Chapter 1
Imaginal Border Crossings and Silence as Negative Mimesis in Elia Suleiman’s Divine Intervention (2002)
Tanya Shilina-Conte
This chapter focuses on the depiction of two prominent instances of border transgression, by the Woman and the Red Balloon, in the Palestinian director Elia Suleiman’s film Divine Intervention. As the title of the film suggests, Divine Intervention invokes a spiritual imagination that transcends the nation-state politics in force at the border. The author argues that Suleiman supplements a literal portrayal of the divide between the Israeli and Palestinian territories with what she describes as imaginal border crossings, drawing on the theory of the imaginal world (mundus imaginalis) by philosopher and scholar of Islamic mysticism, Henry Corbin.
The author demonstrates that Suleiman purposefully calls upon the attributes and aesthetics of the silent film era. As opposed to conventional narrative, Suleiman structures his film as a nonlinear series of isolated tableaux, shot with a static tripod-mounted camera. Signaling dispersed and fragmented representation, these cinematic tableaux provide an oblique commentary on disjointed Palestinian realities, while the immobile camera signifies the inability of Suleiman’s characters to negotiate their space freely and effectively. Finally, relying on Theodor Adorno’s ideas in Aesthetic Theory, the author contends that the expressive silence of Suleiman’s onscreen persona could be interpreted as a form of negative mimesis that implies an ideological resistance to dominant culture combined with an aesthetic strategy of meaningful absence.
Films discussed in Chapter 1:
Blow-Up. Directed by Michelangelo Antonioni. Italy, 1966
Chronicle of a Disappearance. Directed by Elia Suleiman. Israel, Palestine, 1996.
Divine Intervention: A Chronicle of Love and Pain. Directed by Elia Suleiman. France, Palestine, 2002.
The Red Balloon. Directed by Albert Lamorisse. France, 1956.
Sherlock, Jr. 1924. Directed by Buster Keaton. United States, 1924.
The Time That Remains: Chronicle of a Present Absentee. Directed by Elia Suleiman. United Kingdom, 2009.
The author demonstrates that Suleiman purposefully calls upon the attributes and aesthetics of the silent film era. As opposed to conventional narrative, Suleiman structures his film as a nonlinear series of isolated tableaux, shot with a static tripod-mounted camera. Signaling dispersed and fragmented representation, these cinematic tableaux provide an oblique commentary on disjointed Palestinian realities, while the immobile camera signifies the inability of Suleiman’s characters to negotiate their space freely and effectively. Finally, relying on Theodor Adorno’s ideas in Aesthetic Theory, the author contends that the expressive silence of Suleiman’s onscreen persona could be interpreted as a form of negative mimesis that implies an ideological resistance to dominant culture combined with an aesthetic strategy of meaningful absence.
Films discussed in Chapter 1:
Blow-Up. Directed by Michelangelo Antonioni. Italy, 1966
Chronicle of a Disappearance. Directed by Elia Suleiman. Israel, Palestine, 1996.
Divine Intervention: A Chronicle of Love and Pain. Directed by Elia Suleiman. France, Palestine, 2002.
The Red Balloon. Directed by Albert Lamorisse. France, 1956.
Sherlock, Jr. 1924. Directed by Buster Keaton. United States, 1924.
The Time That Remains: Chronicle of a Present Absentee. Directed by Elia Suleiman. United Kingdom, 2009.
A clip from the film Divine Intervention (Source: YouTube)
About the author:
Tanya Shilina-Conte is a Lecturer at the University at Buffalo where she teaches a wide variety of courses in film theory, theory of film narrative, global media and culture, contemporary cinema, gender and film and literary criticism in the departments of Media Study and English. She holds a Ph.D. in English from Saint-Petersburg Herzen State University, Russia, (2004) and an MA in Film Studies from the University at Buffalo (2012). She is the author of a book, “Midway Upon the Road”: A Study of Openings in Contemporary Short Fiction (2011), and several articles on the questions of narrative theory and practice. She is also the recipient of an award from the Ministry of Culture and Cinematography of the Russian Federation (2006).
Tanya Shilina-Conte's webpage
Tanya Shilina-Conte is a Lecturer at the University at Buffalo where she teaches a wide variety of courses in film theory, theory of film narrative, global media and culture, contemporary cinema, gender and film and literary criticism in the departments of Media Study and English. She holds a Ph.D. in English from Saint-Petersburg Herzen State University, Russia, (2004) and an MA in Film Studies from the University at Buffalo (2012). She is the author of a book, “Midway Upon the Road”: A Study of Openings in Contemporary Short Fiction (2011), and several articles on the questions of narrative theory and practice. She is also the recipient of an award from the Ministry of Culture and Cinematography of the Russian Federation (2006).
Tanya Shilina-Conte's webpage