Image and Skepticism: on the link between cinema and reality in Staley Cavell's work

Abstract

Using Cavell’s book The World Viewed as the point of departure, this article discusses the essential link between movies and reality. The text highlights an important aspect of this link which is the fact that the role of reality is in no way the one of being copied, reproduced, or represented in the most truthful way. To Cavell, the matter at hand is to know what happens to reality when it is projected and what happens to us when we see the world of a movie. Therefore, the most possible faithful reinstatement of this exterior world ends up putting into question the different forms that the relation with reality can take, among which representation would neither be the first nor the most important one.