Critical Writing Index

Heretic Experience: Deleuze's Bergsonian Cinema

by Jay Murphy

Afterimage, Feb. 1993, v. 20, no. 7, pp. 4-8

This article explores the Cinematic theories of Gilles Deleuze, while discussing the philosophical theories of Henri Bergson. Deleuze argues that Bergson's notion of the perceived object as images with a consciousness that act as a 'center - point' for all images, relate directly to the notion of the 'new-image' or 'montage'. Bergson's theories of image or movement are formulated around the notion of matter as an 'aggregate of images'. The camera for Deleuze is a conscious repetition of life through art represented by the intersection of two lines perpendicular to each other: 'one a vertical line of memory and the other a horizontal line of space'. He writes on the films of Stan Brackhage, Jordan Belson, Ken Jacobs, Jean-Luc Godard and Michael Snow as filmmakers whose images are informed by the assemblage of molecular parameters. These parameters create an imaging of a world out of synch, representing life through simple stories of people, 'real...right...and true'.

ITEM 1993.144 – available for viewing in the Research Centre

Videos, Artworks and Artists Cited

Cinema 1: The Movement-ImageGilles Deleuze

Cinema 2: The Time-ImageGilles Deleuze

Son + Image (1974 - 1991)Jean-Luc Godard

The Geopolitical Aesthetic: Cinema and Space in the World SystemFredric Jameson

Europa '51 (The Greatest Lover)Robert Rossellini

Joan of Arc at the StakeRobert Rossellini

Passion (1982)Jean-Luc Godard

Prénom CarmenJean-Luc Godard

Six Fois DeuxJean-Luc Godard

Histoires(s) du cinemaJean-Luc Godard

India SongMarguerite Duras

GuevarismGlauber Rocha

NasserismYoussef Chahine

Pour la suite du mondePierre Perrault

The Perfumes NightmareKidlat Tahimik

Maggellan's Slace (Mermoies of Overdevelopment)Kidlat Tahimik

VideodromeDavid Cronenberg

The Manchurian CandidateJohn Frankenheimer

Seven Days in MayJohn Frankenheimer

JFKOliver Stone