Il mito nel cinema, il cinema come mito. Ridefinizioni del mito classico nella cultura contemporanea

Roberto Danese

Abstract:

Frank Westerman, in his recent book Stikvallei (The Suffocating Valley), Amsterdam 2013, has taught us how myths develop in contemporary culture through the mass media and scientific reports as well as in popular tales. The relationship between this particular kind of contemporary mythopoesis and reality is similar to the process of creation of ancient Greek myths. In my opinion, cinema is one of the most powerful mythopoetic systems in contemporary global culture. For this reason, I analyze the formal and thematic relationship between ancient mythological texts and movies that are not only about classical antiquity but that mainly face the modern and contemporary world. This is also an anthropological point of view on the imaginative power of ancient myth, both in its original cultural context and in cultures that have transposed and modified it through new forms of storytelling.