This article focuses on how the Other is represented and understood in films produced in Romania during periods of radical political, social and economic change. Specifically it addresses films produced during the years of communism and the planned economy, during the transition to democracy and to capitalism, as well as films produced during the period of democracy, capitalism and membership in the European Union. The research acknowledges two main aspects: the changing face of the Other over time (the socialist state, the foreign investors, the West, etc.) and the consistency of the fantasy structure. More specifically, the relationship between self and the Other generally follows a strict masochist fantasy script in which the Other has the power to constrain freedom, to inflict pain, and to function as an essential element through which pleasure is understood and experienced. The research proposes an understanding of this structure of fantasy, reflected in film through the existence of a national psyche written by the main myths and stories embraced by the society in discussion. This structure of fantasy hails and constructs a certain subject that has a basic masochistic psychic structure.
This article proposes a model for analyzing transformations of phantasy formations triggered by radical social change. Phantasy has been rarely addressed by scholars studying radical social change, yet it is a key social element that functions as the "glue" that keeps a community together. Trauma associated with radical social change, such as revolution, market collapse, radical economic reform, genocide, or acts of terrorism, has the potential to radically transform phantasy formations. This is the case because trauma is a sudden opening between registers that were once discrete, the opening of which facilitates unforeseen connections. After discussing radical social change as a traumatic event, and three key elements of phantasy, that is, discourse, topography of commonplaces, and structure of phantasy, this article proposes four ways in which trauma can be dealt with in phantasy formations.
This article offers a reading of Transylvania (2006) directed by Tony Gatlif. It makes evident Gypsy identity's unconscious dynamics when it occupies the position of a fetish within the cinematic story and in the interaction of the viewer with the exotic images on the screen. This specific reading argues that Gypsy fetish signals and covers over a site of psychic pain for the protagonist as well as for the viewer. Our argument insists that as a fetish Gypsy identity props up the social order. In this sense Gypsy identity is not addressed as it often is as a symptom, or more specifically as a challenge to the social order, but instead the analysis renders it to be a concealment of the lack around which the symbolic network is articulated. The article further explores Gypsy identity's music, magic, dirt, and freedom as its key characteristics which conserve a potential access to what was disavowed and covered over -a lost enjoyment.
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