Politics Theory and Film

Lars von Trier's intense disturbing and sometimes funny films have led many to condemn him as misogynist or misanthropic. The same films inspire this collection's reflections on how our fears and desires regarding gender power race finitude family and fate often thwart -- and sometimes feed -- our best democratic aspirations. The essays in this volume attend to von Trier's role as provocateur as well as to his films' techniques topics and storytelling. Where others accuse von Trier of being clich�d the editors argue that he intensifies the clich�s of our times in ways that direct our political energies towards apprehending and repairing a shattered world. <p/>The book is certainly for von Trier lovers and haters but at the same time political critical and feminist theorists entirely <em>un</em>familiar with von Trier's films will find this volume's essays of interest. Most of the contributors tarry with von Trier to develop new readings of major thinkers and writers including Agamben Bataille Beauvoir Benjamin Deleuze Euripides Freud Kierkegaard Ranci�re Nietzsche Winnicott and many more. Von Trier is both central and irrelevant to much of this work. Writing from the fields of classics literature gender studies philosophy film and political theory the authors stage an interdisciplinary intervention in film studies.<br>