Love and catastrophe: filming the sublime in Hiroshima mon amour

Abstract

This essay studies two scenes from Alain Resnais's film Hiroshima mon amour (Resnais, 1959) alongside the concept of the sublime in order to take film from a discussion of desire to one of love. Love is understood according to philosopher Emmanuel Levinas's description, as an infinite alterity, rather than as totality or unity. Though Levinas insists on a separation between love and tragedy, and argues that the work of art cannot achieve the ethical, I argue that Resnais's film expresses a sublime achievement by staging, or representing, the infinite tragically through failure and betrayal.