Exposing and illustrating how an ongoing engagement with nihilistic alienation may contribute to, rather than detract from, the value of life,
Cinematic Nihilism
both challenges and builds upon past scholarship that has scrutinised nihilism in the media, but which has generally over-emphasised its negative and destructive aspects. Through case studies of popular films, including
Prometheus, The Dark Knight Rises, Dawn of the Dead
and
The Human Centiped
e, and with chapters on Scotland’s cinematic portrayal as both a site of ‘nihilistic sacrifice’ and as ‘nowhere in particular’, this book presents a necessary corrective, re-emphasising the constructive potential of cinematic nihilism and casting it as a phenomenon that need not be overcome.