MovieChat Forums > The Giver (2014) Discussion > Why give 1 person all the answers and ex...

Why give 1 person all the answers and expect them to cooperate?

posted 10 years ago by mrchanmanx
14 replies | jump to latest

This goes beyond all logic of the movie that tries to explain that a "well crafted world, bent on mind control and brainwashing is ultimately better for us as human kind than letting our own choices dictate our actions."

Why then would this society choose to allow one individual to play god and be able to choose to lie, cheat, steal, attack etc and wreck havoc in this world? That seems counter productive.

There is absolutely no logic in allowing ONE person, or equality or fairness as this world aims to achieve in allowing this young individual to have access to all these memories.

What do you really think would happen? I mean COME ON are you that naive to think that if you empowered someone that they wouldnt snap? Or start questioning things?

You set your self up for that, it kills the entire premise and the plot.

Anyone else think that?

[–] 10 years ago

[deleted]

[–] peeeter-f 10 years ago

I agree with OP.

Why do they need the Giver? Why do they need somebody to hold memories? He doesn't seem to have any impact on the society. He doesn't share his memories, he is not allowed to. Then the Giver is obviously useless.

[–] musicblind 10 years ago

The society was obviously set up with some uncertainty as to wether it would work. That is also why they have a failsafe hair trigger to end it all if the receiver decides to cross the forcefield. The founders were being safe about it, but the people who came after them decided not to be.

"Some day you will be old enough to start reading fairy tales again." - C.S.Lewis

[–] peeeter-f 10 years ago

I know it's a fail-safe. But the point is it's a stupid fail-safe. It would never work. The creators didn't trust any human so they make them all emotion-less zombies but to guard this new society they leave just 1 normal human to judge it? Now the creators suddenly trust just one random 'normal' person? He can love and hate so why would they think that he will guard the society and not destroy it?

[–] peeeter-f 10 years ago

I'd say that such a society wouldn't get past the 1st giver.

If he's a good person he'll rebel like Jonas.

If he's not a good person he'll rule those sheep like a dictator.

Neither of them will sit quietly.

[–] subase 10 years ago

It's stupid in the film, but it would make perfect sense if the community needed to communicate with the outside world. For example, if this community was only one of many in a larger state. Obviously there needed to be someone who wasn't a complete moron/zombie, and that was the Giver. He would be able to talk with them on a rational level and work out whatever it is they wanted. (maybe they wanted more food or goods or soldiers or whatever)

As the Giver says he provides wisdom. If suddenly this community was attacked for example, the Giver would be calling all the shots or if there was some type of ecological or disease disaster.

[–] Korios 10 years ago

We are never told, at least in the film, that there is anything or anyone alive in Elsewhere. We are rather strongly hinted that there is nothing out there.

Fanboy : a person who does not think while watching.

[–] HeathJMac 10 years ago

In the book it's clear that there are other communities, they meet people from them all the time, both to trade with them, and on school trips etc. plus The Giver has a car, and drives about visiting elsewhere. It's just that apart from him the visiting of other communities doesn't really happen in an unregulated way.

[–] mrchanmanx 10 years ago

In such an advanced society, a computerized archive would be a far more suitable answer.

The archive (similar to what national libraries have today) can consist of several thousand entries of newspaper, magazines, clips, etc detailing the history of the world as we know it.

The archive can only be accessed by a select few elders, under surveillance at all times to prevent misuse.

Furthermore, delegating memories to a person is not only risky it is ignorant. For so many reasons that I can list just off top of my head:

A) If memories are passed on from person to person they are bound to be become "interpretations" not real events. A person can not be trusted with precision because they can alter any memory subconsciously by missing a key factor here or a detail there without even knowing it. It is like playing "telephone" the game, the last persons message is completely different than the original one.

B) Because The Giver can "lie" which is stupid, then we can not even trust the fact that the memories he passes to others are correct, it can be a version of his own events or events that he WANTED to happen or WISHED would happen. This is why you can not trust this to a human.

C) What about terminal illness or pre-mature death of a Giver? Can you imagine if he had an accident, that would be the end of the premise. You can not give one person all this power and rely on the fact that he will be okay indefinitely before he can pass it on, that is so risky and in a society that is risk averse i do not see that happening.

E) What about brain trauma? Amnesia? Memory loss? Memories start to become hazy over time, a person may catch cancer or have a brain concussion etc and lose everything. This is just unreal that this concept is in a movie when a society has hover drones and advanced technology.

Just make a digital archive of the memories, problem solved, movie solved ask me for more clarification if needed but I just provided you with the reason why THE GIVER is self-contradictory and pointless.

Thoughts are welcomed.

[–] pauloone1-408-554325 10 years ago

I get what you are saying and agree with the points on B, C and E, did you forget D?
I have a problem with A in the sense that for one person to fully understand an abstract idea I would need a context. The context would come from a set of feeling and experiences which can't be digitally archived. Take morality, what is considered a moral, immoral or even amoral depends not solely of the abstract concept of morality but much more on our perception the world, the zeitgeist.
This is the main reason why we experience religious extremism.
In my point of view, this is why the movie fails and for example The Village succeeds. In The Village there is no effort made to perpetuate the knowledge but rather to suppress it and this, as we well know it, works very well.

[–] BreakingDexter 10 years ago

I was thinking the same thing. I went into the movie thinking it was something completely different. So weird...

[–] browntable759 10 years ago

Show me a story that makes complete sense on every level, and I'll show you a story that doesn't exist. :D I read The Hunger Games trilogy, and I kid you not, it took me a book and a half to get over how unrealistic the premise was. As for The Giver, they don't really explain it in the film, but according to the book, the community would occasionally call on The Giver when something out-of-the-ordinary happened, or if they wanted to make a major decision, such as whether or not to increase the number of children the birth mothers bore. They gave one person all the memories because they didn't want the pain. And if I had all the memories of every tyrannical dictator who used his knowledge and power to oppress others, and how much suffering that caused, and how a lot of those leaders ended up dead because people only ever put up with oppression for so long, I wouldn't be tempted to take advantage of my position. Also, in the book, the Receivers were given the assignment, or rather selected, at 12. They were children, more likely to heed the cautions of adults they trusted, like The Giver(s). A normal 12 year old is only just starting to spread his intellectual wings and think independently of the adults around him. And the Givers had a strong incentive for reining in their young charges because, as the film illustrates, there were ways of punishing uncooperative Givers.

[–] melinda2001 8 years ago

Why then would this society choose to allow one individual to play god and be able to choose to lie, cheat, steal, attack etc and wreck havoc in this world? That seems counter productive.

But it also seems very familiar. Just look at how US presidential power only ever increases. As much as we like to think of ourselves as rugged individuals, we keep choosing to organize ourselves hierarchically and elect strong, self-confident leaders, even when they are clearly self-serving.

[–] Jes' Sayin' (6448) 5 years ago

Was thinking that in version 2.0 of their little community they would try it with no Receiver...