Flatliners And The Tempest

Improved Essays
The complex nature of discovery means that each uncovering can be confronting and provocative. Many individuals find that discoveries result from an unprecedented natural event or an inspired reappraising one’s inner and outer surroundings. Shakespeare’s 1611 play The Tempest explores the dynamics between the significance of new knowledge and how certain experiences become catalysts for the ultimate themes of the play: reconciliation and forgiveness. Similarly, Joel Schumacher’s 1990 movie Flatliners uses a supernatural theme, structure and cinematic special effects to demonstrate how while ideas of discovery vary, each experience is a potent undertaking, intimately related to new perceptions of ourselves and our relationships with others. …show more content…
The use of a supernatural structure makes it evident to the audience how collectively the characters from both texts go through an evolution of individual discovery. For example, in Act three, scene 3, of The Tempest; Ariel’s speech (whom is dressed like a harpy - a supernatural creature) is an accusation of guilt directed at Alonso, Antonio, and Sebastian: "You three men of sin, whom destiny - that hath to instrument this lower world...Where man doth not inhabit, you 'mongst men Being most unfit to live' implying these men are outcasts from humanity by their wrong doings, so that even the 'never surfeited sea' rejects them. They have incurred guilt, which means they must undergo purification and purgation. Shakespeare uses the technique allegory here, to further show Prospero's power and that of it being a temptation scene, or a banquet with overtones of religious sacrament and religious ritual. This is due to Sebastian and his companions being unfit to partake due to them being "three men of sin". This scene is paramount in Alonso's character development: "he thunder that deep and dreadful organ pipe, pronounced the name of Prosper; it did bass my trespass." Alonso's reconsidering of past events leads him - and the audience - to see that he knows now what his guilt is (not unlike Dave in visiting …show more content…
These similarities are due to the main idea of the film: what happens after you die. It is through this eternal struggle with death that the main characters: Nelson, Rachel, Steckel, Joe, and Loraccio, must deal with the repercussions of not only the discovery, but past sins. For example, Schumacher conveys this in in the scene Dog in the alley through the use of the technique ‘pathetic fallacy’ representing humanity's version of the underworld. This is evident in the spray-painted pictures of the devil, hooded figures, and the homeless lady telling Nelson: "We all know what we've done". Further indicating to both the audience and Nelson that his discovery of what happens after death is linked to his past. Both the Tempest and Flatliners make it clear to the audience that the supernatural elements play an imperative role, acting as a driving force behind each and every

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