Personal and Transpersonal Perspectives in Czech and Slovak Ecocritical Cinema

Abstract

Inspired by the concept of “transpersonality” in contemporary psychology, this study seeks to expand its possible meanings – not only in relation to the sometimes overly mystical current ecocritical strands of thought, but even more significantly, in relation to contemporary trends in essayistic or experimental cinema. The study achieves this by analysing the films of three Czech and Slovak female directors, who are united by their ecological concerns stemming from the theme of (the planet as) home. Compared to more traditional examples of ecocriticism in these two local cinemas, the films analyzed here shift away from an objective viewpoint and the expository mode of documentary cinema toward essayistic narratives with a strong personal perspective. However, this shift occurs within a broader context of the need to overcome the personal as well – in favour of a multiperspectival perception of the fate of humanity, and toward a “transpersonal perspective” as an ecological choice. Through the analyses of selected films, the study shows different stages of this process and suggests that the transpersonal perspective can be understood precisely as a deliberate ecological choice – one that embraces a personal viewpoint in order to transcend it in a post-anthropocentric fusion between human perspective, nature, and the universe.