Aesthetics of Mobility in Georgi Daneliia’s Passport (1990)

• In Event: Left Perspectives on Cultures of Decline III: Economic Downturn and Second World Cultural Production I

Abstract

With the advent of perestroika, change became aesthetically favored over stagnation, and mobility over stasis. However, many artists had become concerned about the outcome of the reform. This paper explores aesthetics of mobility under perestroika through Georgian filmmaker Georgi Daneliia’s tragicocomedy Passport (1990), set against the background of Soviet Jewish immigration to Israel. The film depicts a series of failtures and negative consequences of all types of movement and transportation. This theme is a continuation of Daneliya’s earlier films, for instance, Autumn Marathon (1979) and Kin-Dza-Dza (1986). In Passport, I argue, perestroika-era mobility is imagined as something both aesthetically necessary and politically futile.

Author

• Jinyi Chu, Yale U