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Europe on the Global Screen: Geopolitical Scotoma, Transnational Cinema of Memory and Hollywood’s Security Choices

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Book cover Memory and Securitization in Contemporary Europe

Abstract

I theorize (in)visibility through the concepts of geopolitical scotoma and global amnesia. I explore how audio-visual mnemonics (feature films and media reports) are used to construct a specific narrative available for global consumption (the global screen) whilst other narratives remain untold (geopolitical scotoma). I aim to examine how European interregional and transnational agency is employed to encode, store and transmit cultural experiences in order to structure the securitization agenda, and I am also concerned with how an external, globalized agency (Hollywood) is required to articulate global securitization imperatives. My focus is on the 2015 nominations and how they give voice to European mnemonic concerns; conversely, I propose a consideration of the Oscar nomination process as a means for European creative industries to engage in strategies of (de-)securitization on global arena. By analysing common themes found in the 2015 film nominations such as migration, crisis of identity and power struggle in the context of interethnic conflicts, I demonstrate how these films function as emblems of global suffering whilst retaining their particular European dimension.

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Notes

  1. 1.

    The right-wing discourse in Europe takes this argument even further by alleging that the EU is a neo-imperial entity. For an analysis, see, for example, Jenkins and Spyros 2003; Mammone et al. 2012; Zúquete 2007.

  2. 2.

    For another example of the use of cultural events such as sporting activities to achieve global visibility, see the publication in The Guardian about football’s World Cup (May 2016) for unrecognized states (Walker 2016). As is evident from the publication, the event attracted global media attention to the problems of the breakaway region of Georgia.

  3. 3.

    I am grateful to Robert A. Saunders for encouraging me to develop this concept. See Strukov 2000 for previous tentative formulations of these ideas.

  4. 4.

    The interrelated concepts of geopolitical scotoma and global amnesia relate to Jacque Derrida’s notion of the trace, which ‘is not a presence but is rather the simulacrum of a presence that dislocates, displaces, and refers beyond itself’ (ctd in Moran 2002: 569), and generally to his deconstruction (Derrida 2016).

  5. 5.

    Three weeks after the publication of the article, there were 969 shares of the story in social media.

  6. 6.

    For a discussion of digital labour and social media see Fuchs and Sevignani 2013; Terranova 2000.

  7. 7.

    See, e.g., Hyde-Price 2007; Judt 2011; Krabbendam and Scott-Smith 2004; Krige 2008.

  8. 8.

    This is known as ‘the military entertainment complex’ which includes both the US military industrial complex and the entertainment industry. See Stockwell and Muir (2003) for a detailed discussion.

  9. 9.

    On the politics of Hollywood and Hollywood and the US foreign policy see, e.g., Critchlow and Raymond 2009; Giglio 2007; Totman 2009; Wiseman 2015.

  10. 10.

    On the cinema of small European nations see Hjort and Petrie 2007.

  11. 11.

    Of course, Hollywood is not the only existing system of film distribution in the world but is perhaps the most powerful one. On alternative distribution networks see Dennison 2013; Doraiswamy and Padgaonkar 2011; Lobato 2012; Valck 2007; Wong 2011.

  12. 12.

    The director of cinematography is Moscow-trained Ren Kotov who is known for his collaborations with Russian filmmaker Svetlana Proskurina and scripwriter Vasilii Sigarev, e.g. their 2014 feature Good-bye, Mother.

  13. 13.

    The alternative reading of this symbolism is that that the empire and its aftermath is the business of men. This pre-disposition is common in contemporary film, e.g., in Mikhail Kalatozoshvili’s The Wild Field [Dikoe pole, 2009] (see Strukov 2016 for analysis).

  14. 14.

    Pawlikowski’s connection to Russia is both personal—he was married to a Russian woman—and professional: he authored a number of television documentary films about Russian celebrities, most notably Tripping with Zhirinovskii (1995), Dostoevsky Travels (1991) and From Moscow to Petushki: a Journey with Benedikt Erofeev (1990).

  15. 15.

    For example, in 2016 the European Commission opened an inquiry into whether new Polish laws violate EU democracy rules.

  16. 16.

    The actual term he used is ‘films in the style of “shitty-Russia”’; the original Russian [Rashka-govniashka] reveals the crisis of self-perception and concerns about the perception of Russia in the West.

  17. 17.

    See my analysis of Leviathan and soft power in Strukov 2017.

  18. 18.

    See, e.g., how Russia utilized cultural memory as a securitization move in the war in Syria: The Guardian put emphasis on the role of the government in its report of Valery Gergiev’s triumphal concert in Palmira, an ancient site which had been recaptured by Russian-backed forces from Isis (Harding 2016).

  19. 19.

    For my analysis of Zviagintsev’s cinema see Strukov 2007; 2016.

  20. 20.

    The land came into his use from his grandparents—an old photograph shows his family house standing on the same spot a hundred years ago; however Nikolai failed to privatize the land after the dissolution of the USSR and introduction of private property.

  21. 21.

    Hobbes wrote his treatise during the English Civil War (1642–51), which provides yet another layer of consideration for the Russian Federation that perceives the conflict in eastern Ukraine as a ‘civil war’.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. School of Languages, Cultures and Societies, University of Leeds, Leeds, UK

    Vlad Strukov

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  1. Vlad Strukov
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Editors and Affiliations

  1. University of Leeds, Leeds, United Kingdom

    Vlad Strukov

  2. Southern Federal University, Rostov-on-Don, Russia

    Victor Apryshchenko

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Strukov, V. (2018). Europe on the Global Screen: Geopolitical Scotoma, Transnational Cinema of Memory and Hollywood’s Security Choices. In: Strukov, V., Apryshchenko, V. (eds) Memory and Securitization in Contemporary Europe. Palgrave Macmillan, London. https://doi.org/10.1057/978-1-349-95269-4_6

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