations is also proof for our desire to end world conflicts.  The reason I selected this clip in support of Killer of Sheep’s “difficulty of change” theme, is because it clearly illustrates our failure to achieve change in the form of world peace.  The YouTube news clip illustrates how easy it is to return to similar conditions prior to the change.  If we relate Killer of Sheep to the YouTube news clip, we can associate world peace (at least for Koreans prior to the 2010 Korean conflict) with Stan’s unsuccessful road trip.  For a short period, North and South Korea had peace; however, this period of peace ended with North Korea’s attack of a South Korean island earlier this year.  The peace was easily changed back to a war-like environment; therefore, the change was unsuccessful.  The same thing occurred in Killer of Sheep.  For a short time Stan was out of the ghetto; however, this period of being outside the ghetto ended when one of the tires in his car lost its air.  We can think of Stan’s flat tire as North Korea’s attack, they both ultimately destroyed change (which represents peace for North and South Korea, and not being in the ghetto for Stan).

(Recent news footage from the growing conflict between North Korea and South Korea)
Another supporting film is Pearl Harbor. The United States had its first terrorist attach back in 1941 at Pearl Harbor from the Japanese Empire.  After the Pearl Harbor attack, the U.S. military went through a transformation that resulted in the production of the largest military in the world.  This large military is evidence for America's desire to be safe.  U.S. security in the form of protection by a giant military has (in recent modern times) proven to be ineffective against modern terrorist who like the Japanese kamikaze, are willing to give their life for their beliefs.  America's desire to protect its citizens from a “dangerous world” and its failure to do so is evidence of the "difficulty to change" theme.  In Killer of Sheep we also see this with Stan’s failure to be the protector of the house and family.  After being warned (in the beginning of the film when Stan was a child) to always protect his family, he fails to correctly protect his home (which represents his family) from the two criminals that offer him a job.  The same occurred to the US after being warned by the attack on Pearl Harbor, we did not change enough to prevent 911.  In other words, the change that the US did to avoid a future surprised attack was to increase its security in the form of a larger military (which we now know it to be ineffective to modern terrorism techniques).  This is a analogous to the fact that Stan worked long hours to gain money, yet he still didn’t know how to protect his family.  Stan, like the US, both could not change after being warned.  In the selected Pearl Harbor clip, we also see the difficulty of change after being warned.  In this scene the American military fails to recognize a threat after being warned by their radar screens.  The Lieutenant in charge in the scene is quoted saying “Relax; it’s probably the B-17 coming in from the mainland”.  Perhaps, if the threat was truly noticed, than more lives could have been saved.

 (The attack scene in the 2001 Pearl Harbor film) 
   Another clip that illustrates the "difficulty to change" theme can be found in a scene from the film Basketball Diaries where Leonardo DiCaprio plays a drug addict.  This scene also has the theme of "difficult to change" because throughout the film, the main character fails to kick his habit.  It wasn’t until the very end of the film, that the main character finally stops using drugs, and even then, he struggles to keep sober.  I picked this film because it is a good representation of substance abuse, which by definition is a person’s inability to change (to stop using the drug or drugs) when that person needs to.  We also see this inability to change when things are bad in Killer of Sheep.  Stan never makes a change.  Even when he claims to be tired and cannot be romantic with his wife, he persists in keeping his job (the cause of his physical problems).  In the film he is offered a different job in two occasions, and he still declines.  Stan fails to change, just like the addict played by DiCaprio fails to kick his habit (with the exception of the ending of course).  Another film clip that illustrates the difficulty to change in the form of substance abuse can be found in Hoosiers.  In this film a character named Shooter (the town drunk played by Dennis Hooper) relapsed after a period of being sober.  Shooter makes a change, but fails to keep it.  It is not until the last portion of the film that Shooter eventually stops drinking to become a better coach (as evident by the clip I selected).  These fairytale endings (that of Basketball Diaries &Hoosiers) were not seen in Killer of Sheep, because Stan continues to use his drug, which is to work in the factory that is physically hurting him. 

(A scene of the film Basketball Diaries where the main character is begging for money to support his habit)

( Here we have a scene in Hoosiers where Shooter is sober and "changed")

After presenting these supporting clips, Killer of Sheep should become clearer to us as viewers.  The “difficulty of change” theme is a phenomenon that we see all around our history.  Stan tries to change but ultimately fails to, and accepts his life as it is.  Killer of Sheep has no fairytale ending, it just presents the realities for millions of Americans.  The fact that the ghettos of the 1970’s still look exactly like the ghettos of today is the biggest supporting evidence for the “difficulty of change” theme discovered in Killer of Sheep.   

                                                            References 

Fredrickson, George M. (1990). The Arrogance of Race: Historical Perspectives on Slavery,          Racism, and Social Inequality. The Journal of Southern History. 56 (3). 575-576.