Abject Pleasures in the Cinematic: The Beautiful, Sexual Arousal, and Laughter

Abject Pleasures in the Cinematic examines the cinematic strategies that elicit visceral pleasure–tears, goosebumps, sexual arousal, laughter–even in the face of content that is crass, politically problematic, or unethical.

While there might be a progressive predisposition within our discipline, affect pledges no allegiance to any particular political inclination. Progressives, or progressive content, does not hold a monopoly on affect. The beautiful has no inherent bond to the good (i.e., morally good, or having cultural merit), rather it is an affective experience, and it might come to us in the most unlikely and unsavory places. Pornography, even with the most regressive content, wields the possibility to be sexually arousing even despite our own ethical objections. While well-intended academics routinely claim that watching people get hurt is not funny, and we might appreciate the gesture to cultivate our better angels, but such assertions do not necessarily align with our lived-experience.