Cinema

The best of French philosopher Badiou's over 50 years' worth of writing on cinema is collected in this intriguing volume. It begins with an interview conducted by editor de Baecque in which Badiou considers the role of film in culture as a "school for everyone", his evolving relationship with the cinema, and the radical politics that often inform his work. His 1977 essay "Revisionist Cinema" lays out these politics, decrying the ideals of "new bourgeoisie" directors like Bergman and Kubrick. Badiou posits an "axiomatic" approach to film discussion in which we eschew judgment in favor of asking "how a particular film lets us travel with a particular idea in such a way that we might discover what nothing else could lead us to discover." Badiou describes film as "the seventh art", explaining how it interacts with other media, and provides brilliant, in-depth analyses on the techniques, styles, and themes of several films. His crucial essay is "Cinema as Philosophical Experimentation" in which he explores film as both a "mass art" and a subject worthy of serious philosophical thought. Badiou's writing style may be difficult to those unaccustomed to French philosophy, but the material is worth the effort. (June)