The Status of Documentary Scopophilia

Through the concepts of “spectacle”, “colonial difference”, “abandoned body” and “scopophilia”, the article tries to delineate a critical analysis of the controversial film The Act of Killing. In order to do this, the article presents the thesis that the film has to do more with its authors than with the mass killings alone, as the authors do not subject their own position to a critical process of reflection, consequently producing effects that the film itself is not able to control. One of the main fortunate effects of the film is thus the formation of colonial difference, which results in the victims being constructed as abandoned bodies.

The integral (Slovenian) version of this article can be found in the printed KINO!