Akira and Persepolis: A Fight Against the Corrupt
Paper by Julia Dal Pozzo.
War and corruption has stayed the same throughout human history in all cultures. Depictions of war in the media tend to represent similar stories of their violence, tragedies, and warnings against them in many different art forms. Persepolis (Marjane Satrapi; 2007) and Akira (Katsuhiro Otomo; 1988) are two films that share similar stories of coming of age and loss of innocence, rebellion, government/political corruption, and the consequences of war. Both films were adapted into animation based on graphic novels of the same titles, directed by the authors who wrote them. Persepolis is a French/Iranian post-revolutionary animated autobiographical film that tells the story of Marjane Satrapi’s life growing up and facing oppression in Iran after the Islamic Revolution highlighting the power of propaganda, nationalism, censorship, and the evils of war. Akira is a science fiction Japanese anime cyberpunk film that follows a young delinquent biker gang as they attempt to save their friend
from corruption after being subjected to a secret military experiment, reflecting Katsuhiro Otomo’s experiences living in Japanese society post World War II. The two films are critically acclaimed within the film and animation industry,
How “Downfall,” “The Lives of Others,” and “Capernaum” Frame the Past While Manipulating Political Memory
Paper by Sela Diab.
Political films may seem like they are made solely for entertainment, but they also reconstruct history and frame how political and historical trauma is remembered by society. They use emotional storytelling to form audiences’ memories about past vents. Intensifying selective voices and certain aesthetics work together to change how history is viewed by the public. Political films form how viewers interpret suffering, responsibility, and guilt by turning real stories and events into emotional arratives. Three films that depict cultural memory and trauma differently than the actual political history are “Downfall” (2004), directed by Oliver Hirschbiegal, “The Lives of Others” (2006), directed by Florian Henckel von Donnersmarck, and “Capernaum” (2018), directed by Nadine Labaki. Not only do these political movies reconstruct political trauma, but they redefine how people remember hurtful systems, perpetrators, and victims. Realism, formed by emotional intensity, downplays collective memory of the Holocaust and East German Stasi surveillance in “Downfall and “The Lives of Others” by humanizing harmful, violent, and oppressive historical figures. Documentary-like realism is used in “Capernaum” to reveal how structural violence used to and continues to shape post-civil war Lebanon. Political cinema