“Doom” Starring The Rock, Karl Urban Directed by Andrzej Bartkowiak

Even the credits of the motion picture based on the ultra-violent video game from id Software explode onto the screen drenched in tough, manly syllables. Doom. The Rock. Urban. Andrzej. It’s the onomatopoeic collision of two gelignite-infused typewriters, ink ribbons fraying, keys splaying in mindless defiance to the mindful.

Doom delivers on the high-tech violence most Halloween audiences will be looking for. I suspect this is the mode in which the studio will make the bulk of its money. But science fiction has long been the refuge of the most potent societal commentary — to understand today, we must look to the future.

Thus it is impossible to disregard the strongest of the film’s subtexts. Doom is a powerful metaphor for the plight of the modern woman. The savior of femininity here is the hypermasculine Rock, whose yo bro macho talk bends so far back onto self-parody that its presence is laced with orthogonalism — a fully-contained yin and yang of a single color rather than black and white.

Unlike the video game, the demons that erupt onto the scene are the result of human genome decoding, not portals into Hell. The monsters are unleashed from within men — who themselves could be considered aberrations of womanhood from birth, as all humans begin in the womb as physically female — leading to an obvious parallel with the life-altering fear of conception. Freud would weep tears of joy.

Doom deftly shows us that pregnancy is the great differentiator, changing a woman’s role into that of mother, a place where no man can follow. The Rock confronts these fears head on, with a “Bio-Force Gun,” its destructive energy spewing in the same color as the fluid used to demonstrate tampon absorbency in commercials. The message is clear: confront this fear, and purge it from existence.

It’s a fascinating take on how fear of femininity can loom — or doom — a modern woman. In the end, even the Rock must succumb to his darker nature, and becomes “demonized,” settling into the role genetically encoded into each of us as humans: to become parents. But when he changes, so does the framework. We are all monsters of a sort, bred for breeding. They are us, and we them. Through the Rock’s acceptance, we become less afraid ourselves. The skin of the world has been peeled back, but what were once nightmare creatures are now a symbol of family, a sense of completeness.

The demands of the working world are biologically confusing for women, and although Doom’s violence may be initially offputting, I urge audiences of both genders to watch with eyes open. Anything less and you may miss one of the most profound statements about the role of the fairer sex, in this decidedly Modern society.

This entry was posted on Friday, October 21st, 2005 at 11:13 am and is filed under Review. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.