Reframing Space: Religion, History, and Memory in the Early Documentary Film of the Yugoslav Space

This paper examines cinematic representations of religion and religious communities in the early cinema of the Yugoslav space. This paper introduces the readers to the rich heritage of the cinema of the Yugoslav space by providing 1) the first study of the representations of religion and the concepts of faith in the early film, and 2) novel approaches in reading religion and history through film. Film is used as a primary rather than supplementary source in historical research on diverse religious and ethnic communities in this part of the Balkan Peninsula. This is the first study that investigates the importance, place, and role of religion in everyday life in the Yugoslav space through the case study of the early documentary film between 1896 and 1939. This paper will enrich scientific inquiry by providing new approaches for researching history through the documentary film

Cinematic representations of nationalist-religious ideology in Serbian films during the 1990s

This thesis is a critical exploration of Serbian film during the 1990s and its potential to provide a critique of the regime of Slobodan Milosevic. In this dissertation I focus upon how selected films provide insight into the ideological discourse of the 1990s within the Serbian socio-political and cultural context. I discuss a range of Serbian films produced during the 1990s, and I analyse in detail several films, in particular Pretty Village, Pretty Flame (Lepa sela, lepo gore, Srdjan Dragojevic, 1995) and Wounds (Rane, Srdjan Dragojevic, 1998), in which I focus on the depiction of nationalist and religious elements in the films. I analyse cinematic representations of the nationalist-religious ideology, its characteristics, impacts and promotion. On the basis of this analysis I consider the extent to which these cinematic representations are subversive. My dissertation has seven chapters. In chapter 1, which is an introduction to the thesis, I state my research questions and methodology. In chapter 2 I discuss the research context and I consider literature relevant to my research. Since I am basing my research upon different fields, I divide this chapter into three parts: the first one is devoted to the field of film and religion in which I position this study; the second part is on the literature that I used for the exploration of the socio-political context of the 1990s; and the last part is devoted to literature written on Balkan, Yugoslav and Serbian cinema. In chapter 3 I provide an analysis of the Serbian socio-cultural and political context of the 1990s. Chapter 3 is divided into eight parts, in which I primarily focus on the creation, characteristics and impacts of the nationalist-religious ideology. This discussion includes an analysis of the interaction between the Church and the state in the promotion of this ideological discourse. This chapter is important for the further analysis of Serbian film, its contextualization, and understanding the main issues which films communicated. In chapter 4 I analyse Serbian films produced during the 1990s. In the first part of this chapter, and for the purpose of contextualization of Serbian film, I first briefly discuss the cinematic tradition of former Yugoslavia: the Black Wave movement. I move on to discuss the cinematic context of the 1990s and the films produced over this period of time. I particularly focus on several films which dealt with the political-ideological context of the 1990s. I discuss the most significant films which dealt with the war, violence, ideology and the collapse of Serbian society under the Milosevic regime. The aim of this chapter is to provide a cinematic context for the analysed films and a clearer understanding of Serbian film of the 1990s as politically engaged cinema. Chapter 5 is devoted to the film Pretty Village, Pretty Flame while in chapter 6 I analyse the film Wounds. I analyse these two films separately because of their unique depictions of the nationalist-religious ideology. Both chapters are structured the same way and are divided into two major parts. In the first part of each chapter I consider the film's plot, its genre and its production, as well as discussing the film's critical reception. In the second part of each chapter I analyse the film narrative and images. At the end of each chapter I discuss the results of my analysis. Chapter 7 is the last chapter of my thesis and is devoted to the conclusion. In this final chapter I discuss the findings based on the cinematic and contextual analysis in the previous chapters. As part of my final remarks, I outline the contributions this study has made and future research that can be developed on the basis of this thesis

Constructing Space, Changing Reality of Israel through Film

(VLID)356995

Constructing Space, Changing Reality of Israel through Film

This paper investigates the ways in which filmmakers through cinematic space frame reality, mediating the issues of conflict and reconciliation, religion and identity(ies) within Israel. Cinematic space depicts and expresses borders through elements of film language, such as mise-en-scène, montage and the disruption of temporal reality. By (re) framing meanings cinema questions existing socio-political realities, and their impact on the individual or whole communities. The microcosmic realities which constitute different communities within Israel’s wider socio-political reality are built and confronted through the cinematic space. The cinema thus becomes a site through which existing realities are reflected and new realities are constructed, opening up possibilities for transformation. In other words, how film frames an ‘alternative reality(ies)’ is a question related to the construction of space, which will be addressed in this paper. The paper focuses on two films: WEST OF THE JORDAN RIVER (Amos Gitai, 2017) and GEULA (Joseph Madmony, Boaz Yehonatan Yacov, 2018). I juxtapose these two diametrically different films in order to assess the ways in which the cinematic space functions as a direct site for negotiating the identities, religious belonging, and the different communities’ relation to the geographical space of Israel. The analysis of these two films aims to ‘sharpen the focus’ on cinematic space as a continuum in which such complex realities are expressed, renegotiated, and transformed

Activist Citizenship, Film and Peacebuilding: Acts and Transformative Practices

In this article I explore film as a socio-political and artistic-transformative cultural practice through which acts and activism are performed. I am interested in how film embeds acts of peacebuilding and how this scene of imagery/imaginary is transformed by those acts, with the filmmakers transformed into activist citizens whose activism questions ideologies that surround them. I argue that acts of citizenship and activism, as a creative practice, do not solely involve the analysis of how activism has been represented in films, but also the understanding of what is beyond these representations and narratives. I look at a) how film auteurs emerge as activists through the narratives and the created scenes 1 in film; b) how these acts consequently represent the “answerability to Others” 2 and c) the link between (cinematic) performativity and activism

"I Sing the body electric". Body, Voice, Technology and Religion

In his controversial poem “I Sing the Body Electric”, Walt Whitman glorified the human body in all its forms. The world according to Whitman is physical and sensual. Bodies are our fundamental way of being – being in the here and now, being in time and space. Bodies we have and bodies we are are as much sensed, felt, experienced, seen, or heard as they are material objects.2 As bodies, we are in space, and through our bodies, their processes, their practices, their skills, we leave traces in space and time and extend ourselves in space. Bodies that extend and reach out and communicate through voice, as well as how voice materialises the immaterial, was the topic of a colloquium, “I Sing the Body Electric”, held at the University of Hull, United Kingdom, in 2014, which in turn inspired the following special issue of the Journal for Religion, Film and Media (JRFM). Following on from the colloquium’s inspiration, this JRFM issue is dedicated to the interrelation between religion, body, technology, and voice and its analysis from an interdisciplinary perspective using approaches from musicology, philosophy, and religious studies