About the Book
For well over a century, going to the movies has been a favorite pastime for billions across the globe. But is film actually good for anything? This volume brings together thirty-six scholars, critics, and filmmakers in search of an answer. Their responses range from the most personal to the most theoretical—and, together, recast current debates about film ethics. Movie watching here emerges as a wellspring of value, able to sustain countless visions of "the good life." Films, these authors affirm, make us reflect, connect, adapt; they evoke wonder and beauty; they challenge and transform. In a word, its varieties of value make film invaluable.
Table of Contents
Contents
Acknowledgments
Foreword by Mike Figgis
Introduction: Film Ethics as Delivering the Goods
Martin P. Rossouw and Julian Hanich
PART ONE. ADAPTIVE GOODS
1. . . . A Portal to Another World: On Cinema, Climate Change, and a Good Apocalypse
Jennifer Fay
2. . . . Scaling Down: On the Unsustainable Pleasure of Large-File Streaming
Laura U. Marks
3. . . . It’s Invaluable: On Film Spectatorship in the Era of Covid-19
Sarah Cooper
4. . . . Stabilities and Mobilities: On the Generic Values of Emplacements, Displacements,
and Outplacements
Timothy Corrigan
PART TWO. EMPATHETIC GOODS
5. . . . Lies, Loops, or Liberation: On the Dis/Obedience of Feeling More
Michele Aaron
6. . . . Public Engagement: On Postcolonial African Cinema’s Critical Value
Litheko Modisane
7. . . . Shedding Light on Abject Lives: On Global Cinema as Ethical Art
Seung-hoon Jeong
8. . . . Empathy: On Its Limitations and Liabilities
Malcolm Turvey
9. . . . Political Impact: On the Societal Vibrancy of Film
Jens Eder
PART THREE. SENSTITIVE GOODS
10. . . . Moral Reflection: On the Reflective Afterlife of Screen Stories
Carl Plantinga and Garrett Strpko
11. . . . Challenge and Discomfort: On Situated Elitist Pleasures in Art and Indie Film
Geoff King
12. . . . Heterocosmic Connections: On the Many Worlds and World Values of Cinema
Daniel Yacavone
13. . . . Depth of Experience: On Early Phenomenology and the Value of Boredom in the Cinema
Christian Ferencz-Flatz
14. . . . Striking Beauty: On Recuperating the Beautiful in Cinema
Julian Hanich
PART FOUR. REVIVING GOODS
15. . . . Wondering Offscreen: On Cinema’s Transformations of Our Relation to the Unseen
Jaimie Baron
16. . . . Coming to Wonder: On Cinema’s Renewal of Vision
Catherine Wheatley
17. . . . Moral Improvement: On How Watching Films Might Make Us Better People
Thomas E. Wartenberg
18. . . . Cinematic Ethics: On Film as Transformative Experience
Robert Sinnerbrink
19. . . . Spiritual Exercises Before a Screen: On “Film as Philosophy” and Its Transformational
Ethics
Martin P. Rossouw
PART FIVE. COMMUNAL GOODS
20. . . . Remembrance and Reflection: On Social Justice Cinema in the #BlackLivesMatter Era
Maryann Erigha Lawer
21. . . . Making Movie Generations: On the Cultural Work of Hollywood Remaking
Kathleen Loock
22. . . . Reaching Unlettered Audiences: On Global Blockbuster Cinema and Its Oral Affinities
Sheila J. Nayar
23. . . . Love of Community and Reality: On André Bazin and the Good of Cinema
Dudley Andrew
PART SIX. MEDIAL GOODS
24. . . . Projection and Protection: On Cinemagoing as Playing Hide-and-Seek with Reality
Francesco Casetti
25. . . . An Animated and Animating Medium: On Hegel,Adorno, and the Good of Film
Nicholas Baer
26. . . . The Bigger Picture: On Watching Films on a Cinema Screen
Martine Beugnet
27. . . . Quality Time: On Resisting What’s Next, or Staying with the Credits
Tiago de Luca
PART SEVEN. UNSETTLED GOODS
28. . . . Wanton Destruction: On Cinema’s Antisocial Thrills
Adrian Martin
29. . . . Alienating Interventions: On What the “Bad” in David Lynch’s Films Is “Good” For
Annie van den Oever and Dominique Chateau
30. . . . Dangerous Situations: On Whether Cinema Is Poisonous
Michel Chion
31. . . . Good for Nothing? On How Films Help Us through the Night
Tom Gunning
32. . . . Medium-Sized Matters: On Whether Cinema Has Made Any Difference
Mark Cousins
Afterword by Radu Jude
List of Contributors
Index
