Abstract
This paper considers how documentary films have the potential to influence geopolitics. Developing the concept of geopolitical resonances—defined here as the ways in which popular media can determine events and outcomes in global politics—the paper argues that Bryan Fogel’s 2017 documentary Icarus has instrumentally shaped understandings of the Russian doping regime at the 2014 Sochi Olympics. Icarus is considered through the Author-Text-Reader model of film analysis, with an emphasis on the agency of the director, the content of the film, and its influence and reception. More broadly, documentaries are one of suite of oppositional formats that serve as the basis for the reconsideration of the formation of geopolitical cultures and narratives.
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Notes
Notably, Icarus’s epigraph is from Orwell: “During times of universal deceit, telling the truth becomes a revolutionary act.”
Dittmer and Dodds (2008, p. 453) compliment the textual approach used in the study of films and other media in popular geopolitics by suggesting that scholars should also consider “audiences and the meanings that they construct out of popular culture and related texts.”
As a result of the doping investigation, the Russian team was stripped of three medals, two of which were gold, bringing its number to 30 total medals, 11 of which were gold. Norway also won 11 gold medals, but was second on the medal table with fewer overall medals (26).
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Holland, E.C. The flight of Icarus: on the geopolitical resonances of documentary film. GeoJournal 87 (Suppl 1), 125–132 (2022). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10708-022-10649-w
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s10708-022-10649-w