Cinema of Suicide

By: Ryan Conrath

A lot of movies deal with the ambivalent “event” of suicide. Many films would have it that suicide is always ONLY unknowable (ie Mulholland Drive), and often employ it as a kind of “privileged point of destabilization,” as Catherine Russell says about mortality in narratives.

The question kind of becomes: “Ok. Now what?”

On the other hand…

• 01
  Nostalghia
  Andrei Tarkovsky
• 02
  The Devil, Probably
  Robert Bresson
• 03
  Le notti bianche
  Luchino Visconti
• 04
  Sátántangó
  Béla Tarr
• 05
  Shutter Island
  Martin Scorsese
• 06
  Mishima: A Life in Four Chapters
  Paul Schrader
• 07
  The Sea Inside
  Alejandro Amenábar
• 08
  Violence at Noon
  Nagisa Ôshima
• 09
  Mouchette
  Robert Bresson
• 10
  Winter Light
  Ingmar Bergman
• 11
  Spring, Summer, Fall, Winter... and Spring
  Kim Ki-duk
• 12
  Hunger
  Steve McQueen
• 13
  Water and Power
  Pat O'Neill
• 14
  Hidden
  Michael Haneke
• 15
  The Lady of Musashino
  Kenji Mizoguchi
• 16
  Wavelength
  Michael Snow
• 17
  Sansho the Bailiff
  Kenji Mizoguchi
• 18
  The White Ribbon
  Michael Haneke
• 19
  Four Nights of a Dreamer
  Robert Bresson
• 20
  Une femme douce
  Robert Bresson
• 21
  Last Life in the Universe
  Pen-ek Ratanaruang
• 22
  Japón
  Carlos Reygadas
• 23
  Taste of Cherry
  Abbas Kiarostami
• 24
  The Decalogue
  Krzysztof Kieślowski
• 25
  Ballast
  Lance Hammer
• 26
  Walkabout
  Nicolas Roeg
• 27
  Stroszek
  Werner Herzog
• 28
  Closely Watched Trains
  Jiří Menzel
• 29
  The Secret in Their Eyes
  Juan José Campanella
• 30
  The Apartment
  Billy Wilder
• 31
  Last Days
  Gus Van Sant
• 32
  The Fire Within
  Louis Malle
• 33
  The Seventh Continent
  Michael Haneke
• 34
  Goodbye Solo
  Ramin Bahrani