The only dog that died during the 9/11/01 attacks was the police K9 Sirius (top left), perishing in the Twin Towers, becoming another trump that manifested that morning. Sirius wore PAPD Badge #17, syncing with the Grand Gallery’s card 17, the Star (top right), signifying the Egyptian Dog Star. (Bottom) Former President Bill Clinton met Sirius on September 11, 2000, one year prior to his death.
In The Batman (2022), when the Riddler/Edward Nashton is captured, his hair is noticeably flat because of all the times he enveloped his head with Cling Wrap.
Toward the beginning of The Batman, vandals spray-paint the word BROKE on the pillars of the Bank of Gotham, clearly presaging the failure of the Silicon Valley Bank, the second-largest collapse in US history. The Batman was released on March 4th, 2022, and the bank failed on March 10th, 2023, almost a year to the day later. Believe it or not.
A little teaser from CS4, which is coming along nicely. Also, Rob returns to Coast to Coast AM next Saturday night, so stay tuned for information on that – more coming next week.
Led Zeppelin’s “♫ traveler of both time and space [who] sit[s] with elders of the gentle race this world has seldom seen ♫” is often considered one of the occult founders of Rock ‘n’ Roll as his presence forever looms in Hollywood and pop culture. Crowley’s shadow falls upon SPECTRE’s Blofeld and Casino Royale’s Le Chiffre in Fleming’s James Bond universe.[1] Frater Perdurabo’s impact upon the latter villain is clearly visible in the 2006 cinematic version of Fleming’s first novel. Le Chiffre uses a platinum-plated inhaler, signifying Crowley’s chronic drug abuse, causing the magickian to develop asthma in the 1920s.[2] M (Judi Dench) states that Le Chiffre is a chess prodigy paralleling Crowley, who was a chess master. And, like the Beast, Le Chiffre is a sadomasochist, torturing Bond’s testicles (and enjoying it) before meeting his demise by getting a bullet through the head. In a bizarre twist, Le Chiffre finances 9/11, suggesting Crowley’s magick that transcended that tragic day.
[1] Actors that have portrayed Blofeld include Anthony Dawson in From Russia with Love (1963) and Thunderball (voiced by Eric Pohlmann (1913-1979) in both films); Donald Pleasence in You Only Live Twice; Telly Savalas in On Her Majesty’s Secret Service; Charles Gray in Diamonds are Forever; Max von Sydow (1929-2020) in the noncanonical Never Say Never (1983); and Christopher Waltz in Spectre (2015) and No Time to Die (2021). Orson Wells (1915-1985) portrayed Le Chiffre in the 1967 noncanonical Casino Royal and Mads Mikkelsen in its 2006’s canonical adaption.
[2] In Fleming’s story, Le Chiffre uses the inhaler because he suffers from haemolacria, causing him to weep blood from his left eye.
All the Star Trek imagery in Elvis (2022) is there because it was one of the King’s favorite television shows. Keep your eyes peeled the next time you watch it.
Happy New Year! Enjoy this sneak peek at Cinema Symbolism 4 (the Preface, rough copy). Enjoy!
To this author, the thought of composing another occult movie book in the vein of Cinema Symbolism 2 (2017) and Cinema Symbolism 3 (2021) is, quite frankly, nauseating. I have no interest in writing another volume focusing on a particular movie, then analyzing it through an esoteric-Hermetic-Gnostic lens while identifying Easter eggs. I’ll take a rain check on that.
Instead, this time around, I am taking Cinema Symbolism 4 in another direction. While select films will get individual chapters (those with well-hidden undercurrents like The Batman, 2022), this book will focus on arcane topics and how specific movies project and visualize the occult, magic, and mythology into pop culture, casting powerful spells. For instance, rather than apply Joseph Campbell’s (1904-1987) monomyth to a certain film, I will present the elements of the hero’s journey and identify them as they appear in cinema proper. Indeed, I will continue to point out Easter eggs as I discover them; if I didn’t do that, what sort of analyst would I be?
And speaking of Easter eggs, how did I miss that elusive one in Mother! (2017) and that diabolical homage in The Witch: A New-England Folktale (2015). Mother!, a Gnostic flick that looks like it was directed by Valentinus (ca. 100-ca. 180 CE) and produced by Philo of Alexandria (ca. 25 BCE-ca. 50 CE), was dissected thoroughly in Cinema Symbolism 3 (2021) by yours truly. However, upon rewatching it in the autumn of 2021, I noticed the yellow elixir Mother (Jennifer Lawrence) drinks to ease her anxiety alludes to the Rolling Stones’ appropriately titled song “Mother’s Little Helper” (1966). The tune is about a mama who consumes yellow tranquilizers to alleviate her depression. Does not Lawrence’s Sophia-like Mother “♫… go running for the shelter of her mother’s little helper ♫” to get her through her “♫ busy dying days ♫” spent with the demiurgic, capricious Him (Javier Bardem)?
The Witch, a Luciferian masterpiece also scrutinized in Cinema Symbolism 3, was rewatched by this author during the summer of ’22. Once more, something jumped off my flat-screen television I hadn’t observed before. William’s (Ralph Ineson), the pride-infected father of the doomed family, ceaseless wood splitting hearkens back to The Amityville Horror (1979), wherein the hapless patriarch, George Lutz (James Brolin), also incessantly chops firewood. Whether the impetus is conscious or subconscious, Robert Eggers, The Witch’s director, uses woodcutting as an occult mnemonic, transferring the evil lurking inside 112 Ocean Avenue to the Puritan family’s seventeenth-century homestead where the satanic Black Phillip is king (because “♫ a crown grows out his head [and] to a nanny queen is wed ♫”).
Also left out of my last book was the origin of Twin Peaks’ (1990-2017) Dweller on the Threshold, a term lifted from the neo-Gnostic world of Madame Helena Blavatsky’s (1831-1891) Theosophy Society. The Russian mystic defined them as “certain maleficent astral doubles of defunct persons,” hence the entities inhabiting the Black Lodge representing the person’s shadow self and unresolved issues at the time of their death.[1] Make no mistake, David Lynch and his ilk are occult experts.
If the reader is familiar with Cinema Symbolism 3, then they should know Midsommar (2019) is a morbid retelling of The Wizard of Oz (1939) eighty years later. Ergo, the conspicuous airplane turbulence in the former is a throwback to the tornado in the latter. Just as a violent twister whisks Dorothy Gale (Judy Garland, 1922-1969) to a magical yet foreboding land, a bumpy flight speeds Dani Ardor (Florence Pugh) to a beautiful yet saturnine landscape accordingly. I can’t believe I did not pick up on this one earlier.
Then there is the solar tapestry woven around Elvis Presley’s (1935-1977) life that I analyzed in my last movie book. I thought I had nailed everything, only to recently learn the King of Rock ‘n’ Roll purchased Graceland in mid-March ’57, a few days before the vernal equinox when daylight and warmth overcome darkness; thus, Elvis’ heliacal career was on its way symbolized by his opulent estate. He married Priscilla (née Wagner) on May 1st, 1967. Beltane is midway between the vernal equinox and the summer solstice when daylight triumphs; ergo, it’s only appropriate for the Apollonian musical messiah to take a wife that day. Elvis’ daughter, Lisa Marie, was born on Imbolc, February 1st, 1968, halfway between the winter solstice and the vernal equinox when light continues to gain strength.
On top of that, the sun king’s manager, Col. Tom Parker (1909-1997), was born on June 26th, a mere two days after midsummer when the life-giving orb is at its apex in the northern hemisphere. Thanks to him, Elvis famously began performing at the International Hotel in Las Vegas on Lammas Eve, 1969, midway between the summer solstice and the vernal equinox signifying the forthcoming harvest while honoring the weakening sun. As such, Elvis would entertain audiences at the renowned venue up to the year he perished. However, the King met with the leader of the free world, the thirty-seventh President of the United States, Richard Milhous Nixon (1913-1994), on December 21st, 1970, the day before midwinter when the sun is annually renewed or born again, signifying his pop culture transcendence.
How the fuck did I miss these? The answer: ultimately, no one is perfect.
Unlike my other cinema tomes, this preface will be brief as my purpose in writing it is to explain the book’s template, then move on to the good stuff. As with my other volumes, keep an eye out for Easter eggs concealed in the text and image layout. With that, I unveil Cinema Symbolism 4.
Robert W. Sullivan IV, Esq.
Lughnasadh 2022
Baltimore, MD, USA
Copyright 2022 Robert W. Sullivan IV. All Rights Reserved.
[1] G. de Purucker, Occult Glossary: A Compendium of Oriental and Theosophical Terms (London: Rider & Co. Paternoster House, E.C., 1933), 50-51.
It is only apropos that the latest biopic about Elvis Presley (1935-1977), the Apollonian sun god, will be released on June 24th. That is midsummer, the feast day of the Baptizer (aka John the Baptist, the Lord of Summer), three days after the summer solstice, the apex of the sun in the northern hemisphere, and the birthday of modern-day Freemasonry. As above, so below as they say, so inscribed of the Emerald Tablet of Hermes Trismegistus. Coming soon: Cinema Symbolism 4.
The name Katniss Everdeen (Jennifer Lawrence) literally means Sagittarius the Archer, a fire sign, making her “the girl on fire.”
is a retelling of The Wizard of Oz (1939).
Robert W. Sullivan IV 