The unplugged week is over, but I still need time to get things done and prepare for spinal cord stimulator therapy. Please continue to enjoy these posts (even if you’ve read them before).
To recap and review, I give you two trailers for the film. The first is more yin (dark) aspect, covering the destructive side of the movie– the destruction of the mother-wife of Preston’s family, and the destructive side of Preston as Tetragrammaton Cleric, First Class.
The second is more yang (light) aspect, covering the rise of John Preston to Champion of the Resistance, and his communications with Jurgen. It is the official trailer for the U.S. market.
Taijitu, or “diagram of ultimate power”, in classic Taoist representation. The white is Yin while the black is Yang, and the dots indicate their crossing and merging interaction.
As in the Taijitu, there are cross-elements– the more yin-like trailer has yang element, and the more yang-like trailer still has yin.
Where there was destruction and darkness, creation and light fought to break free, and John Preston witnessed that light, sometimes very literally. But Preston had to fight for this light, and as the Angel of Death, he destroyed agents of darkness.
Note that yin (dark) energy is associated with the feminine and the night, while yang (light) energy is associated with the masculine and the day. There is a good summary at Wikipedia. While Kurt Wimmer references Western notions of masculinity and femininity, these Eastern concepts remain, even in the ways he uses white and black colors in the film.
Furthermore, Angus MacFayden (Vice-Counsel Dupont) says in Finding: ‘Equilibrium’ that the story is “almost a Buddhist tale” where good must oppose evil.
Opposition in all things, dear readers.
For it must needs be, that there is an aopposition in all things. If not so, my firstborn in the wilderness, righteousness could not be brought to pass, neither wickedness, neither holiness nor misery, neither good nor bad. Wherefore, all things must needs be a compound in one; wherefore, if it should be one body it must needs remain as dead, having no life neither death, nor corruption nor incorruption, happiness nor misery, neither sense nor insensibility. (2 Nephi, chapter 2, version 27, The Book of Mormon)
This is one of the bridges between my LDS faith and philosophical Taoism. Hence, this blog remains “the tao of jaklumen”.
FINAL POST IN THE SERIES: Hero’s Journey Art: John Preston
Related articles
- Yin-Yang (judelleludovice2000.wordpress.com)
- The Hero’s Journey: Equilibrium (jaklumen.wordpress.com)
- Equilibrium the Movie (newmedia500.wordpress.com)
- 7 Ways to Balance Your Yin and Yang Energies (zazenlife.com)
the tao of jaklumen 
April 13, 2014 at 06:35
Wish I could watch the vids at work. This reminded me of some episodes of the Clone Wars I just saw. Anakin and Obi-Wan get stuck on a Force Prison which represented the fight between Light Side and Dark Side. All about balance.
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April 13, 2014 at 13:12
Uh oh– hard at work, or hardly working? I guess these trailers contribute more to the post, whereas earlier posts in the series, if you’re familiar with the movie, you aren’t missing too much.
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April 13, 2014 at 20:45
Very interesting insights… I now feel as though I need to re-watch the movie. It has been a very long time.
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April 13, 2014 at 21:05
I didn’t see it in the theaters and found out about it only through some friends of mine. It took me a few views to really get into it, but then I had to make it part of my personal collection.
I was really surprised how well it fit with the Hero’s Journey model, right down to several stages Joseph Campbell lists that a lot of writers gloss over (following Christopher Vogler’s famous memo, more or less).
It’s such an underrated movie. Wimmer also did Ultraviolet, which I didn’t like as much.
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April 15, 2014 at 21:44
I’m told that everything and everyone have both yin and yang aspects to them. Yin is the feminine, darkness, giving. Yang is the masculine, light, taking. It’s a very elegant way of understanding the principle of opposition in all things.
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