The Archaic in the Yugoslav Cinema of the 1960s

This book investigates the Golden Age of Yugoslav cinema and sheds light on it from a fresh perspective. By examining various tropes and discourses of the archaic that shaped not only the flourishing Yugoslav cinematic modernism of the 1960s but also a broader Yugoslav cultural politics, the book reveals a nuanced panorama of cultural negotiations. The archaic that which is at odds with modernity is a peculiar crossroads where Marxism intersects with Balkanism, while both are circumscribed by a general distrust towards representation. The analysis thus opens new perspectives on a politics of aesthetics that shaped some of the most successful Yugoslav films of all time. Furthermore, its findings will be relevant to any context in which a political as well as artistic movement seeks to present itself as avant-garde but is confronted with a discourse assigning it time-lag. Addressing an academic audience of scholars and postgraduate students interested in Balkan and Eastern European area studies, Slavic studies, cultural studies, film, and postcolonial studies, this book is also of interest to those researching the intersections of time, aesthetics, and politics.