The 2009 comedy
The Men Who Stare at Goats, inspired by (not based on) Jon Ronson's book of the same name, is another of the Hero Quest, or Monomyth, genre similar to Spielberg's sci-fi fairy tale
A.I.--though this one mired in satire, flat irony, goofy faces, and political statements.
To recap, the Hero Quest is a journey of enlightenment: the hero leaves his home, or world; he then encounters various travails on his journey; these travails literally "build character." The hero, following the tests of the journey, then returns to his home or world a changed man, thus he can now affect change there.
So why, you ask, is the Hero Quest "satanic," or
adversarial to God more accurately? Because the New Age monomyth (the journey toward apotheosis) explicitly denies the need of a Savior; the journey itself is one of works-based self-salvation, wherein man becomes his own savior--literally the
oldest trick in the Book: "Ye shall be as gods."
Our hero is Daily Telegram reporter Bob Wilton. He lives a small life in a small town. His wife then leaves him for an amputee and his life falls apart; this is the catalyst for Bob's hero journey. Devastated, Bob narrates:
"I was like a child, or a hobbit safe in the shire. Or a blond farmboy on a distant desert planet... unaware that he was already taking the first steps on a path that would lead him relentlessly towards the heart of a conflict between the forces of good and evil."
This
farmboy on a distant planet would be Luke, or Anakin, Skywalker--also a hero on a quest. One of the running gags of the film is that Bob Wilton, played by Ewan McGregor, who also filled the iconic role of Obi-Wan Kenobi, doesn't seem to know anything about the
Star Wars franchise.
The conflict between good and evil is here presented as the so-called "War on Terror" as the film cuts to a montage of scenes from Iraq. But this is a New Age film, as will be demonstrated, and the Iraq war is but a stage for the real message of the film, that of the transformation of man.
At an outdoor cafe/restaurant in Kuwait, Bob doodles an eye in a pyramid for no apparent reason. He then strikes up a conversation with a nearby American Lynn Cassidy. Oddly enough, Bob has already heard about Lynn from a man back in Michigan claiming to be a psychic spy; Lynn was supposedly the best there was, an
occult force. When Bob mentions the man, Lynn gets up abruptly and leaves.
Lynn Cassidy later explains in the hotel room that he is a a super soldier, or remote viewer, a Jedi warrior, a member of Project Jedi, the first generation of the New Earth Army. This subject matter proves much more interesting to Bob than covering the Iraq war and he asks to accompany Lynn into Iraq.
At this point we recognize Lynn as the guide on Bob's hero quest, just as Gigolo Joe was David's guide in
A.I.This New Earth Army is based on Lieutenant Colonel Jim Channon's First Earth Battalion, on which a whole bunch of weird stuff can be read here in the
Journal of Non-Lethal Combatives.
LTC Jim Channon appears in the film as Bill Django, whom we first meet in the Vietnam War. It is in combat, after being shot, that Bill receives divine revelation from a Vietnamese woman.
"
The gentleness is the strength," she says. And from this point on Bill devotes his life to the search for unarmed combat methods, or psychic warfare. Now, in a film heavily dependent on irony for laughs, it's easy to miss (probably intentional) the larger in-joke that these silly hippies practicing these psychological operations, or PsyOps, and who use the symbol of the Illuminati, or
enlightened ones, are themselves participating in the psychological attack of a propaganda film. But because this is a comedy, few will accept that.
It is also at this point that the film splits into two hero quests: we follow Bob Wilton's journey during the Iraq war, and Bill Django's following his Vietnam experience as told by the Lynn Cassidy guide (who himself underwent the quest under Bill's tutelage).
Django receives permission and funding from the Pentagon to immerse himself into the New Age movement. When he returns to Fort Bragg North Carolina, home of the U.S. Army Special Operations, we see that he has an eye painted onto his forehead, thus signifying the opening of his "third eye chakra," i.e., he returns to Ft. Bragg enlightened.
Bob, reading from the New Earth Army manual, says, "
The Jedi warrior will follow in the footsteps of the great imagineers of the past... Jesus Christ, Lao Tse Tung, Walt Disney."
This New earth/New Age belief that Jesus Christ was a great imagineer, or master, posits that Jesus was merely a man who became enlightened, like Buddha or Krishna; he
became the Christ rather than being the Son of God. If you have ever paid much attention to New Age pablum, then you've probably heard that Jesus "knew how to do it," meaning that He knew how to become His own savior, or god. Their point in using Him as an example, rather than denying Him, is that you too can become your own savior--as all the major religions teach.
And then off they go into the desert, the barren wasteland of this existence. The hero quest always takes the hero
into the wilderness in some form.
Along the way, Lynn tells us, "
Bill understood that if you want to change the world you gotta start by changing the armies."
The next morning Bob awakens to find Lynn doing the "salute to the sun" on the roof of the car. The viewer can't help but notice the blatant symbolism and thematic content in the film; however, it is all tempered under the cloak of satire, ostensibly harmless. This, in fact, is how the gentle psychological attack works: the comedy disarms the conscious filters of the viewers' mind and allows the film's messaging to enter the unconscious mind unfettered.
Later, Lynn and Bob get captured by a gang and imprisoned. It is in this dark cell (the belly of the whale on the hero's quest) that Lynn reveals to Bob his "third eye chakra" tattooed on his chest, the symbol of the Jedi. Bob was destined to be here, Lynn tells him.
The two men are then removed from the cell and put into the back of a truck to be transported and later sold. On the t-shirt of one of the captors we see the black cat symbol. At the same time, Lynn says, "
Whatever you fear most has no power over you; it's the fear that has the power."
In the viewers' mind it has already been established by visual juxtaposition (not explicitly) that this "conflict between good and evil" is the war in Iraq, or the overall war on terror itself. So the viewer would here assume that the fear Lynn speaks of refers to their captors. However, one can be sure that the ultra-liberal George Clooney, one of the film's producers, would not involve himself with a film pegging the Iraqis as evil. It can be assumed though that he would not mind being involved with a film pegging
fundamentalism, or religion in general, as evil in some way.
Ergo, we interpret this black cat symbol as that of superstition, fundamentalism, or religion. So the hero guide Lynn is here schooling Bob (the audience) not to fear superstitious religions on his personal quest for enlightenment. This is a common theme exposed here in film reports: that religion, Christianity, that is, was created by the controlling elite to enslave us and suppress out evolution of consciousness.
We then jump back to the beginning of Lynn Cassidy's quest under Bill Django.
One of their first exercises is to dance, but Lynn is afraid as he was told not to dance by his father as a child. Once Lynn lets go of the past and begins to dance, Bill tells him, "
Welcome to the hero's journey, Lynn."
The Earth Prayer:
Mother Earth… my life support system… as a soldier… I must drink your blue water… live inside your red clay and eat your green skin.
I pray… my boots will always kiss your face and my footsteps match your heartbeat.
Carry my body through space and time… you are my connection to the Universe… and all that comes after.
I am yours and you are mine.
I salute you.
We see a young Lynn doing Yoga when a butterfly lands on his hand, then flies up to a nearby apple tree. The butterfly, a symbol of transformation, ascends to the Tree of Knowledge, a symbol of the Garden of Eden, or Paradise.
Bob, narrating, tells us, "
For the first time in his life, Lynn felt truly happy. Then, into the Garden a serpent did come."
That serpent is Larry Hooper, another psy-warrior (sitting in the middle), but who represents the dark side, or misuse of the powers. He will later be responsible for the breakup of the New Earth Army.
The men practice the psychic abilities, or remote viewing, by seeing what's in the boxes on the shelves. In this case they are looking into "K-9." Based on the film's context, we can assume that this K-9 is an allusion to the star Sirius, the Dog Star, from which the light around the Illuminati pyramid/eye symbol emanates.
If you have ever seen the Jim Carrey film The Truman Show, you'll remember that Truman finds a stage light marked Sirius B has fallen from the sky; this eventually leads him on his own path to enlightenment, or freedom from the illusory world.
Lynn is the only one to get the content of the box correct. He says it's a man sitting in a chair. Bill then reveals a picture of the Lincoln memorial. Recall the use of this Lincoln symbol (freeing the slaves) in both Spielberg's film
Minority Report as well as Ewan McGregor's other film
The Island, in which he played the role of Lincoln 6 Echo.
This is off topic, but the viewer will notice the deliberate inclusion of chemtrails in the film (as with several other recent films).
After Lynn and Bob escape from the gang, they are picked up by private contractors.
After their car hits an IED, Bob and Lynn wander through the desert. it is here that Bob realizes that there is no mission and Lynn has no idea where he is going. Lynn tells him that Bill appeared to him in a vision and that he is now using his intuition to find him.
On the Womack Medical center sign we find an inverted pentagram, the goat's head, or sigil of baphomet. This, we hear, is know as the "goat house," where Special forces medics train on wounded goats as part of their instruction.
Supposedly, the pentagram pointed upward represents the positive evolution of mankind, such as was seen in the
Fantastic Four film. And the downward pointed pentagram represents the misuse of the universal energy, that of selfish gains.
In the Goat House, Lynn is asked to use his psychic powers to stop the heart of a goat, which he does reluctantly. It is because of this misuse of power that Lynn feels that he becomes cursed, and we find that he too is on a journey of redemption.
Bob and Lynn are rescued from the desert and taken to a remote military installation. There is an important shift in the characters following their rescue. Bob, who left home in crisis, is now somehow fortified from the journey and becomes the new leader. Lynn, who we met as a confident psy-warrior on a mission, is now exposed as a frail has-been putting on a front; he also claims he is dying.
This point we recognize as the Apotheosis stage of Bob's Hero quest: the point at which he achieves enlightenment.
We soon learn that Larry Hooper is operating a private psychic company here: PSIC. He has kept the New Earth Army going in a way, although now it is for profit. Together with this fact we find the logo is a downturned pyramid with an eye--the negative connotation.
It comes as quite a shock to both Lynn and Bob to find Bill Django working here for Larry--the man who caused his downfall. Larry tells them that Bill is "
looking into subliminal messaging."
It is now Bob that motivates both Lynn and Bill to continue down the path to redemption--to free the goats on the base. Bill comes up with an idea to sabotoge Larry's work the same way he had sabotoged the New Earth Army--with LSD. They put it in the camp's food and water.
coincidental with Bob's
enlightenment, we see that he has a bandage on his forehead signifying the opening of his third eye chakra.
The three men then free all the goats and prisoners.
Bill and Lynn fly away in a helicopter. Before leaving Bob asks, "
What about the mission?"
Lynn: "
You're the mission, Bob. It's your job now. Tell everybody what happened."
Then, watching them fly away, Bob narrates, "
Like all shaman, they returned to the sky."
This helicopter is an obvious symbol of ascension into heaven; the two
shamans have finished their work and have passed the baton of enlightenment to the next generation--Bob.
Upon his return home, Bob does tell the story but is completely ignored. As he watches a news spot make fun of his revelations, he wears a black shirt with a skull and crossbones on the chest. He tells us that destiny did not intend for him to return to his old life and that he is at peace with that.
This death head represents the death of his old self. The enlightened hero has returned a new man. And without being discouraged by not being taken seriously, he says:
"And if I ever needed proof of how the dark side had taken the beautiful dream of what a nation could be, and had twisted it, destroyed it... well that was it. But I won't stop, I won't give up. Because when I look at what has happened in the world, I know that now more than ever we need to be all that we can be. Now, more than ever... we need the Jedi."
Bob then runs through the wall. He is a true Jedi warrior, able to pass through solid objects--a feat that was not possible at the start of the film by General Hopgood (based on Gen. Albert Stubblebine III) who championed the New Earth Army.
The film leaves us with a striking visual impression that these special powers are actually real and not just the ramblings of some silly hippies from Vietnam. This is the exclamation point on the film's sub-narrative: man can evolve into higher beings if freed from the fear, limitations, and slavery of the controlling and oppressive institutions.
As with the film's Lynn Cassidy figure, this New Age theology appeals to the weak, disaffected, outcasts, or the just plain lazy. Like witchcraft or magic, it is inherently selfish as an exercise is gaining for oneself powers--powers, which are of course, shortcuts to actually
doing anything. This idea that
we are the gods we have been waiting for is packaged under the sugar-coated guise of affecting positive change in the world. But the reality is that this ideology is intended to separate one from God by taking on His attributes for oneself, for redemption and restoration are the exclusive domain of God Himself.
"Nevertheless we, according to his promise, look for new heavens and a new earth, wherein dwelleth righteousness." -2 Peter 3:13
