ABSTRACT

This chapter provides a close reading of three recent Hollywood productions: The Internship (2013), directed by Shawn Levy; The Interview (2014), directed by Seth Rogen and Evan Goldberg; and Hail, Caesar! (2016), directed by Joel and Ethan Coen, overviewing how they reinterpret communist ideas. Overviewing the recent transformations of mainstream cinema, the chapter analyses the modes in which communist ideology is truncated as a farcical object. The definition of communism, or 'the Doctrine', is largely that of a political and economic system founded on the philosophy of Karl Marx. Many philosophers followed suit and claimed the need to abandon the 'Doctrine' altogether, and to review the core concepts of Marxism. Farce. It induces a radical transformation of actions, characters and even historical events, by emptying them of their true content. Post-Marxist authors hastily accepted the neoliberal dogma that the capitalist mode of production has been radically transformed by the new media technologies.