Spirit of place and cinematic space: Jim Jarmusch’s Dead Man movie

Abstract

Within the scope of the research, the role of the fiction-character-space trilogy, which are inseparable parts of the cinematic universe, in storytelling was emphasized, and the focus was on the human-space relationship in the context of the spirit of the place. In this direction, it was aimed to examine how the cultural and socio-economic lives and internal conflicts of the characters in the film were processed through spaces. The film “Dead Man”, written and directed by Jim Jarmusch, who has a unique perspective on his life and approach to cinema, was chosen as the material. Based on visual data, a phenomenological approach based on interpretation in accordance with qualitative research technique was adopted. Christian Norberg-Schulz’s concept of Genius Loci has formed the theoretical basis for the analysis of spaces in the film. When the relationships between the places in the movie Dead Man and characters and story fiction are examined, the concepts of “death, inactivity, drift, acceptance, self-discovery, belonging, peace” are revealed. As a result, in this film, places are used as powerful transfer tools that strengthen the viewer’s perception and evoke memories. Drawing attention to changing human-human, human-nature, and human-space relations after the industrial revolution, the film is remarkable as an interdisciplinary tool in examining and evaluating spatial relations and cross-sections.