Althusser and Pasolini ─ Philosophy, Marxism, and Film

Agon Hamza offers an in-depth analysis of the main thesis of Louis Althusser’s philosophical enterprise alongside a clear, engaging dissection of Pier Paolo Pasolini’s most important films. There is a philosophical, religious, and political relationship between Althusser’s philosophy and Pier Paolo Pasolini’s films. Hamza teases out the points of contact, placing specific focus on critiques of ideology, religion, ideological state apparatuses, and the class struggle. The discussion, however, does not address Althusser and Pasolini alone. Hamza also draws on Spinoza, Hegel, Marx, and ?i?ek to complete his study. Pasolini’s films are a treasure-trove of Althusserian thought, and Hamza ably employs Althusserian terms in his reading of Pasolini’s films.Althusser and Pasolini provides a creative reconstruction of Althusserian philosophy, as well as a novel examination of Pasolini’s film from the perspective of the filmmaker’s own thought and Althusser’s theses.

Agon Hamza is a PhD candidate in philosophy at the Postgraduate School ZRC SAZU in Ljubljana, Slovenia. He serves as the coeditor-in-chief of the international philosophical journalCrisis and Critique. His latest publications are: Slavoj ?i?ek and Dialectical Materialism(coedited with Frank Ruda), Repeating ?i?ek, and From Myth to Symptom: The Case of Kosovo, coauthored with Slavoj ?i?ek.