The introduction of the book the “Religion and Cinema” by Muhammad Madadpoour

What and how is the religious cinema?

The book the “Religion and Cinema”, by Dr Muhammad Madadpoour, is a work composed through the adoption of a second degree approach and a philosophical view towards the category of arts and cinema and specifically towards the process of turning the cinema into a religion-based cinema.

News ID: 445734

Date: 29 June 2019 - 23:41

RNA - Admission to the level of Cinéma vérité (the truthful cinema) in the present world requires much attempt. The said cinema is supposed to bypass its modern counterpart and morph totally into another cinema belonging to the world of religion and Islam, whose ideal is dealing with the unseen universe and the world of martyrdom. In this stage, the professional cinema is employed as the materials of the Cinéma vérité, and as a result, the cinema moving towards the concupiscence and offence will no longer be of use.

The book the “Religion and Cinema”, by Dr Muhammad Madadpoour, is a work composed through the adoption of a second degree approach and a philosophical view towards the category of arts and cinema and specifically towards the process of turning the cinema into a religion-based cinema. The book includes 12 chapters; having the framework of query and response. Using some up-to-date materials, the book deals with the selected pivotal issues and style, though its first edition was published 11 years ago.

Chapters one to seven of the book deal with the philosophical and disciplinary areas of the cinema, and the next ones deal with the future of the cinema, cinema of the End Time and the day issues of the Iranian cinema.

The present article is an attempt to provide readers and those interested with some selected and different parts covered by each chapter of the book.

The sensual face of the truth in the world of cinema

The world of cinema provides a sensual face of the truth. This sort of treatment is a development of the Descartes’ metaphysical thought of the world, manifested through the art and cinema. In this world, space, time, place and the events happening in them all bear some verisimilitude to the truth, yet they are manipulated and morphed into a state, generated and maintained through a bogus unity/cohesion, though the producers insist the pieces have been put together with cohesion in the movies.

The pictures are put together or cut effectively in order to present a delusional picture of the unity of action and a verisimilitude to the Aristotelian presentation. Some movies intentionally abstain from inducing the said unity through the employment of the Epic theatre and spacing. Anyway, the cinema provides its audience with a sensual truth, and introduces the man either as a hero or a typical person. Everything is produced according to the wants and ideas of the producer.

The nature of the religious art

The religious art is the one that is possible to be linked with the religion due to abstract nature of the art. In my eye, the abstract meaning of the art is supposed to reveal the truth, the world of religion, the Heavenly world, sensual world, world of angels, satanic world or ought to divulge the truth through delusions and imagination. The new art is the recognition of the concupiscence through imagination which is finally manifested sensually in the form of voice, tone, figure, volume and clearly in different formats, movements and moving pictures.

Anyway, art is eventually the manifestation in which the man has some links with the truth. The said links fall into two categories: one is formed through mediation and the other is direct.

The fundamental problem of the Iranian cinema

Being much far from the professional cinema of the world is the chief problem of the Iranian cinema; the international festivals have dictated upon the audience in non-industrial third world states a kind of cinema that keeps the said audience far from the professional and serious cinema, though the latter enjoys the general audience. Admission to the level of Cinéma vérité (the truthful cinema) in the present world is much difficult.

The said cinema is required to bypass its modern counterpart and morph totally into another version belonging to the world of religion and Islam whose ideal is dealing with the unseen universe and the world of martyrdom. In this stage, the professional cinema is used as the materials of the Cinéma vérité, and as a result, the cinema moving towards the concupiscence and offence will no longer be of use. With the rise of this new world, the western culture and art loses its history, as it will no longer be effective.

A contemplation over the religious cinema: the form and the sense

Titus Burckhardt, the Muslim Swiss thinker, in his book the “Sacred Art in East and West”, writes, “For an art to be regarded as the sacred art, it is not sufficient to have been originated from a spiritual truth in terms of topic and content or to be solely religious or mingled with pious feelings as a requirement, yet an art could be regarded as religiously sacred if its formal tongue verifies the Heavenly spiritual origin (of the truth) and if its framework and face is a special manifestation of the said truth. A characteristic that is called the style/manner of expression. Accordingly, the arts of Renaissance and Baroque can’t be considered religious and sacred as there is no discrepancy between them and the mundane and non-religious art of their own time.

The spiritual philosophy of the cinema

Manifestation and revelation of the sacred issue (truth) form the foundation and soul of the theoretical, mystical and religious studies, dealt with and introduced by all the ancient and present societal scholars, including Rudolf Otto, Titus Burckhardt, Martin Heidegger and some Western Post-modern and Eastern thinkers having employed the religious movement and spiritualism (Irfan) prior to the Renaissance.

Mircea Eliade, a contemporary philosopher, has also dealt with the concept of sacred manifestation of the Heavenly truth and the manifestation of the sacred issue in his works. Using the material and mundane fact, usual, natural and non-sacred affairs, he introduces this concept in order to the reveal and introduce the sacred and Heavenly issue (fact). Through this manifestation, the apparent material of the non-sacred world become sacred, and everything, maintaining its mundane nature, is converted to a sacred truth. The manifestation of the sacred issue opens a window from the natural objects and affairs unto the supernatural world.

The religious cinema, the future cinem of the world

Late in the first half of the nineteenth century, Arthur Schopenhauer had said that the Western journalists are the vendors of the public thoughts, and shortly afterwards, Kierkegaard, in his personal notes, explained the mentioned expression. What mentioned also will gradually apply to Iran, though nothing has happened yet despite the penetration of nihilism, modernity and the development of the modern thought. And contrary to the idea of Hegel, reading the newspaper has not taken the place of people’s Morning Prayer.

Still, in the religious-mythological, semi-mystical, half-intuitive and mundane world, the Iranian people live with their remained half national self and haven’t left it behind, though they are inundated and somehow affected by modernism.

Book Specifications:

Name of the Book: Religion and Cinema

Author: Muhammad Madadpoour

Publisher: Sooreh Mehr- The Research Centre for the Islamic Culture and Art

Number of Pages: 336

Persian source: Vasel.ir

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