Shanghai Gesture – mad love, oneirism.
the traditional Marxist attack (derived from Taint and Blinks) adumbrates a theory of types, as distinct from contingent phenomena
The counterpart of Kubrick’s jejune liberalism is a jejune nihilism.
There is no doubt that the cross can serve as a phatic signal and as a degenerate index, triggering off an effusive and devout meditation, but this should be radically distinguished from the conceptual content articulated by the symbolic sign.
Of course, it is possible to approach films by studying some other feature; by an effort of critical ascesis we could see films, as Sternberg sometimes urged, as abstract light-show or as histrionic feasts.
