MovieChat Forums > Patterns (1956) Discussion > ...the more they stay the same

...the more they stay the same

posted 17 years ago by cymcinto
7 replies | jump to latest

This was a great movie. Still applicable to today's corporate world, which can be ruthless and unfeeling even when you've given them everything you've got and there's no proper work/life balance.

Briggs was a tragic character on multiple accounts, but what I really liked was that he wasn't a "yes man" like so many of the other executives who reported to Ramsay. Perhaps times had changed, and it was time for a change with respect to his position, but I loved that he had a backbone when squaring off against Ramsay.

The tragedy was that he'd spent most of his adult life working like a dog, rarely able to spend time with his son, only to die in -- and because of -- a workplace that had been plotting his "demise" anyway. I really liked Briggs's speech about the little humiliations one has to endure when one is being pushed out of an organization. However, I'm glad he didn't succumb so easily to Ramsay's machinations -- but then again, I wish he had: it just wasn't worth it in the end.

I love it when old movies hit the nail on the head in terms of what continues to occur in modern times (sometimes I think things were so different in the old days, but in many ways, they were the same).

[–] 17 years ago

[deleted]

[–] JoeySanchez3456 12 years ago

You hit the nail on the head! Today's corporate world doesn't even try to be sneaky about their plans for you. They would rather stab you in the eye. Rod Serling was such a gifted writer.

[–] Culburn 11 years ago

In this case (Patterns) Ramsey has a case. The 900 men who will (possibly) lose their job (in the opening board meeting) in the acquisition by Ramsey have a (probability) of turning into 1800 men employed because of the success that Ramsey has fostered in his company. This part must not be passed over, but, examined. It's important to what has come before and what comes after (between Briggs & Ramsey). Ramsey repeatedly warns against the (welfare state) in the micro & macro, in business, but, Ramsey hints to outside that board room as well. And he's correct. Ramsey does not have to like Briggs, nor Fred, AND vice versa. I love this film and it survives almost 60 years later.

[–] diurnalemissions 8 years ago

While the corporate world CAN be cold and calculating, so can other areas of our society. Does anyone think POLITICS is nice man's game? It's even more cutthroat. Sports? Everything is a competition. Higher education? I went to college for Accounting, and the backstabbing I heard about from the Accounting Department politics after I graduated was intense.

It simply has to be faced that all walks of life have people who will walk over others to get where they want to go. Wherever you have a hierarchy, you will have people leveraging themselves up on the shoulders of the others they push down below them.

But, for whatever reason, "businessmen" and the "corporate" world gets special treatment from the "artists" of the world, but when they get a chance at power, they typically prove themselves to ten times more ruthless. In the last 100 years we had countries run by a person who considered himself an artist "appointed by Providence", a person who considered himself poet by profession, and a person who was a librarian. All were butchers when they got a hold of power. So how much of the vitriol from Hollywood et al is really just projection? Do they know deep down inside there's a Robespierre dwelling within, and they have to lash out at easy targets?

And, Hollywood IS a business, and it's the one closest to hand to use as a model. These players in Hollywoodland see how cutthroat THEIR business is and they throw it out that ALL businesses and industries are run the same way. They use their own DIRTIEST example to go by, but it's XYZ Corp that makes their screenplays and scripts. Again, projection.

[–] cfwente 8 years ago

Yes. And very well said.

[–] irvberg2002 8 years ago

I get Hitler. Is the poet Mao? Who is the librarian?

[–] Iconoclast321 (429) 4 years ago

Mao worked as a library assistant. Stalin and Saddam Hussein were poets (actually Mao was too. Khomeini as well - gosh, lots of poets here).