Valori identitare și memorie culturală în cinematografia kârgâză contemporană
Identity Values and Cultural Memory in Contemporary Kyrgyz Cinema

Summary/Abstract: The study examines the subject of several fiction feature films awarded at the first Bishkek International Film Festival (November 17-21, 2023). These films exalt the identity values and the cultural memory of Kyrgyz people and of other neighbored Central-Asian peoples, in order to put the question: “Which are conceptually these identity values?” and “Which are the narrative situations and the hero types that better emphasize them?” After identifying several such identity values, the study focuses on the motif or even the archetype of the abandoned child, a frequent motif in the films mentioned above. Through an effort to mature his conscience, but also with the support of an adult spiritual mentor, the abandoned child morally rises above the adults who abandoned him due to negligence or selfishness, becoming himself their potential spiritual savior. The study starts from the premise that a local and relatively young cinema industry, like the Kyrgyz one or generally the Central-Asian one, which hasn’t yet axiologically dissolved into the current of globalization, cannot be correctly and plenary understood without a deep knowledge of the cultural and civilizational background that generated it. Film analysis is therefore interwoven with anthropological analysis and cultural theory.

• Details
• Contents