World Cinema and the Ethics of Realism

308 Pages·2011·4.59 MB·English

by  Lúcia Nagib

World Cinema and the Ethics of Realism
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World Cinema and the Ethics
of Realism
Lúcia Nagib
The Continuum International Publishing Group
80 Maiden Lane, New York, NY 10038
The Tower Building, 11 York Road, London SE1 7NX
www.continuumbooks.com
Copyright © 2011 by Lúcia Nagib
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced, stored in a
retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means, electronic,
mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise, without the written
permission of the publishers.
ISBN: HB: 978-1-4411-3783-8
PB: 978-1-4411-6583-1
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Nagib, Lúcia, 1956–
World cinema and the ethics of realism / by Lúcia Nagib.
p. cm.
Includes bibliographical references and index.
ISBN-13: 978-1-4411-3783-8 (hardcover : alk. paper)
ISBN-10: 1-4411-3783-1 (hardcover : alk. paper)
ISBN-13: 978-1-4411-658 3-1 (pbk. : alk. paper)
ISBN-10: 1-4411-6583-5 (pbk. : alk. paper) 1. Realism in motion pictures.
2. Motion pictures--Moral and ethical aspects. I. Title.
PN1995.9.R3N35 2011
791.43'612--dc22
2010033009
Typeset by Newgen Imaging Systems Pvt Ltd, Chennai, India
Printed and bound in the United States of America
To Nagisa Oshima,
with profound admiration and gratitude.
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CONTENTS
List of Illustrations ix
Acknowledgements xiii
INTRODUCTION 1
Realism, Presentation, Representation 3
Presentational Ethics 8
Part I Physical Cinema
Chapter 1 THE END OF THE OTHER 19
Physical Realism 23
The Missing Other 32
Atanarjuat, The Fast Runner 34
Yaaba 42
God and the Devil in the Land of the Sun
(Black God, White Devil) 51
The 400 Blows 64
Chapter 2 THE IMMATERIAL DIFFERENCE:
WERNER HERZOG REVISITED 74
The Excessive Body 74
Literal Difference 82
Physical Difference 93
Representational Difference 103
Part II The Reality of the Medium
Chapter 3 CONCEPTUAL REALISM IN LAND
IN TRANCE AND I AM CUBA 125
Allegorical Real 131
Reality as Process: Trance in Land in Trance 138
Trance, Sexuality and the Christian Myth in I Am Cuba 143
Mimesis of the Principle 148
Concluding Remarks 155
vii
viii Contents
Chapter 4 THE WORK OF ART IN PROGRESS:
AN ANALYSIS OF DELICATE CRIME 157
Part III The Ethics of Desire
Chapter 5 THE REALM OF THE SENSES, THE ETHICAL
IMPERATIVE AND THE POLITICS OF PLEASURE 177
Originality, Beauty and the Porn Genre 181
The Eroticized Nation 187
Sex in Red and White: Double Suicide 193
Anti-realism and Artistic Real 198
The Participative Voyeur and the Eroticized Apparatus 203
Part IV The Production of Reality
Chapter 6 HARA AND KOBAYASHI’S
‘PRIVATE DOCUMENTARIES’ 219
Historical Time 220
Phenomenological Time 226
Active Subjects 231
Chapter 7 THE SELF-PERFORMING AUTEUR: ETHICS
IN JOÃO CÉSAR MONTEIRO 236
Ethics of the Impossible Real 238
God’s Autobiography 246
The History Man 255
Notes 262

Bibliography 267
Index 279
LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS
Figure 1.1 Running on ice: Natar Ungalaaq in Atanarjuat,
the Fast Runner 20
Figure 1.2 Running in the heat: Noufou Ouédraogo and
Roukietou Barry in Yaaba 21
Figure 1.3 Running in the desert: Geraldo Del Rey in God and
the Devil in the Land of the Sun 22
Figure 1.4 Running in the wintry landscape: Jean-Pierre Léaud
in The 400 Blows 23
Figures 1.5–1.6 Atanarjuat, fi nal credits: ‘making-of’ insets of the
naked run prove its authenticity 28
Figure 1.7 T he punching-head competition: physical
endurance in Atanarjuat 30
Figure 1.8 Physical punishment in Yaaba 30
Figure 1.9 Physical punishment in The 400 Blows 31
Figure 1.10 Manuel’s physical penances in God and the Devil
in the Land of the Sun 31
Figure 1.11 Sana’s brown withered skin is one more shade
of the red soil, in Yaaba 46
Figures 1.12–1.14 Judgmental fi gures within the scene: smiling faces
in Yaaba 49
Figure 1.15 The spectator/voyeur within the scene, in Yaaba 50
Figure 1.16 Breaking the fourth wall, in Yaaba 51
Figure 1.17 Othon Bastos, playing alternately Corisco and

dead Lampião, calls attention to the reality of
the actor, in God and the Devil in the Land of the Sun 61
Figures 1.18–1.20 A state of confusion and dilemma is created by
the camerawork and characters’ disposition at the
phenomenological stage of shooting: triadic
compositions in God and the Devil in
the Land of the Sun 62–3
Figures 1.21–1.22 Confronting material reality: the Eiffel tower as
an iron cage and the sea as sheer cold water
in The 400 Blows 68
Figure 1.23 Antoine Doinel as a romantic hero, in The 400 Blows 73
Figures 2.1–2.2 Signs of war: airplane wreckages in Kluge and
in Fata Morgana 88
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