The Haunted Screen: A Contribution to the Hauntology of Contemporary Cinema
Abstract
The article is an attempt to present cinema as a haunted medium. In his reflection on the ontology of the cinema (in relation to such writers as André Bazin, Stanley Cavell and Garett Stewart), the author seeks to show that the way the camera (and the on screen fiction) functions is similar to contact with spirits, that legitimate the semantic ambiguity of the term ‘medium’, referring both to the media of media studies, and spiritualistic media. Because of cinema’s oscillation between permanence and transience, and its double time structure, and because of its links with death, it can be called a spectre art, or art of spectres. These natural predispositions of the medium mean that it can be analysed using the notions of hauntology defined by Derrida, which thanks to the work of his later commentators proves the need of the introduction of the category of spectrality into the reflection on modernity and contemporary culture. The latest cinema (both commercial and artistic) perfectly expresses both of these threads of reflection, confirming once again the initial thesis of spectrality of the medium of cinema.
Keywords:
hauntology, Jacques Derrida, spectralityReferences
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Authors
Miłosz Stelmachkwartalnik.filmowy@ispan.pl
Jagiellonian University Poland
Absolwent filmoznawstwa na Uniwersytecie Jagiellońskim; doktorant w Instytucie Sztuk Audiowizualnych tamże. Jest redaktorem czasopisma o tematyce audiowizualnej „Ekrany”. Jego zainteresowania badawcze koncentrują się wokół zagadnień filmowego modernizmu i jego przejawów w polskim kinie, a także przemian współczesnego kina artystycznego.
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