Doppelganger and King Kong English Speech

Introduction: “Good morning/afternoon class and *teacher*, today I will be speaking about how Michael Parker, the author of Doppelganger and Peter Jackson, the director of the film King Kong, accurately portray the main concept of the Beast Within through the symbolism of masks and the notions of betrayal and duplicity. I will be talking about Josh and Andrew from Doppelganger, Carl Denham and the people that he manipulated and affected through his deception, from King Kong and explain their contributions to the main idea of the Beast Within, how they wear a mask and how they portray the concepts of Duplicity and Betrayal. Body Paragraph 1: (Doppelganger) “In Parker’s novel, Doppelganger, a key character, Josh, shows that he has a cunning and devious side in the dystopic Sydney when he premeditatedly (purposefully) gives Andrew a Raksi that is spiked with the drug QZ45. Andrew drinks the Raksi without any knowledge of the ‘added ingredient’ and when he drinks it he realises that it tastes different to how it did previously, when he tried some with Josh in the bar.

He noticed that Josh was acting in an expectant manner, as if he was waiting for something to explode on him, the simile in the text, “It had a slightly different taste – as if sand was added to it,” is used by Parker to indicate that Andrew had a suspicion that something was wrong with the Raksi. Regardless of this, he trusted Josh enough to go on to have even another shot of the “ethanol” smelling Raksi, with the foreboding sandy substance half dissolved into it.

After this second shot, Andrew begins to feel something “Jolting the neurones”, and when Andrew finally finds out what Josh did, Josh very casually mentions that he “Just added something to the Raksi” and smiles. Josh wears a metaphorical mask in this situation, because he has to act as if there is nothing wrong with the Raksi, he even talks nonchalantly about how the Hallboys will be “yelling for” the QZ45, in an attempt to make it seem less suspicious to Andrew.

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Josh portrays the theme of betrayal because he literally betrays the trust of Andrew by spiking the drink, because Andrew at least had ‘some’ trust for Josh in the Dystopic Sydney. The fact that Josh gave Andrew the QZ45 meant that there is now a whole new series of events that affect the storyline; Andrew ends up killing ‘boy’ because the QZ45 has a mental and physical effect, where the taker feels ‘ready to fight or kill’.

In this case, boy makes Andrew angry, by slashing him with a knife during the chase in the tunnels, and Andrew goes on a crazy rampage and kills boy. Andrew soon becomes very guilty that he killed boy because he realises that in the normal Sydney ‘boy’ is a kid named Derek, who dies in a car crash, which makes Andrew logically believe that if one person is killed in the Dystopic Sydney, this same happening will reflect in a slightly different manner, in the normal Sydney.

Josh also demonstrates the concept of the Beast Within through the plain evil of what he did to Andrew, the evil intentions of Josh were the reason why he did it, it wasn’t to save anyone’s life, like Andrew ends up doing later on in the text, but it was all part of Josh’s scheme to become the owner of the metsin factory so that he could become the richest and most famous person in the Dystopic Sydney, he was willing to kill many people to get his desire and he managed to get a whole gang of ‘hallboys’ to listen to him and do it.

Body Paragraph 2: (King Kong): In the film, King Kong, Ann Darrow, a key character, is first seen as a nice girl who is struggling to pay her way through life. This is because she ends up losing her job at the theatre; she is portrayed as a desperate unemployed actress, reduced to homelessness by the Great Depression. Ann is given the opportunity to be a stripper to get her some money, but she ends up leaving because she doesn’t want to resort to something as immoral as that.

Carl Denham, another key character, is a wannabe film director on the verge of bankruptcy. He is treated with contempt by all of the movie studios in New York, despite having some excellent footage of natural wildlife. Carl ends up having to make split second decisions on a new film that he is planning to create, based on an idea that there is an island and a mythical beast out in some ocean, that he isn’t even sure about completely.

He is missing a lead actress, because his first one is working on another film. Carl needs a girl that fits into a size 4 dress. He ends up looking at the strip club where it just so happens that Ann Darrow, a now former Vaudeville actress, is also standing, directly behind him, because she is looking for a place where she can earn some money. He is just about to walk in, when he seems to notice the figure in the reflection of the door window.

He notices that she walks off. Soon after, Ann attempts to steal an apple from a fruit stand and is caught. Carl jumps in just as it starts to get heated, and he saves the day! He makes it seem like she dropped the money by saying “Excuse me, Ma’am, I think you dropped this. ” This shows that Carl is very nifty in the manner of getting what he wants. He picked the perfect opportunity to get Ann’s attention, in a seemingly good way.

This confirms that Carl does in fact wear a metaphorical mask, because he has to act like he is some wonderful, lovable person, who can’t do anything wrong, but soon after, all of the crew and actors that he dragged along on the pitfall of a journey to an island that he didn’t even know was there in the first place, realise that he is an illusory and scheming character whom will put anyone’s life at risk to get what he wants… FAME, GLORY AND RICHES through the “price of an admission ticket” as he very clearly said after good friend and cameraman - Herbert - was killed by a horde of hungry Velociraptor-like dinosaurs that came and nibbled him away into the shadows.

Even after Herbert was killed, he continues to go on about how he will continue the movie and get the money that he needs to apparently “donate it to the wife and kids,” of the deceased, Peter Jackson changes the music as Carl says this to make it seem that he is misleading everyone. This technique through music allows leads us into the thought that Carl is in fact a deceptive person. Although it may be quite easy for some of us to believe that Kong would be the one to portray the ‘beast within’ in this film, it so happens that it is not, if Kong kills in the film, it is never because he wants to do it out of hate, but because he is only trying to defend his territory and keep his little friend, Ann, safe from creatures and other humans. Carl is the beast.

Carl is not a cold-blooded killer, or somebody looking to take advantage of a woman, in the case of the question that he asked Ann: “You wouldn't happen to be a size 4 by any chance?. ” He is none of these things, but he can still be classed as a beast, because he does foolish and wild things that risk other people’s lives and actually end up killing many of them. Conclusion: The core concept of the symbolism of masks, betrayal, duplicity and the key idea of the “Beast Within” are depicted with both quality and accuracy by Michael Parker, the author of Doppelganger, and Peter Jackson, the director of King Kong. They both do this through various film and literature echniques, such as simile, music in film, symbolism, characterisation, foreshadowing and key events. Josh from Doppelganger definitely displays the Beast Within and the concept of masks through his deceptive and evil attitude towards Andrew, he also demonstrates betrayal - of trust - when he adds the QZ45 to Andrew’s Raksi. Carl Denham from King Kong demonstrates that he has a ‘Beast Within’ and that he wears a mask through his actions and his demonstration of his corrupt thoughts through his dialogue. He never killed anyone directly, but he indirectly did by deceiving and carrying along the crew and actors and actress on a journey to a place that he didn’t even know was real. THANK YOU.

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