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The Non-fiction Oppositional Film Cinematic Aesthetics of Resistance: Reframing the Non-fiction Oppositional Film

pandemic is likely to lead to increased political and economic crisis, conflict and nationalism I consider Steyerl's proposition that throughout history moments of extreme conflict and crisis gave rise to the development of a new range of aesthetic approaches to artistic research–including the essayistic documentary film. I focus on the films of Ken Fero and Oliver Ressler and discuss the methodological decisions I took in the construction of my own interlinked trilogy of epistolary documentary films produced with the aim of evoking spectatorial resistance.

Keywords: Alexander Kluge ; Documentary practice ; Epistolary essay ; Hito Steyerl ; Hybrid strategies ; Marxism ; Memory and history ; Nationalism ; Political action ; Rosa Luxemburg ; Visual language

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References

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References

  1. Aaltonen, J. . ( 2016). Weeping men and singing women: Voices in Finnish documentaries.. In Studies in documentary film (Vol. 10, No. 2, pp. 169182). Routledge;.
    [Google Scholar]
  2. Agamben, G. . ( 2004). Difference and repetition: On Guy Debord's films. . In T. McDonough . (Ed.), Guy Debord and the situationist international: Texts and documents (pp. 313320). MIT Press;.
    [Google Scholar]
  3. Bazin, A. . ( 1997). The life and death of superimposition.. In B. Cardullo. (Ed.), Bazin at work: Major essays and reviews from the forties & fifties (Trans. A. Piette & B. Cardullo)(pp. 7376). Routledge;.154
    [Google Scholar]
  4. Buñuel, L. . (Director). ( 1933). Las Hurdes/Land Without Bread [DVD]. Ramón Acín;.
  5. Butler, J. . ( 2010). Frames of war: When is life grievable? Verso;.
    [Google Scholar]
  6. Carpenter, E. . ( 2009). Art-activist symmetry in the artwork of Oliver Ressler. https://research.gold.ac.uk/id/eprint/3108/1/Oliver_Ressler_Text_EC_final.pdf
  7. Cinema Action .. (Directors). ( 1969). UCS1 [Film]. Cinema Action;.
  8. Daniels, J. . (Director). ( 2018). Breathing Still. https://vimeo.com/253291495
  9. Daniels, J. . (Director). ( 2020). Breathing Still 2020. https://vimeo.com/398485823
  10. Daniels, J. . (Director). ( 2021). Resisters [Film]. Migrant Films.
  11. Fero, K. . (Director). ( 2001). Injustice. https://vimeo.com/34633260
  12. Fero, K. . (Director). ( 2012). Po PO. https://vimeo.com/73925091
  13. Fero, K. . (Director). ( 2014). Burn. https://vimeo.com/103783794
  14. Fero, K. . ( 2018). Documentary practice as radical process in challenging dominant media and state narratives. Sheffield Hallam University;.
    [Google Scholar]
  15. Fero, K. . (Writer/Director). ( 2020). Ultraviolence [Film]. Migrant Films;.
  16. Gaines, J. . ( 1999). Political mimemis. . In J. Gaines , & M. Renov . (Eds.), Collecting visible evidence. University of Minnesota Press;.
    [Google Scholar]
  17. Johnson, C. . ( 1973). Notes on women's cinema. In Society for education in film and television (Vol. 14, No. 4, pp. 2431).
  18. Leyda, J. . ( 1973 [1960]). Kino: A history of the Russian and Soviet film. George Allen & Unwin Ltd;.
    [Google Scholar]
  19. Rascaroli, L. . ( 2017). How the essay film thinks. Oxford University Press;.
    [Google Scholar]
  20. Ressler, O. . (Director). ( 2009). What is Democracy? https://www.ressler.at/what_is_democracy/
  21. Ressler, O. . (Director). ( 2016). Everything's coming together while everything's falling apart: Ende Gelände/(end of the road). https://www.ressler.at/everythings_coming_together/
  22. Richter, H. . (Director). ( 1927). Inflation. https://www.dailymotion.com/video/x6711ha
  23. Richter, H. . ( 2017 [1940]). The film essay: A new type of documentary film. . In N. M. Alter ,& T. Corrigan . (Eds.), Essays on the essay film. Columbia University Press;.
    [Google Scholar]
  24. Sobchack V. . ( 1998). Synthetic vision: The dialectical imperative of Luis Bunuel's Las Hurdes. . In K. B. Grant ,& J. Sloniowski . (Eds.), Documenting the documentary: Close readings of documentary film & video. Wayne State University;.
    [Google Scholar]
  25. Steyerl, H. . ( 2010). Aesthetics of resistance? Artistic research as discipline and conflict. maHKUzine, Journal of Artistic Research, 8, 3137. https://www.mahku.nl/download/maHKUzine08_web.pdf
  26. Thomas, J. . ( n.d.) The third rail, Issue 10. http://thirdrailquarterly.org/alexander-kluge/
  27. Vertov, D. . (Director). ( 1924). Kino Eye/Kinoglaz [Film]. Goskino.
  28. Vertov, D. . (Director). ( 1929). Man with a movie camera [Film]. VUFKU.
  29. Vertov, D. . ( 1984 [1923]). In A. Michelson . (Ed.), Kino-Eye: The writings of Dziga Vertov (Trans. K. O'Brien). California University Press;.
    [Google Scholar]
  30. Winston, B .. ( 1988). The tradition of the victim in Griersonian documentary. . In A. Rosenthal . (Ed.), New challenges for documentary (pp. 269287). University of California Press;.
    [Google Scholar]
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