Another set of comparisons links "Jaws" and the Nazi ascendancy reflected in both Riefenstahl's "Triumph of the Will" and Fritz Hipler's 1940 anti-Semitic broadside "The Eternal Jew." While all three films imply a threat from an intrusive Other, in Spielberg's movie the shark is a symbol broad enough to signify everything and nothing (conservatives saw it an illegal aliens, Fidel Castro read it as capitalism itself). In Nazi cinema, however, the invasive danger has already been identified with a specific group due to "a narrative that explains [Germany's internal] tensions in terms of a foreign intruder—the Jews."

It's noteworthy that, while Zizek's background is Marxist and "Pervert's Guide" unsurprisingly devotes some sharp critical scrutiny to the internal contradictions of Nazism, fascism and capitalism—the movies covered include "Titanic," "Cabaret," "The Dark Knight," "The Sound of Music" and many others—he's equally astringent regarding the Communist mythology that bolstered dictators like Stalin, Mao and Castro, a system based on a belief in an imaginary creature known as "the People" and that justified its many horrors thereby. However, rather than attacking those iconic leaders, Zizek says, the best way to show up such myths is by dethroning that non-existent creature; and he cites Milos Forman's early satires as films which do just that.

In any case, he concludes, "The depressing lesson of the last decades is that capitalism has been the true revolutionizing force, even as it only serves itself."

For many viewers, no doubt the most startling and provocative part of Zizek's journey comes when he follows Freud down the rabbit hole of deep Western belief, where he identifies Judaism with "anxiety" and Christianity with "love." And then, using Kazantzakis and Scorsese's Resurrection-less "The Last Temptation of Christ" as his exemplary text, he says, "The only real way to be an atheist is to go through Christianity. Christianity is much more atheist than the usual atheism…."

ncG1vNJzZmivp6x7s7vGnqmempWnwW%2BvzqZmq52mnrK4v46tn55loJq%2Ft7HRrapmn6WesaZ506hkopyVpLmws9hmaWlpYw%3D%3D