Interest in Walter Benjamin’s arcade project?
Don’t usually post ads on the blog (but you’re welcome to use it for all sorts of exchanges). Aimee Mitchell is unloading her paperback copy of Benjamin’s Arcade Project by Susan Buck-Morss. This book’s a keeper and a steal at $20. Contact: amitch@yorku.ca
March 20th, 2008 at 1:30 pm
Situating Accented Cinema – Hamid Naficy
(don’t think this is the right place, but can’t find anywhere else to go…)
My apologies to the class for this not-so-interactive form of presentation, but something quite serious came up and I had to be out of town. I will try to keep it light and chatty here and suggest possible points of discussion, in the hope that you will find something in it to chew on in class.
So, in looking at Hamid Naficy’s chapter on Accented Cinema, at first blush I found the project of grouping so many divergent filmmakers from so many countries and sensibilities, and films of so many production levels into one huge bunch, seemed like an absurdly broad net to cast.
But in delving in further, it began to feel like an intriguing approach, especially as he’s not only considering thematic issues, but more significantly, STYLE.
- pg 579 - “The accented group style, however, has existed only in a limited, latent and emergent form, awaiting recognition. Even those who deal with the accented films usually speak of exile and diaspora as themes inscribed in the films, not as components of style.
First up, Naficy clarifies terminology and makes some distinctions between
- exilic
- diasporic
- post-colonial ethnic and identity filmmakers
However, this breakdown serves almost as much to articulate the themes and experiences of each category and the extent to which they overlap, highlighting the extent to which many of the personal and social experiences are held in common, as much as they have their distinctions.
In fact, Naficy’s project of identifying “accented cinema” appears to be offered, not as an absolute category or a single reading of the films and filmmakers in question, but rather as one way of looking at the patterns and nuances in films born out of a certain kind of life experience.
As an example of the breadth of what he is suggesting, he describes the life and career of Luis Buñuel (in the book version of An Accented Cinema – not in the chapter in the reader). Obviously Buñuel could be categorized in several ways – on the one hand he is the archetypal Surrealist filmmaker, but he is also frequently considered to be a Spanish filmmaker, though of course he left Spain very early in his life and made most of his films in Mexico and France. Thus, “…Buñuel is both the epitome of exile and its most prominent exception.” A large part of what is an exception according to Naficy’s system, is Buñuel’s international success, his movement beyond the margin.
One quote from the reading seemed to help clarify in a quite general way some of the distinguishing characteristics of what is meant by “an accented cinema” -
Pg 581 -
“Applied to cinema, the standard, neutral, value-free accent maps onto the dominant cinema produced by the society’s reigning mode of production. This typifies the classical and the new Hollywood cinemas, whose films are realistic and intended for entertainment only, and thus free from overt ideology or accent. By that definition, all alternative cinemas are accented, but each is accented in certain specific ways that distinguish it. The cinema discussed here derives its accent from artisanal and collective production modes and from the filmmakers and audiences deterritorialized locations. Consequently, not all accented films are exilic and diasporic, but all exilic and diasporic films are accented.”
Also, on pg 580, “…realism is, if not subverted, at least inflected differently”.
Within the “Accented Style” he is identifying, he lists and explains some of the frequent identifying markers -
- language, voice, address
- embedded criticism
- accented structures of feeling
- tactile optics
- third cinema aesthetics
- border effects, border writing
- themes (journeys, identity)
- authorship and autobiographical inscription
Further to these categories, in the book, An Accented Cinema, he goes on to identify the use of “epistolary” conventions – letter-writing and phone calls – as well as “interstitial” production modes, and also offers an appendix with an extensive, detailed listing of components frequently found in exilic and diasporic films. Some examples of these are: multilinguality, amateur aesthetics, fetishized icons from the homeland, nostalgia, etc.
If we look at Divine Intervention, or indeed, The Perfumed Nightmare, we can ask ourselves whether these components are present and significant, and ultimately helpful in reading the film this way. For example:
- is the film political? (embedded criticism, 3rd cinema aesthetics)
- are the characters sad? Lonely? Alientated? (structures of feeling)
- is there a fragmented narrative? (border effects)
- does the filmmaker serve multiple roles? (autobiographical inscription)
- are there scenes in airports? Check points? (border effects)
And then perhaps a further question might be: does this “accented” way of thinking about the film give us fresh insight or a deeper understanding?
Again, looking at Divine Intervention or Perfumed Nightmare as examples, perhaps the following quote from pg 572 might be relevant for discussion, as it seems to hint at the nature of the nuanced politics and presence of the filmmaker he suggests are to be found in this body of work –
“As partial, fragmented and multiple subjects, these filmmakers are capable of producing ambiguity and doubt about the taken-for-granted values of their home and host societies. They can also transcend and transform themselves to produce hybridized, syncretic, performed or virtual identities.”
It might also be interesting to look at a quote from Elias Suleiman, the maker of Divine Intervention, in an interview from Framework magazine, Spring 2004, as he is clearly very aware of working with many of these issues –
“…I don’t see anything Jewish about statehood. In the conceptual, spiritual sense of the word. Of a diasporic experience, of always resisting power, authority, and centeredness, of making affiliations with non-dominant authorities. The list is endless to what we can say is Jewish. It is my affiliation. It’s what I thrive on. Not only in my daily life, but in my films. Look at my being in the frame. It’s completely marginalized. I am almost a present absentee or an absent presentee. I make sure that I don’t have any weight that could attract authority. I try to exist in a form of translucency so that I do not contain the whole frame. When you decenter the frame, it gives a democratic reading…This is very Jewish. I mean conceptually. Not tribally. By refraining from any sort of possession of authority.”
Another area for discussion might be the notion of “accented structures of feeling”, “which, according to Raymond Williams, is not a fixed institution, formation, position, or even a formal concept such as worldview or ideology. Rather, it is a set of undeniable personal and social experiences – with internal relations and tensions” (584).
Also, “Accented films differ from other postmodernist films because they usually posit the homeland as a grand and deeply rooted referent…”. And, “Multiple sites, cultures, and time zones inform the feeling structures of exile and diaspora…”. And, “Sadness, loneliness and alienation are frequent themes, and sad, lonely, and alienated people are favorite characters in the accented films”. (585)
Have fun with it!
Katharine