Three Approaches to a Cultural Object: The Film &amp;lt;i&amp;gt;Under the Skin&amp;lt;/i&amp;gt;

Ana Belchior Melícias,Maria Aparecida Cabral,João Augusto Frayze-Pereira

doi:10.11648/j.ajap.20200906.12

Abstract

This article presents three approaches to the film Under the Skin by Jonathan Glazer (2014) that correspond to three interpretative vertices. The film is an adaptation of Michel Faber´s science fiction novel set in Northern Scotland which follows an extraterrestrial that, manifested in a female human form, drives around the countryside picking up male travelers. She seduces and sends them to her home planet. Her experience on Earth is complex and causes tragical consequences. The impact of the film offered an opportunity for the authors to expand their perspectives on different directions. The first part of the article refers to psychoanalytic concepts that are applied to the film, mainly the psychoanalytical conceptualizations about the body and the starting point of mental functioning. In the second part subjective constructions are evoked by the method of free association which is applied to the film recalling the Marsyas Myth, the confrontation of Oedipus with the Sphynx, the work of Anish Kapoor in his modern version of Flaying Marsyas. A subjective construction is built. These two ways of reading the film are called applied psychoanalysis. The third part, a perspective derived from the articulation between Psychoanalysis, Aesthetics and Art Criticism serves as a trigger to read the film in its specificity as a cultural object allowing the expansion of psychoanalytic reflection in the interdisciplinary sense. This third way of reading a piece of art is called implicated psychoanalysis.

Highlights

The aesthetic impact of Jonathan Glazer's film (2014) Under the Skin (Debaixo da Pele, in Portugal, and Sob a Pele, in Brazil), became a trigger for the reverie on the bodily theme
A subjective construction is presented through the process of free association supported by some aspects of culture–myth, painting, sculpture and music–in order to put them into perspective; in a third moment, we see the aesthetics and art criticism that enables reading and interpreting the film as a cultural object itself, expanding reflection in an interdisciplinary sense
The film Under the Skin provided an excellent opportunity to discuss some ways of reading a cultural object

Summary

Introduction

The aesthetic impact of Jonathan Glazer's film (2014) Under the Skin (Debaixo da Pele, in Portugal, and Sob a Pele, in Brazil), became a trigger for the reverie on the bodily theme. Three complementary approaches were taken on the film’s artistic narrative, creating a containing skin of innumerable meanings, under which diverse perspectives dialogue. The multiple and paradoxical interfaces (un)revealed by the film weave a conceptual narrative whose clinical-theoretical dimensions, like a movie script, introduce the film to those who have not seen it. A subjective construction is presented through the process of free association supported by some aspects of culture–myth, painting, sculpture and music–in order to put them into perspective; in a third moment, we see the aesthetics and art criticism that enables reading and interpreting the film as a cultural object itself, expanding reflection in an interdisciplinary sense

The Film as Clinical-theoretical Evocation: A Conceptual Narrative

The Film as a Subjective Construction: a Free Association Reading

The Film as an Aesthetic Object: a Perspective Implicated in Art

Conclusions