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Dislocation Reference Gaze: The Cinematic Language Enigma and Ontological Philosophy of Resurrection

Author(s)

Lei Yao, Rui Hou

Affiliation(s)

Chongqing University of Posts and Telecommunications, Chongqing, China

Abstract

In an era marked by the upheaval of digital media and the persistent discourse of the “end of cinema,” Bi Gan’s new work, Resurrection, responds to the concerns of the times through a meta-cinematic, self-reflexive perspective, using its imagery to pose a profound inquiry into the very essence of cinema. The film relies on a mechanism of encoding and decoding structured like “enigma/solution,” weaving a system of cinematic language puzzles that combines narrative tension with philosophical depth through three dimensions: the suturing of memory via historical dislocation, the aesthetic reference of cinematic language signs, and the bidirectional construction of identity through the gaze. By intertwining and dialectically engaging narrative, symbolic, and ontological puzzles, the film transforms enigma into cinema’s very mode of existence, offering a poetic response to the question of cinema’s survival in the digital age. In the active decoding by the audience and the mutual verification of sensory subjectivity, the film reconstructs the power dynamics of looking, simultaneously rewriting film ontology for the contemporary era and reaffirming human life’s subjectivity through the interrogation and return of the gaze.

Keywords

Resurrection; Meta-cinema; Film Ontology; Puzzle Narrative; Bi Gan

References

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