In girum imus nocte et consumimur igni
From The Art and Popular Culture Encyclopedia
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"The movie-going public ... is now recruited almost entirely from ... the stratum of low-level skilled employees in the various “service” occupations [and] in many ways they resemble slaves" --tr. Ken Knabb "I pride myself on having made a film out of whatever rubbish was at hand; and I find it amusing that people will complain about it who have allowed their entire lives to be dominated by every kind of rubbish." --ibid "It thus has to be admitted that there has been neither success nor failure for Guy Debord and his extravagant pretensions." --ibid |
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In girum imus nocte et consumimur igni is a 1978 black and white political film by Guy Debord first shown in 1981. This film, Debord's sixth and last one, is largely autobiographical but begins with a thorough and pitiless critique of the spectator who goes to the cinema to forget about his dispossessed daily life as a modern slave:
- "I will make no concessions to the public in this film [... and] this particular public, which has been so totally deprived of freedom and which has tolerated every sort of abuse, deserves less than any other to be treated gently. The advertising manipulators, with the usual impudence of those who know that people tend to justify whatever affronts they don’t avenge, calmly declare that “People who love life go to the cinema.” But this life and this cinema are equally paltry, which is why it hardly matters if one is substituted for the other."[1] (tr. Ken Knabb)
The film consists of material filmed by Debord (tracking shots from a boat in Venice, tracking shots of Paris), maps of Europe, his Le Jeu de la Guerre Kriegsspiel, aerial photos, snippets from famous films (mainly western films, war films (Charge of the Light Brigade) but also a Zorro film and a film depicting General Custer), several minutes of blank screen, photo stills (including advertising photos and portraits). Over the entire film we hear the monotone voice-over of Debord.
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Music
There is an occasional piece of classical music and a jazz composition:
- "Whisper Not" by Art Blakey
Title
The title of the movie is a palindrome known as "the Devil's verse." It is Latin for "We enter the circle at night and are consumed by fire", and was said to describe the behavior of moths. It is likely from medieval rather than ancient times. It was first brought to wide attention in Cesare Cantù's Storia Universale (1840–47).
Debord probably encountered the palindrome in Dictionnaire liturgique, historique, et theorique de plain-chant et le musique d'église
The phrase is also found in Umberto Eco's The Name of the Rose (1980).
Citations
Debord cites such authors as Robert Musil, Carl von Clausewitz, Swift (“It is no small satisfaction to present a work that is beyond all criticism”) and Antoine-Henri Jomini.
Themes
The entire film (including the images, but already in the text of the spoken “commentary”) is based on the theme of water. ... Secondarily, there is the theme of fire. [2]
Reception and influence
Glockgirl at IMDb comments that "the use of stills upon which the discourse progresses from the evocation of the mechanisms of the society of the spectacle, the alienation by consumption, the oppression of modern society to the deception of imbecile propaganda cinema, transmitting falsehood, to considerations about Paris, the loss of its true spirit and about himself, Guy Debord, is not only an illustration of détournement ... but it is simply a beautiful work of modern visual poetry."
A 2007 retrospective of the SI in Basel and Utrecht was aptly titled "In girum imus nocte et consumimur igni".
Films cited
- "The voice-over narrative within ... is superimposed with filmed images of Zorro, the comic book character Prince Valiant, and the use of films, such as Marcel Carné Les Visiteurs du soir, and Les Enfants du paradis, Jean Cocteau's Orphée , and Carol Reed's The Third Man."
See also
