Following the 9/11 attacks in the USA, Islamophobia became the popular justification for the U.S.-led global "war on terror." In this paper I read the film Bab’Aziz: The Prince Who Contemplated His Soul as a resistant response to this assault. The film follows the journey of two central characters, Ishtar and her grandfather, Baba Aziz, who embark on a journey searching for a Sufi meeting. I...
States of trance and spirit possession have inspired the modernist imagination perhaps more than anything else, as they typically exceed the limits of visual representation. This article investigates different approaches to coping with these challenges, focusing on the works of a group of Italian documentary filmmakers, including Luigi di Gianni, Cecilia Mangini, and Gianfranco Mingozzi, who...