Towards a Cosmopolitan Cinema: Understanding the Connection Between Borders, Mobility and Cosmopolitanism in the Fiction Film

Abstract

This paper argues that the cosmopolitan cinema has been largely un-theorised, and should be understood as a mode of production and a cross-cultural practice. It starts by probing the connection between mobility, borders and cosmopolitanism across a range of approaches in the social sciences. Using a cultural sociology lens, it then goes on to explore how images and experiences of borders and mobility matter for the constitution of cosmopolitan cinema as a mode of production, which invites structures of feeling (i.e. care, compassion and empathy) that enable new affective and intellectual engagements of the audience with ‘others’ whose access to cultural dialogue is severely limited. Looking at two film examples (In This World and Kandahar), and their conditions of production and reception, the paper concludes by showing how particular aesthetic and narrative options are consequential for the creative ways in which human dignity and its violation can be made ‘representable’ and personalized so as to inspire public dialogue – among film-makers, film critics, journalists, interested citizens and viewers – in a transnational public sphere.

Keywords:

• Cosmopolitanism
• Borders
• Public sphere
• Film
• Narrative

Acknowledgements

I am grateful to Andrew Tudor for his comments on an earlier version of this paper.

Notes

1. The Author’s translation from French to English.

2. The Author’s translation from French to English.

3. The Author’s translation from French to English.