Cinematic Landscapes of Memory, Pain and Revenge: Remember (2015) vs. Old-Timers (2019)
Cinematic Landscapes of Memory, Pain and Revenge: Remember (2015) vs. Old-Timers (2019)

Summary/Abstract: The paper presents a comparative analysis of two recent representatives of the road movie genre, Atom Egoyan’s Canadian feature film Remember (2015) and its Czech counterpart Old-Timers (2019), co-written and co-directed by Ondřej Provazník and Martin Dušek. Both films share a variety of thematic elements; the principal one is their focus on octogenarian or nonagenarian heroes who seek to avenge crimes committed in the service of past totalitarian regimes.I approach the films via genre studies, as represented by David Laderman’s exploration of the road movie; Sally Chivers’ examination of the aging in recent cinema; Vivian Sobchack’s scholarship highlighting the role of embodiment in the cinematic experience; Doreen Massey’s description of space as “a simultaneity of stories so far”; and Mariusz Czepczyński’s discussion of landscapes of post-socialist cities.I argue that the focus on the bodies of older protagonists disrupts traditional genre coordinates that rest, among other things, on images of youth and mobility. My analysis also includes an investigation of the filmmakers’ respective uses of landscapes. Here I show how the filmmakers integrated afilmic historical traumas into diegetic genre movement.While limited in scope and focusing solely on the road movie genre, the study aims to highlight recent developments in international cinema regarding the representation of embodiment, masculinity, and mobility across cultural landscapes.

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