Original subtitles

The first entirely detourned film in the history of cinema:

CAN DIALECTICS BREAK BRICKS?

A toast to the exploited: for the extermination of the exploiters.

An epitaph for some friends.

A film produced by the person listed here,

who naturally has no idea what has happened to his film.

Let it be said: all films can be detourned:

potboilers, Vardas, Pasolinis, Caillacs,

Godards, Bergmans, as well as good spaghetti westerns and all commercials.

He looks like a jerk, true, but it's not his fault. It's the producer's.

He's alienated and he knows it. He has no control over the use of his life.

In short, he's a proletarian. But that's going to change.

And not by voting for the Common Program or by joining the PSU.

CAN DIALECTICS BREAK BRICKS?

French language version of 1973 by the Association for the Development of

Class Struggle and the Propagation of Dialectical Materialism.

Early one chilly morning in a country where the ideology is particularly cold...

I would like you to remember... that my karate teacher died of a bullet in the head.

Yes...

IN THE HEAD!

- Without dead time. - Without restraints.

- Without restraints. You know the password. - Without dead time.

The bureaucrats are coming!

Imbecile bearing a sack of petitions.

Bearer of petitions justly trampled underfoot by the servants of the State.

Young proletarian seen through bamboo in the foreground.

Say now, work is freedom, isn't it?

The bureaucrats just did that. What does it mean?

You don't answer. Why? Why? Are you afraid?

So, explain it to me.

It means they're going to drink the sweat of the proletarians to the dregs again

and send our children to school. We've had it with these scum.

The bureaucrats begin by exploiting us... and end up by alienating us.

"Serving the People" they call it.

Don't worry, the film's just starting.

They've made propositions to me but... Don't worry, the film's just starting.

They've made propositions to me but...

they were only improvements in poverty or poverty itself that they were "improving."

Comrade!

"Nor god, nor Caesar, nor tribune..."

Listen to me, Comrade! The bureaucrats have chosen your house.

Of course...to drink my sweat.

That's not all, you have to go to your crummy job -- the exploiters -- and

show how much you've produced. That's not all, you have to go to your crummy job -- the exploiters -- and

show how much you've produced.

- Horrors! - Comrade!

- Are you really sure about this? - Yes, I'm beginning to really tell

the exploiters from the exploited. It's been going on so long, you can see how it works.

So what good was it to us to read Marx and Lautreamont? Dejacque and Coeurderoy?

Bakunin and Fourier?

Our tactics must be indissolubly founded on the practice of individual realization.

What are you doing around here, anyway?

I'm waiting for the Morning of the Great Evening, but above all for the Great Evening.

to take pleasure in burning off the hair under their arms.

And to make sure the landlords hang and the priests are cut in two...

I'm going to sharpen my dialectics on impending situations.

Have you resolved the question of organization?

Afterwards...the Workers Councils will be realized in generalized self-management.

But what can we do until then?

We'll find something like Councils. You can't combat alienation with alienated means.

Don't worry about it. It'll all work out.

The bureaucrats are coming!

Quick! Back to work!

So, that's how you exercise your dialectical materialism and, why not...

your radical subjectivity.

That can still be of use.

Not for wildcat strikes. Not for the occupation of factories, I hope.

Nor for arson against public services.

Nor for looting major department stores. Work must be your only role.

Work. Family. Fatherland. Work! Family! Fatherland! Just stick to that.

I don't want to hear any more about class struggle. If not I'll send in my sociologists!

And, if necessary, my psychiatrists! My urban planners! My architects!

My Foucaults! My Lacans! And if that's not enough, I'll even send my structuralists.

Bureaucrat!

I'm fed up! I'm not gonna kill myself at some stinking job my whole life!

Oooh! You could have a word about that with your union...

Or perhaps read the Nouvel Observateur?

You take me for a jerk?

I will as long as I can.

Comrade! Comrade!

Lemme go! Lemme at 'em!

Well, now that I think about it, this isn't the first time this has happened.

We already got to you without taking any prisoners in Catalonia in '37

And in the streets of Budapest in '56.

See you next time.

Bureaucrat! We're not just some bunch of militants! We'll never again let ourselves

be used as the weapon of critique.

Yes, I know, there's nothing without critique...

through the use of weapons.

Take him.

- Kill him! - Very well, sir.

Now there's how radical subjectivity can become a practical force.

We'll crush you! Kill him!

Cut him up!

- Nice, huh? C'mon let's go. - No.

I'm sure he's seen Themroc.

Themroc? Oh yes, that excellent filmanthropic production!

He must have been at Kronstadt.

Against Trotsky. And certainly in the Ukraine with Makhno.

Or again with Pancho Villa in Mexico. He's undoubtedly read all the Classics of Subversion.

published by Champ Libre, then.

That you can rip off from any good bookstore.

He's sung "Cops fall dead on the corner" to the tune of "It's 5am, Paris awakes..."

The bastards!

"Certain people say in speaking of revolution..."

- Lies, and Trotskyoid lies at that! - That's right!

And it's all done the better to fuck us over.

Now that's the important point. Comrades, what do you say of this foolishness?

And you, comrade, tell us a bit about it.

Yes, this shit originates in the stupid and obtuse Leninism of Trotsky. But let's not

be too cruel to the grandfather of bureaucracy. It's so archaic.

Yes, very archaic. And just when will this eruption of the end take place?

Dialectical reason thunders in its crater.

- Yeah. It's time to hang the landlords! - And to cut the priests in two!

And to smash every church to the ground as Comrade Ravachol advocated.

And now, that's not all. We must win!

All this can only mean, comrades, that "The Commune is not dead!"

Ideology reinforces itself as it becomes more atomized.

Revolutionary theory transforms itself.

It seems their latest discovery is to detourn the mass media.

These detournments disturb me.

That, old man, is the beginning of the end.

What disturbs me most in this practice is that they are quite capable of reducing

our own wooden language to shavings if not to sawdust.

We've got to watch that. "What is to be done," said...

- Lenin. - Yes, Lenin.

Even as the ruling class, one is often in the shit.

The mug. It's all in the mug. The more stories we tell 'em,

the more we get 'em used to our mugs.

We have resolved many of the contradictions of State Capitalism...

but not those which threaten to sweep us away.

Even with our great asses in warm water, our ideology still gets cold.

Run and talk to Escarole and that jerk Jean-Daniel.

These jerks who are supposed to be watching but see nothing.

These jerks. I'm going right now.

C'mon, I've got something for you to suck on.

They've alienated yet another proletarian.

Another one lost.

- What's going on? - This one just became a union rep.

As soon as he did, he repressed a wildcat strike, just before buying a TV on credit.

It's sad. These bastards... suppose we burn off the hair under their arms.

And kindle a fire for the cauldron for the party on the Morning of the Great Evening.

And try our hands on the priests, first.

Alert! Bureaucrats in the neighborhood!

Death to the scum!

Spare no one! Just like in Budapest! Death to the proles!

- To the death! Long live Moscow! Long live Stalin! - Die, you cunts!

Greetings, prole!

I have a proposition which should not displease you.

Piss on it.

No, you should accept. It'll be a social promotion. Girls and good wine.

My friend will never join the shitheap clan.

Ok. We'll see about that tomorrow.

It's better like that. It's good to be on the winning side.

Plenty of dough. The prettiest young boys and as much opium as you want.

We'll see. Didn't you understand?

We'll see. We'll see tomorrow. Tomorrow, understood?

Hmm. Very well.

Let's go home.

It's nothing. Let's walk for a bit.

Take it.

Listen. Can't you understand?

No! Go and let your new friends look after you, fuckface.

Let's go.

- He hit you? - Yeah, right here. It still hurts.

We wanted to finish 'em off. He let us down. Ok, guys. Some dialectics now.

It's the only way to break bricks, comrades. We cannot be discouraged by other

proletarians. We must annihilate forever what could one day destroy our work.

What can we do about that guy? Tomorrow he'll become a union official.

We must radicalize our practice: occupation of factories.

Not bad, but it's better to take prisoners, too.

Management and union bosses into the closets, Ok. But it's not a real advance.

What have you to say?

There's radio and TV. All of the centers of communication. How can we take them?

Don't talk about it here. There's cops in the place. Let's be discreet.

Let's organize revolt in daily life, so it's not lost.

C'mon, let's go for a stroll.

Something wrong? You still make me hard. I haven't changed.

You know I can't forget you.

"China night, caressing night...."

Sit down.

You recognize me, darling?

I think so. We must have seen each other on the rue Gay-Lussac.

It smelled good, like flowers beginning to blossom.

Are you going to see the bureaucrats tomorrow?

Yes.

You're on the wrong track. Do you know the nature of the power-wielding classes?

Of the bureaucracy? And all the contradictions of capitalism?

Don't underestimate the adversary.

I know all that.

And you're getting mixed up in it?

Yeah.

You're playing into their hands and mediation is their game.

I'm sick of commodity ideology. You're just like the others and they're killing us with it.

But not for much longer.

You still get hard?

The only thing I have left is the experience of love.

Getting it up against the old world which brings me such boredom.

You don't see it, your fingers are blocking your eyes.

Why don't you put them somewhere else?

Not today. Maybe later tonight.

You're no longer a man.

What's gotten into you?

Try to understand me.

Listen. Don't be a jerk. You have no power. But it can get better. We're gonna try to

smooth over class struggle. To arrange social peace so there'll be no more injustice.

They offer crumbs, we want it all. A bit more pay, a bit more poverty.

They can drop dead!

Take it easy. I'm no Trotskyist. Do I look like a bastard? The bad days will end.

I believe you. I've seen you kill more than one priest. But you can't conquer alienation

with alienated means.

Comrade, what are you thinking about?

- Durruti. - And the archbishop he knocked off.

Don't go to pieces. There's plenty more like him. And lots more fun in store.

Hey guys, there's someone missing here.

Have you seen Comrade Brecht?

Welcome. The Comrade-Secretary is waiting for you inside.

I don't like you, flunkey. Are they all like Peninou in there? It must stink like

those bad evenings at the Sorbonne.

Come in. You'll see.

What are you doing around here?

Wanna dance, you little jerk?

Here is Comrade-Secretary, our helmsman in adversity, our beloved leader.

- Good day, sir. - Greetings to you, queen of the cunts.

From the start of this detourned film, they've had me say a bunch of stupid shit...

but I, too, believe bureaucracy has gone too far.

It's hard for me to believe this new lie.

For once, I'm honest when I speak. And frankly, it's not bullshit.

The Long March is over. We're not in Yenan. Cut the chat on art and literature.

Dialectician, you've been reading too much. I just want to let you in on that.

No conscious individual can be taken in by you. You should know that.

That's Ok, I won't insist this time.

Sooner or later you'll get it up the ass. I was just making an honest proposition.

- Leave this to me. - Very well, sir.

Why don't you leave me alone for once?

Why so nasty? Don't be like that. What have I ever done to you anyway?

You've kept your illusions about Castro. You're retarded. Leave me the fuck alone.

You should realize it's a bit stupid to retain all those illusions.

Don’t take it too hard. She'll get over it soon. She's a Castroist but it's because

she hasn't read Reich yet.

Well now. So we love little boys, too?

Exactly. Proletarians have no complexes.

Maybe you don't know, but bureaucrats are no Puritans, at least when it comes to kids.

Children are not objects! In any case, not for proles.

Bureaucrat sonofabitch. We're gonna cut you up, shitheap, and sooner than you think.

You know, with a guy like you it really kinda grieves me.

This bird's not exactly a fun time. And he takes us for a couple of jerks.

They're all the same. They think they can feed us this shit, but we're men.

Very amusing, but I'll have you sooner or later.

You'll accept the day I offer you a place on the Political Bureau.

For this sequence consult "Enrages and Situs in the Occupation Movement,"

Gallimard edition, pages 207 and 231.

Go put away your phallic symbol!

You'll get another taste of my qualitatives later, you asexual lowlife.

On this wall a slogan was just erased.

"Run quickly comrade, the old world's behind you. That includes the Ligue Communiste."

Go around the other way.

A proletarian is someone who's exploited and has understood that

the proletariat itself can only be a power in becoming conscious of itself.

I read the letter to the Polish Communist Party of Kuron and Modzelewski.

It confirms our critique of the movement. Clearly not too bad. But it's not enough.

Crying doesn't help. The bad days will end, goddammit.

The Commune. Nicholas, the Commune is not dead.

And her over there?

You don't know her?

Well then you're not on the scent of things.

Your bottle breaking trick is nothing special, cunt.

Try it on the skull of an individualist who's seen plenty.

Ideology can only shatter to pieces on contact with radical subjectivity.

Pass this test and you'll make foreman.

Out of the question. I'll never be a small-time boss.

You said you wouldn't use the sharp edge.

Mr. Dumbshit, never believe a bureaucrat.

Cruel fortune! To die and never see the city hall in flames!

Watch out! Don't let 'em read the SI reprint from van Gennep any more!

Or Society of the Spectacle! Or The Revolution of Everyday Life! - Long live Leon!

Hey girlie, you ever read Philosophy in the Boudoir by the divine Marquis Donatien?

Alphonse Francois de Sade, comrade of the Picques Section?

What's wrong, darling?

The French edition is out of print, has been for a long, long time.

No, no. Champ Libre's going to reprint it in their "Classics of Subversion" series.

Your little comrade is bored. Go caress her.

All over and with sesame oil. Count on me.

Have a good screw!

They're talking about letting them loose on us.

The mass media. Yes, I know. We can detourn them to our advantage.

Then we must act quickly.

Yes.

You could join the party just to see.

We'd strum up a tune of class struggle and viola-tion without pleasure.

You've understood nothing, you dickbite Leninist. We're gonna fuck you up.

Bamboo up the ass with red ants. And we'll burn it all up on the New Red Square.

You really think so? What about my army?

Let's talk about it.

Shut up!

You've read nothing. Your brave generals will be shot by their own troops.

The illusion of your power is only the power of your illusion.

We're gonna have your hide. Trust me. See you later.

Get him!

So, what do you say now? My power is an illusion?

- Hey, coyotes! What about ideology? - And there's no smoke without fire!

Hey dialectician, aren't you coming to see the comrades?

Little guy, I want you to tell all the comrades that whatever is lost

in partial contestation becomes part of the repressive function of the old world.

Don't forget. Also, an insurrection is needed in the capitalist countries.

All powers reinforce each other.

You must destroy all powers then. Reminds me of the First International.

Master, the demo has taken a bad turn.

- Ever ready to kill some proles? - Ever ready!

Hello, most beautiful. They left you here alone?

- They went to dynamite something. - And you stayed here?

There were no more cigars to light fuses.

The scum. They make us eat shit.

Don't worry about it. Things are changing. We'll make them stuff their faces with it.

You could be with a girlfriend or masturbating. You've got two good arms.

I've just read Reich's Function of the Orgasm in a non-masperised version.

What's that mean? Oh yes, I know. Non- falsified. Radical critique through gesture.

Matches! Poetry of the schools!

Down with masperisers! Down with bureaucrats!

Say, you are promising!

- Search everywhere! - Very well.

A pretty girl...

Kill her!

Kill her!

Bring her back over here.

Fake it!

Everyone must know that bureaucrats have balls.

- They've occupied another factory! - Let's cut them down!

The bureaucrats are in deep shit and trying to save their asses. Alain Bouc, too.

They can't make butter from donkey piss.

The only good militant is a dead militant.

Those who exterminate bureaucrats half-way are only digging their own grave.

Down with the State!

Down with all States!

Long live la sociale!

- They give you a password? - Like at Watts, and it's all gonna burn.

We've talked about it a lot. Now Spring is gonna get hot!

Ready for the final struggle and the end of alienations!

For a classless society! And to avenge Makhno and Lumumba!

And Duval and the comrades of Canton and Barcelona!

To avenge Bonnot!

Let's go!

Say now, finally to avenge Bonnot!

Here now for the first time in the world, thanks to radical critique, one aspect

of the final struggle. On my right, the proletariat!

On my left, its representation! Today's L'Equipe special had this to say:

The proletariat has the historical weight of its unfinished struggle...

...its representation, the dead weight of ideology.

In preceding encounters the proletariat, not having discovered in time its

representation, lost in Russia, in Germany, among others, where we remember

those good ol' Sparticists.

One must say that the falsifiers sang Socialism above all the charnel houses

and it is the practice of revolutionary theory which denounces the representation

of the proletariat, that is, the bureaucracy as a ruling class in place of

a commodity economy.

In this sense, it is but one aspect of the final struggle. But for the countries

concerned, it is the real and absolute aspect of the forces present.

The proletariat is international or not at all.

For reasons of censorship, familiar to the friends of Charlie-Hebdo, the proletariat

has no weapons. It goes without saying, in reality it will be otherwise. At this very

moment, I have just been informed of several confrontations in other

so-called "socialist" countries where the proletariat is in the process of drowning

the next-to-the-last bureaucrat. This latter is no doubt declaring before dying:

"But it's the Berezina!" And I said "the next-to-the-last," because in order for

humanity to be happy, the guts of the last bureaucrat are reserved, as you know,

my friends, for hanging the last capitalist. On this subject, the news from Paris,

Rome, Tokyo, New York is fabulous. The old world seems to be in the process of

being overturned. To judge by reading this last dispatch, it would seem the proletariat

has come to recognize itself. But, I'm getting carried away: the unions have,

for the time being, jammed up the revolutionary victory. From now on,

we must count on them to defend the old world and must not forget the old dictum:

"Those who speak of revolution and of class struggle without explicitly referring

to everyday life, without understanding what is subversive in love and positive

in the refusal of constraints, have a corpse in their mouths."

I'm taking advantage of them all being out for a drink at the local bistro

to include a phrase I had forgotten: "Can permitted ecstasies be compared to

those ecstasies which combine spicier enticements -- those priceless ruptures

of social restraints and the overthrow of all laws?"

A fine practice: not an eye for an eye, but the whole ugly mug.

We need hardly give instruction on the art of evasion or the radical response.

Say now, a bureaucrat in a commonplace situation.

Our friends will recognize themselves here.

I've got Marchais and Seguy here. Go for it!

Now, how a rolling grandpa swallows no moss...

but gets his fill of bureaucrat by using his head!

And now: Prince Charming vs. Mr. Ugly.

No suspense here. Anybody but a jerk knows how this one will turn out.

The white against the red: you guess who's going to win.

In its great series, "With Unequal Weapons," L'Oiseau de Minerve presents

Dialectics Against Power, reduced to a few images, since we aren't in the street.

Say, ideology's starting to ooze.

Finally, this is getting serious. What a fine-looking man!

Presto change-o: 1-2-3 But ideology's still there.

Ok, enough. Finish off this scum.

I've got such a crush on you, I've got you under my skin.

You ok, gramps? And the others?

They're sick of dubbing dialogue tracks so they're pretending to be dead.

It's hard work, it seems, and doesn't even pay the cab fare.

Maybe. Then our friends aren't really dead?

No, no. They're only pretending.

Nestor, answer me. Tell me you're not dead.

It was no sacrifice...

For one of ours 100 of theirs! God-fucking-dammit!

We took care of them. We'll take care of the others.

What kind of planet is this? No one will remember this and we'll die here.

We must settle our own affairs. From Moscow to Tokyo, from Paris to New York

this fucking planet's gonna explode. All the exploiters will fall into our hands...

even the reformists. But that's all for a future film. To detourn a film is no longer

enough --- How can we truly utilize the cinema?

L'Oiseau de Minerve has a few surprises in store for us as night falls.

The original detourned version was realized with the help of:

Raoul Cure, Jacques Thebeaut, Michelle Grellier

Dominique Morin, Daniel Galle, Patrick Deweare, Jean-Pierre Leroux

Yves-Maria Morin, Michel Bardelet, Michel Elias and Dominique Page.

Under the direction of Gerald Cohen

Original subtitles by Keith Sanborn and Nathalie Borgers, aided by Bertrand Augst, Catherine Avello and others.

Karagarga update edited and transcribed by sib, 8/2012.