Freewheeling on the margins: The discourse of transition in the new Slovenian cinema

• Published in: Studies in Eastern European cinema Vol. 2; no. 1; pp. 7 - 20
• Main Author: Mazaj, Meta
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: Routledge 2011; Intellect
• Subjects: Damjan Kozole; Janez Burger; national/transnational; new European cinema; new Slovenian cinema; small national cinemas
• ISSN: 2040-350X; 2040-3518
• DOI: 10.1386/seec.2.1.7_1

This article is a study of the Slovenian New Wave, an often overlooked yet significant development in contemporary European cinema. The article addresses various contexts and forces that shape this new cinema, and explores how in contrast to a glowing political discourse on Slovenia's emergence as a new democracy, the New Wave of films construct a scathing critique of Slovenia's transitional society and provide a significant insight into the contentious relationship between national and transnational forces in new European cinema. In the analysis of films, V leru/Idle Running (Burger, 1999) in particular, the concept of 'freewheeling' emerges as a potent metaphor for the transitional state that characterizes Slovenian contemporary society, indicating both an absence of the national as well as a distance from the supranational.