Interesting Giorgio Agamben Video

Here is an onlined mini-lecture by Giorgio Agamben on the profane and the sacred.

Updates on posts about Bound (1996)

I am just posting this to say that even if you read the series of posts on the movie Bound before (when each post had a “part x” in its title), they are very different now and worth re-reading.

However, I am not done updating them yet, and so if it still has a “part x” in its title, then it is the same post from before.

Thanks

Paikea as Sovereign and Homo Sacer

I would like to propose a possible reading of the movie Whale Rider, in particular the fact that Paikea must, to make her grandfather respect her, go out to sea and (almost) drown. I want to compare this with Giorgio Agamben’s analysis of the king’s two bodies in Homo Sacer. My basic thesis is that

Bound and Bisexuality part 6

            I will start with the scene that ends in Caesar’s death. He has just knocked Corky out when Violet comes in with a gun. Violet tells Caesar that it is all over, that she has called Micky, and that he had better run. Caesar protests that Violet still does not know him after all of the years they had spent together. Caesar begins to go for the gun that’s lying on the floor. Violet tells him to stop, but Caesar does not believe that Violet can shoot him. Violet says, “Caesar, you don’t know shit” and then we see her fire the gun again and again at him, as blood starts hitting the paint and he falls down.

            The scene obviously recalls certain other scenes in the movie. First,

Multiple Dialectics in “Bound” (1996)

            This time I want to examine Andy and Larry Wachowski’s film “Bound” without using a particular theorist as a guide. Specifically, I want to ask why Caesar has a look of what I understand to be calm right before killing Gino. Is this moment of peace just an eye at the center of the storm? Or is there something more behind it?

            I will try to argue that there is something more behind it. I think the peace is the result of

“Bound” (1996) – Gorgio Agamben vs. William Connolly

In this post I seek to examine Andy and Larry Wachowski’s film “Bound” from the perspective (once again) of Giorgio Agamben. This time I want to go over the scene where Caesar kills Gino (played by Richard Sarafian). I suggest that Caesar’s ability to kill Gino is a good illustration of the figure of homo sacer within the sovereign. I want to then consider  William Connolly’s criticism of Agamben, and relate that back to the film – showing how there is

Bound’s (1996) Politics of Becoming

            This post I want to once again visit  Andy and Larry Wachowski’s film “Bound” – this time from the perspective of William Connolly’s Bergsonian idea of duration (as advanced in his book Pluralism). The specific scene that is of interest is the scene where Corky and Violet plan to steal the money. It is a scene that has a number of temporal oddities that well reflects the temporal politics of becoming. My thesis is that Bound, in this scene, gives a good representation

Roland Barthes and a Relaying Anchor: or why Bound (1996) Betrays the Cinema’s Tragedy

I want to revisit Andy and Larry Wachowski’s film “Bound”, this time from the perspective of Roland Barthes’ (in his Rhetoric of the Image). I want to specifically examine the character Shelly

Bisexuality and the Exception in “Bound” (1996)

I think that the Andy and Larry Wachowski’s film “Bound” is an interesting case for examining the exclusions that found what Robert Cover calls nomoi. This article is an attempt to analyze two scenes from the movie in light of the idea that every normative universe is founded

Adorno, Barthes, and Benjamin

The way I read Theodor Adorno’s Culture Industry Reconsidered was at least partially as a response to Walter Benjamin’s The Work of Art in the Age of its Technological Reproducibility. I also read Roland Barthes’ Rhetoric of the Image that way. So I am going to try to elaborate the three in relation to each other. These are all three difficult texts, so there is a good chance that I am completely missing the point. As such, any comments of a critical nature are welcome (non-critical comments, as I shall show, are either fascist or conformist).