1st Edition
Melancholy Emotion in Contemporary Cinema A Spinozian Analysis of Film Experience
Introduction Part 1 Philosophical Models and Interpretative Instruments 1 From Spinoza to the Embodied Mind A Radical Notion of Immanence The Embodied Mind Body Concepts and Idealised Cognitive Models Metonymical and Metaphorical Blending Emotions and the Imitation of the Affects Sad Passions and Knowledge as the Most Powerful of the Affects Summary and Conclusions Part 2 A Spinozian-Experiential Theory of Film 2 A Spinozian Re-Evaluation of Cognitive Film Theory Top-Down Processes and Cognitive Semiotics The Ecological Psychology of Film Engaging Film Characters Scenarios, Moods, and the Imaginative Dynamics of Involvement Embodied Simulation and Films Experiential Perspectives on Film Analysis Conclusions 3 A Spinozian Philosophy of Film Experience The Relation between Philosophy and Cinema Film Are Percepts The Issue of Trauma and Sad Passions in Film Experience Summary and Conclusions: The Experiential Viewer and Her/His Possibilities Part 3 Case Studies: Four Melancholic Films 4 A Contemporary Job: A Serious Man 5 The World Shatters: Melancholia 6 Mastering Genocide: The Act of Killing 7 Time Is a Flat Circle: Only Lovers Left Alive Conclusions Bibliography Index
Biography
Francesco Sticchi obtained a Ph.D in Film Studies at Oxford Brookes University under the supervision of Dr Warren Buckland. He works as Associate Lecturer in the same institution, and his research concerns the study of sad passions in audiovisual experience, and the relation between Spinoza’s thought and embodied cognitive theories. He is also interested in an experiential and interactive use of Mikhail Bakhtin's Chronotope, and he is currently working on an affective-ethical approach to analyse how contemporary media culture addresses the concept of precarity.
"Sticchi commendably navigates some of the most complex philosophical writings ranging from Spinoza through cognitivism to Gilles Deleuze and back. This, in and of itself, is no mean feat, and the material Sticchi discusses is extraordinarily rich, complex, and open to a variety of interpretations." - Tarja Laine, University of Amsterdam
