Jean Baudrillard's Postmodernism Theory

Jean Baudrillard's Postmodernism Theory

Baudrillard argues we live in such a media saturated society that media images dominate and distort our perception of the world around us to the extent it’s become difficult to distinguish between media images and reality. There is no specific reality and that there can be multiple simultaneous realities. A form of rejection of Modernism. It also suggests that;

1. Everything we create is a copy of a copy

2. We are unable to distinguish between simulation and reality. (hyperreality)

3. Meaning implosion (Too many messages, all can’t be true. Audience can find any meaning they want to fit their own narrative/ideology)

Postmodern features:

- Intertextuality - the shaping of a text's meaning by another text

- Parody/Homage/Pastiche - a cinematic device that directly mimics the cinematography or scene work of another filmmaker

- Bricolage - a technique where works are constructed from various styles

- Irony - a literary technique where the full significance of a character's words or actions is clear to the audience but unknown to the character. It gives the viewer all the information and making the result of that information affect the character.

- Fragmented Narrative - non-linear storytelling. jumbled up story sequence challenging the reader to piece together the different components of the story to make sense of it.

- Self reflexivity - reminds audience that it's a movie. the character is aware of the story world (breaking the 4th wall)

- Common themes (what if, future of tech, human existence, consumerism)

- Loss of reality (surrealism)