Screening the human mind: A Deleuzian approach to altered states of consciousness in cinema history
AN-ICON July 21, 2023 DOI: 10.54103/ai/15448 via DOAJ
Summary
AI-generated from the abstractCinema has long been fascinated with altered states of consciousness—memories, visions, nightmares, and dreams—which interrupt a story's flow by inserting different temporalities. Following Gilles Deleuze's arguments on cinema, this essay examines how narrative film has represented such states. In early cinema of attractions, altered states appeared as physical realities intertwined with the world. Classical Hollywood later developed a visual grammar to normalize these disruptive images within the narrative. Modern cinema, with its new interest in the link between moving images and thought, explored this issue in depth. The essay concludes by analyzing the hallucinations experienced by Isak Borg in Bergman's Wild Strawberries as a complex case of altered mental states.
Study at a glance
| Characteristics | Theoretical or philosophical paper Peer reviewed |
|---|---|
| Keywords | Deleuze Cinema Temporality Hallucination Bergman |
| Key finding | Cinema's representation of altered states evolved from early cinema's physical intertwining with reality, through classical Hollywood's normalization, to modern cinema's deep exploration of thought and moving images. |
Abstract
From its very origins, cinema has demonstrated a particular interest in the representation of altered states of consciousness: memories, visions, nightmares and dreams are a common feature of narrative films and usually interrupt a flow of events by inserting different temporalities in the present of the story. Following the arguments explored by Gilles Deleuze in his groundbreaking works on cinema, this essay will address the issue of how narrative cinema has represented altered states of consciousness. If in early cinema of attractions altered states were represented as physical realities intertwined with the world, classical Hollywood films progressively exorcised the disruptive potential of such images by defining a visual grammar in order to normalize them within the narrative. It will be modern cinema which will focus on this issue in depth, given its new interest in the link between the moving image and the mechanisms of thought. In this regard, the essay will in conclusion address the hallucinations experienced by Isak Borg in Bergman’s Wild Strawberries, a complex and highly illuminating case of various forms of altered mental states.