Event
SG - Subversive Humour in Film
Movies challenging dictatorships, (bourgeois) hypocrisy and/or good taste are plentiful. Join film critic Kevin Toma in this exploration of the joyfully subversive, and enjoy some great scenes along the way.
About Subversive Humour in Film
From the pitch black jokes in the films of Yorgos Lanthimos (Poor Things, Kinds of Kindness) to the surreal attacks on bourgeois hypocrisy by director Luis Buñuel – cinema’s history presents us with all kinds of subversive humor. Challenging good taste, like John Waters in his series of self-mocking trash-movies starring drag queen Divine. Or subtly criticizing dictatorships, as in Daisies, the great Czech movie from 1966. Tonight film critic Kevin Toma (De Volkskrant) guides us through the world of cinematic subversive humor. He will discuss a diverse palette of brash, distasteful, transgressive or shocking film scenes from classic and contemporary cinema that dare to be extremely funny at the same time. How do these films achieve their complex, ambiguous effect? And how can cinematic tools be used in the act of the joyfully subversive?
About lecture series Subversive Humour
The times are a bit gloomy, so let’s have some fun! Let’s have a look at subversive humour! Mocking the powers that be seems joyful, or at least satisfying. Until you meet some of the caveats. Like: What exactly are the powerful dogmas to be mocked? How funny do you find the distasteful? Can subversive humour turn against itself? But don’t worry. There will be plenty to laugh about in this series.
About Kevin Toma
Kevin Toma (Sittard, 1974) studied Film- and Performance-Studies at Radboud University Nijmegen. He started his career as movie reviewer for De Filmkrant. Starting 2007 he works as a movie reviewer for De Volkskrant. Furthermore he composes modern music for, and accompanies silent movies. He wrote new scores for and accompanied live among others Sunrise (1927), Häxan (1922) and Berlin, die Sinfonie der Groβstadt (1927).