The Fear of Real Tears: The Films of Krzysztof Kieślowski

To bring film thought back to the rational mainstream as quickly as possible, the British Film Institute invited Slavoj Zizek to deliver a series of lectures at the National Film Theatre, which were collected here in book form. All of Zizek's works are ambitious, and this book can be seen as a model for renewing film studies by intensifying its theoretical ambition. Drawing on Marx, Freud, and Lacan, he offers a dazzling interpretation of Krzysztof Kieslowski's films, setting them against one another in a series of illuminating comparisons. Like all his works, The Fright of Real Tears combines controversy with rigor, and wit with insight. It shows us that so-called basic film analysis, if it lacks theoretical insight, does not exist. Conversely, theory must be reborn again and again through a genuine love of cinema.