The content of the concept of “slow cinema” in modern Russian film studies

This article analyzes Russian-language scholarly discourse on the phenomenon of “slow cinema” using the works of Yu.V. Isaeva, N.A. Zimenkov, K.N. Bespalova, and L.B. Klyueva. This study identifies the underlying assumptions and contradictions within the logic of the proposed contemporary conceptual models. The study examines the strategies of these researchers, including formal-aesthetic, sociocultural, intentional, and perceptual approaches. Particular attention is paid to deconstructing the research argumentation to identify the mechanisms by which the discursive model of “slow cinema” is constructed, using the method of deobjectification.

The analysis demonstrates that despite the authors’ desire to overcome the reduction of “slow cinema” to a set of conditionally stable formal characteristics, the texts under consideration remain dependent on traditional descriptive models. At the same time, identifying internal contradictions reveals a confusion of levels of analysis within this cinematic phenomenon, leading to the unstable status of the proposed concepts within the theoretical structuring of the concept of “slow cinema”.

As a result, “slow cinema” functions not as a strictly defined cinematic category, but as a discursive construct subject to variable interpretation. This study attempts to systematize the identified propositions and concludes that further theoretical clarification of the concept of “slow cinema” is necessary to ultimately formulate a more coherent model.

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