GORE CAPITALISM - ANNIHILATION

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March 28 at 6pm | One of the most powerful allegories for climate change in recent years, ANNIHILATION operates on a simple what-if premise: what if the boundaries between “human” and “environment” were finally and utterly elided? Of course, there is a premise for this philosophical query: an all-women group of military scientists, led by Natalie Portman’s Lena, is sent to examine the Shimmer, a “zone” (think Andrei Tarkovsky’s STALKER) created by a meteor strike three years ago into which people enter but never return. In the Shimmer, a long-desired communion between (wo)men and nature becomes possible—perhaps forgiving humanity’s sins on the planet once and for all. Be careful what you wish for. The Film Center is delighted to welcome the return of our long-running lecture series, presented in collaboration with the School of the Art Institute of Chicago’s Art History, Theory and Criticism, and Film, Video, New Media, and Animation departments. GORE CAPITALISM will run January 31 through May 9. Inspired by Sayak Valencia’s book of the same name, GORE CAPITALISM is not about “horror movies,” although some of its titles draw on conventions of that genre. Rather, this screening series starts from the premise that “horror” is what we live through right now, whether in our everyday lives or via the information bombarding us from screens. This horror has something to do with the economic order in which we live: sometimes called “neoliberalism,” it is a situation of acceleration in which it is increasingly harder to make ends meet; the gap between haves and have-nots keeps growing; and tactics of repression are ever more violent. GORE CAPITALISM is particularly concerned with how the individual gets caught in uneven wars between classes, races, genders, sexual orientations, healthy and sick, states and citizens. “Gore” is one way to name - and to witness - what it is that happens to vulnerable human bodies, in an increasingly polarized and ruthless world. Valencia focuses on how Mexican cartels turn the pornographic violence of slasher films into a reality. My aim, in this screening series, is to restore back to cinema urgent ethical questions from our shared global crisis: What can we add to these conversations? What futures can we envision? Why should cinema persist? Lecturer: Professor Daniel R. Quiles, SAIC, Department of Art History, Theory and Criticism.