[Reader-list] new issue of rouge

[Alexander Keefe]

At long last, the new issue of Rouge has come out: http://rouge.com.au/

Of particular interest to list-members will be the lead essay "Politique des
archives" <http://rouge.com.au/12/hediger.html> (in English, despite the
title) by film and media theorist Vinzenz Hediger.

During a long discussion on the possibilities and conditions for the
emergence of a "European cinema," he takes a detour through the theoretical
implications of Bollywood's supraregional status in India, noting that
"Hindi cinema's condition as a post-colonial, not-quite national, or rather
hyper-national cinema that incorporates a multiplicity of cultural
differences without giving preference to any specific set of cultural
traits, a condition that is undoubtedly one of the key elements of Hindi
cinema's enduring success in India and with Indian audiences residing
abroad. At the stage of European unification that we are now, European
cinema could be similarly thought of as an imaginary 26th member state, an
imaginary territory, located everywhere and nowhere in Europe, inhabited by
everyone who chooses to live his or her life of dreams and aspirations
through films originating from somewhere close to that territory,
incorporating a multiplicity of cultural differences without giving
preference to any specific set of cultural traits. However, despite all the
best efforts by state and European authorities, and even though many cinema
networks, particularly of the avant-garde, have always been European rather
than national in scope, such an imaginary 26th member state has so far
failed to emerge on the European stage. Hence also, and sadly so, there was
no European cinema there to blame for its failure to provide the necessary
supranational projections and thus preventing the failure of the European
constitution. "

-- 
jugaadoo.blogspot.com