Sine ni Lav Diaz : A Long Take on the Filipino Auteur

This original collection fills a gap in the literature on Lav Diaz, and more broadly, on slow and durational cinema. The importance of the director in contemporary world cinema is beyond doubt. This collection considers Lav Diaz and his works holistically without being confined to a specific approach or research method. On the contrary, it involves almost all the major contemporary academic approaches to cinema. It focuses on an auteur who has been celebrated immensely in recent times and yet has remained largely unexplored in cinema studies. The book will address this research gap. As such, this book aims to situate Diaz at the crucial juncture of 'new' auteurism, Filipino New Wave and transnational cinema, but it does not neglect the industrial-exhibitional coordinates of his cinema. The rationale behind this project is to raise questions on the oeuvre of a significant auteur, to situate him in and outside of his immediate national context(s), to present a repository of critical approaches on him, to reconsider the existing critical positions on him, to find newer avenues to enter (and exit) his canon that will consciously avoid the time-worn rhetoric of long take and slowness of the proverbial 'slow cinema' camp and to find corridors in him that will lead to informed ways of reaching other movements/auteurs in other times, other places. It explores various other aspects of Diaz and his cinema whose notoriety, the editors believe, should not rely solely on its incredible running time. The collection looks at Diaz from the perspectives of a national and a transnational critic - one of the two editors is from the Philippines, the other from another Asian location. It concentrates both on the spatial and the temporal, to place him within the intricacies of the culture and creative industries and the distribution practices and politics in his native place, to allow space for his 'detractors' who (perhaps rightly) focus on and object to his 'artlessness', and also to read him in the context of his fascination for the epic novel and novelistic cinema, his engagement with Dostoevsky and Jose Rizal, among others. This is the first book-length study on the Filipino auteur Lav Diaz. It looks critically at his career and corpus from various perspectives, with contributions from cinema studies researchers, film critics, festival programmers and artists. It offers a nuanced overview of the filmmaker and the cinematic traditions he belongs to for film enthusiasts, researchers and general readers alike. Primary readership will be researchers, scholars, educators and students in film studies. Also academics and researchers interested and working in cultural studies and Philippine studies. Front Cover Half Title frontispeices Sine ni Lav Diaz: A Long Take on the Filipino Auteur Copyright Page Table of contents Foreword: Lav Diaz, Artist Preface Acknowledgements Introduction: Lav Diaz: Cinema beyond Time Part 1 Lav Diaz Through Cinematic Histories 1 After Brocka: Situating Lav Diaz in Philippine Cinema Note References 2 Homeward Hill: Messianic Redemption in Diaz and Dostoyevsky A national cinema Raskolnikov from far-off Radical freedom Realism and allegory Messianism and redemption Beauty of the soul Notes References 3 Long Walk to Life:: The Films of Lav Diaz May Adadol Ingawanij examines the dialectic between idealist projections of the postcolonial nation and its present aberrations in Lav Diaz’s epic tales of endurance. Physical Realism Cartography of a Nation From What Is Before turns the experience of military terrorisation in Mindanao into an emblem of the neglect of the people by the nation-state apparatus. Stories of Mothers Acts of physical exertion — their duration, spatiality and intensity — become the means by which a film maps a territory and defines a people. 4 Freedom Is a Long Shot: A Chronicle of Lav Diaz’s Artistic Struggle Introduction Five centuries under the influence The digital (r)evolution Conclusion Notes References Part 2 From Death to the Gods: The Resurrection of the National? 5 Never, Always and Already Saved: A Soteriological Reading of Norte and Florentina Hubaldo, CTE Norte, the End of History Florentina Hubaldo, CTE Conclusion References 6 The Idyllic Chronotope and Spatial Justice in Lav Diaz’s Melancholia The idyllic chronotope in Diaz’s epic melodrama Locating spatial justice in Melancholia Thresholds and landscapes Spectral embodiments, and walking as ritual of mourning References Part 3 No Cinema, No Art Either 7 How Do You Solve a Problem Like Lav Diaz? Debating Norte, the End of History Materialism and humanism in Norte, the End of History Are we permitted to evaluate Diaz? Critique and counter-critique References 8 Evolution of a Filipino Family and/as Non-Cinema Philippine revolution Philippine evolution Style and self-consciousness 9 Jesus, Magdalene and the Filipino Judas: Lav Diaz and His ‘Artless Epics’ Prologue Proposition Film criticism The figures, the cinematic, the performative The Grand Inquisitor Epilogue Notes References 10 Distributing the Cinema of Lav Diaz Background The (slow) cinema of Lav Diaz Marketing and distribution strategies, and experiencing the cinema of Lav Diaz 1. Eventization 2. Endurance viewing 3. The distributor’s cut Conclusion References Part 4 Interview with Lav Diaz 11 A Lav Affair with Cinema Note Part 5 Tribute 12 Indictment and Empowerment of the Individual:: The Modern Cinema of Lav Diaz Contributors Back Cover

This original collection fills a gap in the literature on Lav Diaz, and more broadly, on slow and durational cinema. The importance of the director in contemporary world cinema is beyond doubt.

This collection considers Lav Diaz and his works holistically without being confined to a specific approach or research method. On the contrary, it involves almost all the major contemporary academic approaches to cinema. It focuses on an auteur who has been celebrated immensely in recent times and yet has remained largely unexplored in cinema studies. The book will address this research gap.

As such, this book aims to situate Diaz at the crucial juncture of ‘new’ auteurism, Filipino New Wave and transnational cinema, but it does not neglect the industrial–exhibitional coordinates of his cinema. The rationale behind this project is to raise questions on the oeuvre of a significant auteur, to situate him in and outside of his immediate national context(s), to present a repository of critical approaches on him, to reconsider the existing critical positions on him, to find newer avenues to enter (and exit) his canon that will consciously avoid the time-worn rhetoric of long take and slowness of the proverbial ‘slow cinema’ camp and to find corridors in him that will lead to informed ways of reaching other movements/auteurs in other times, other places.

It explores various other aspects of Diaz and his cinema whose notoriety, the editors believe, should not rely solely on its incredible running time. The collection looks at Diaz from the perspectives of a national and a transnational critic – one of the two editors is from the Philippines, the other from another Asian location. It concentrates both on the spatial and the temporal, to place him within the intricacies of the culture and creative industries and the distribution practices and politics in his native place, to allow space for his ‘detractors’ who (perhaps rightly) focus on and object to his ‘artlessness’, and also to read him in the context of his fascination for the epic novel and novelistic cinema, his engagement with Dostoevsky and Jose Rizal, among others.

This is the first book-length study on the Filipino auteur Lav Diaz. It looks critically at his career and corpus from various perspectives, with contributions from cinema studies researchers, film critics, festival programmers and artists. It offers a nuanced overview of the filmmaker and the cinematic traditions he belongs to for film enthusiasts, researchers and general readers alike.

Primary readership will be researchers, scholars, educators and students in film studies. Also academics and researchers interested and working in cultural studies and Philippine studies.

A holistic consideration of the works of celebrated Filipino filmmaker Lav Diaz. This original collection considers Lav Diaz and his works without being confined to a specific approach or research method. On the contrary, it touches on nearly every major contemporary academic approach to cinema. Though Diazs contributions to slow and durational cinema are well known and his importance in contemporary world cinema is beyond doubt, the director remains largely unexplored in cinema studies. The book addresses this research gap, situating Diaz at the crucial juncture of new auteurism, Filipino New Wave, and transnational cinema, but it does not neglect the industrial-exhibitional coordinates of his cinema. The first book-length study on the groundbreaking auteur, the collection takes a critical look at his career and corpus from various perspectives, with contributions from cinema studies researchers, film critics, festival programmers, and artists. It offers a nuanced overview of the filmmaker and the cinematic traditions he belongs to for film enthusiasts, researchers, and general readers alike. The first book-length study of the Filipino auteur Lav Diaz, this edited volume offers a nuanced overview of the filmmaker, his corpus, career and traditions from various perspectives for film enthusiasts, researchers and general readers alike. 17 b/w illus.