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Aspects of the Urban Life in Tokyo!
Cross-Cultural Studies
2016,
45(), pp.245-268
DOI : 10.21049/ccs.2016.45..245
Publisher : Center for Cross Culture Studies
Research Area : Literature
DOI : 10.21049/ccs.2016.45..245
Publisher : Center for Cross Culture Studies
Research Area : Literature
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Tokyo! is a 2008 French / Japanese / South Korean / German anthology film containing "Interior Design" by Michel Gondry, "Merde" by Leos Carax, and "Shaking Tokyo" by Joon-ho Bong, all of which were filmed in Tokyo. This cinematic triptych of three Tokyo-set stories is concerned with how the experience of self-alienation is related to urban life, that is, how to survive in a city as a self. The problem of life is the struggle for self-preservation. In Tokyo! the three film directors have shown that urban life is both self-deconstructing and self-preserving. In this paper, our purpose is to examine different modes of urban life by using two concepts reformulated by the French philosopher Jacques Derrida: the urban ipseity and auto-immunity. According to Derrida, ipseity is a system subjected to a circular structure. Such a system cannot avoid the general logic of auto-immunity; i.e., the structure of ipseity functions as both self-deconstructing and self-preserving. The three episodes contained in Tokyo! testify, each in its own way, to the function of that logic. In bringing to light the three modes of self: appropriation, dis-appropriation, and in-appropriation, we claim that the modality of urban life is confronted with the autoimmune reaction.
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