Кадрирање кул­турне интимности: некол­ико мисл­и о динамици самопредстављања и самопоимања у српској кинематографији
Framing cultural intimacy: a few thoughts about the dynamics of self-presentation and self-concept in Serbian cinema

Summary/Abstract: The work is an attempt to determine how the concept of cultural intimacy offered by Michael Hercfeld – assigning him as one form of cultural identity that is considered a source of ex­ternal embarrassment, but also providing community members a feeling of security for belonging to the society – can enrich the standard procedures of the anthropological analysis of the film, and analysis of the functioning of national cinema. The analysis includes ex­amples that are classified by elementary chronological (1896–1945, 1945–2000, 2000–present) and thematic criteria (a war film about World War I, the partisan war movie, film noir, Roma film, a film about gender stereotypes, a tragic comedy). Based on the analysis of ex­amples, we can conclude that cultural intimacy as a model provides a valid framework for ex­amining the visual narrative when it is engaged in bringing into question the official national (and nation- alist) discourse that is prescribed and imposed on the society as the dominant cultural code, especially when such practices of internal hegemony are described and criticized through the views of “ordinary people“ and/or marginalized groups, when the ambiguity is not purposely disintegrated and the sides in the conflict are deeply tied. Also, cultural intimacy as a model helps to better understand the practice of authors who metaphorically play with certain forms of social margin, and find in them the general framework of social self-concept, not taking identity from the social groups that practice that concept. On the other hand, the categories of cultural intimacy is of little use in the cases where film is used to transfer the official ideology, or national project, which forces the establishment of cultural and ideological homogeneity in the society with the help of radical ex­clusion of all those who do not fit into such a firm model. It is also not useful in analysis of highly stylized, anti-realistic and radically critical intoned projects. Finally, its greatest analytical value comes not from the answers it provides, but from the question that it opens.

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