How to cite the following paper:

Scalambrino, F. (July, 2013). Filming the impossible: Orpheus and the sense of community in
Amour. Unpublished paper presented at Film-Philosophy Conference: Beyond Film, University
of Amsterdam, The Netherlands.

Contact Information
E-mail: Scalambrinof9@gmail.com
Website: https://sites.google.com/site/scalambrinof/home

Film-Philosophy Conference 2013: Beyond Film

Filming the impossible: Orpheus and the sense of community in Amour
Frank Scalambrino, Ph.D.1
Abstract
In this paper I consider Michael Hanekes film Amour in regard to Jean-Luc Nancys
notions of sense, community, and impossibility of love. I invoke Wilhelm Wurzers
notion of filming to locate Nancys sense in Amour. Filming the impossible, then, as it
relates to Amour invokes a non-classical understanding of catharsis regarding the films themes
of love and death. To formulate it as a question: Can we understand the film qua film Amour as
a movement of images whose power of discourse exceeds the representation of those
particulars shown (Wurzer, 1990, p. 107), and as such functions as the condition for the
possibility of impossibility, i.e. a discourse for presencing the community of love?
The non-classical understanding of catharsis at work her e invokes the plight of Orpheus.
Here, Orpheus speaks to the anarchy of a cathartic dismemberment that remembers an
inoperative unavowable community. The filming of love and death in Hanekes Amour is not
understood as the representation of an identity analogous to the plight of Orpheus. Rather, the
filming of love and death, i.e. the film qua film Amour, is understood to cathartically presence
abandonment, and it is by the possibility of abandonment that one knows the possibility,
inverted or lost, of love. And it is also in this way that one knows the justice beyond justice of
love (Nancy, 1994, p. 41). Indeed, The trembling of the soul is the difference of love
(Nancy, 1994, p. 30).
Orpheus juxtaposed here with filming, then, illuminates somewhere beyond any point
of view with a lens that would aim for life from the vantage of the secret of death (Nancy,
1997, p. 52). Hence, the cathartic power of the discourse of Amour, filming the intensity of
death, brings to presence a community of love.
Who, if I cried, would hear me
among the angelic orders?
And even if one of them suddenly pressed me against his heart,
I should fade in the strength of his stronger existence.
For Beautys nothing but beginning
of Terror were still just able to endure,
and why we adore it so
is because it serenely disdains to destroy us. 2
~Rainer Maria Rilke First Elegy

Introduction
The following six (6) brief sections beyond this Introduction provide a reading of Michael
Hanekes film Amour (2013). Whereas some of these sections are primarily intended to provide
support for my reading the presence of Orpheus in Amour, others speak to the cathartic power
of Hanekes film to invoke a different sense of community, i.e. to bring the audience to presence

1
2

Affiliate Assistant Professor of Philosophy, University of Dallas, Texas.

Rilke, Rainer Maria. (1942). Duino Elegies. J.B. Leishman & S. Spender, (Trans.). New York: W.W.Norton, p. 21.

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a community of love. I will refer to scene changes and chapter groupings as indicated in the
screenplay for Amour. Lastly, for the sake of brevity I will explicate such philosophical
terminology as Wilhelm Wurzers notion of filming, Jean-Luc Nancys notion of
community, and my notion of catharsis in the sections where they appear.
I. poetic dwelling Filming s archetypal communication
In an interview regarding Amour Haneke had the following to say about catharsis:
I think catharsis is an overly ambitious term. If a film manages to
make spectators as viewers reflective for a few hours, if it manages
to make them for a short time nicer to each other, more humane,
then youve achieved a great deal. Catharsis is too ambitious. I
dont think, in todays society, you can achieve catharsis with a
book uh, film (OHehir, 2013).
Now, according to Aristotle in his Poetics, A tragedy, then, is the imitation of an action that is
serious with incidents arousing pity and fear, wherewith to accomplish its catharsis of such
emotions (Aristotle, 1984, p. 2320, 1449b24-28). Hence, I intend catharsis here as nonclassical insofar as it does not refer to the purgation of pity and fear as much as it describes a
purification of the spectators meaning-making process. In other words, the process through
which an agent interprets experience and thereby their agency in experience may undergo a
kind of catharsis, i.e. a process of purging the impediments to a less narrow sense and more
poetic dwelling (cf. Hlderlin, 1980; cf. Heidegger, 2001). This catharsis belongs primarily to
the agents relation to logos not pathos, though pathos clearly plays a role here too; as such, like
a cleansing that begins with ones sight, this catharsis pertains to the agents capacity to gain an
archetypal awareness of the presence of what the ancient Greeks may have considered
divinity.
Peculiar to the topics of love, death, and memory, catharsis here invokes the figure of
Orpheus. For, according to an early twentieth-century French commentator, to the ancients,
Orpheus was the theologian par excellence, founder of those mysteries which ensured the

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salvation of mankind, and no less essential to it as the interpreter of the gods (Reinach, 1909, p.
v). Recalling, then, the Eleusinian mysteries and initiation rites, this cathartic purification refers,
respectively, to a deepening of the meaning of experience and a sense of oneself as member of an
extra-ordinary community. In his article Plato and Orpheus Francis Cornford points to this
notion of catharsis in the Phaedrus where Plato associates the ideas of madness, enthusiasm,
ecstasy, [and] inspiration, with the idea of purification; as such, By enthusiasm the soul is
lifted out of itself; [and] the loss of self-possession is the condition which must precede
possession by the divine (Cornford, 1903, p. 438; cf. Plato, 2007c).
Now, the operative understanding here of entheogenic (), i.e. of possession by the
divine, may encompass the bodily and spiritual interpretations associated with the Eleusinian
mysteries (cf. Kernyi, 1967; cf. Wasson, 2008). On the one hand, both Aristophanes and Plato
associate Socrates with these mysteries (cf. Aristophanes, 1906; cf. Plato, 2007a-e; cf. Ruck,
1981; cf. Ruck 1986; cf. Ruck 2006; cf. Cornford, 1903). On the other hand, initiation to these
mysteries is said to have a soteriological aspect, i.e. notions of grace and salvation are operative
here regarding possession by the divine (cf. Guthrie, 1952, pp. 148-158; cf. Mylonas, 1974; cf.
Reinach, 1909). Hence, archetypically these mysteries are variously associated with figures such
as Orpheus, Dionysus, and Jesus.
How, then, is such a non-classical catharsis achieved through film? The notion of film
at work here comes from Wurzers seminal text Filming and Judgment. There Wurzer discusses
filming as a movement of images whose power of discourse exceeds the representation of those
particulars shown (Wurzer, 1990, p. 107; cf. Wurzer, 2005). Hence, in this way, the scenes of
Hanekes film Amour may be read as providing the audience access to the Orpheus archetype.
Where Wurzer speaks of a discourse exceeding representation of particulars, I speak of an
archetypal communication and a deepening of the meaning of experience. Lastly, allow me

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to note that the question of the extent of overlap between my use of the term archetype and
Carl Jungs use is outside the scope of the current discussion (cf. Jung, 1968; cf. Jung, 1990).
II. The Mystery of the End in the Beginning: Whats gotten into you?
Haneke begins Amour with its ending scene. We immediately learn of the character
Annes death prior to seeing her animated. The characters of the first scene subtly announce the
mystery of the window open in Annes room, despite previously revealing the doors to her room
as sealed shut. Upon entering the room, the lead police officer asks those who gained entrance to
the room if they opened the window, and the answer he receives is No. Following the
screenplay in counting the title screen as scene two, a related mystery appears when the
characters become individuated from the crowd and first begin to speak in scene six, and though
one pertains to the end of the film and the other to its beginning, the juxtaposition of these two
mysteries through a montage made available by filming illuminates the mystery of the end in
the beginning.
The first time we see Anne animated she is among a group of spectators in an audience,
and whatever other effects this scene may have it also strengthens the association of Amours
audience with Amours characters. Universally we ask: Does the human characterization of the
coupling of love and death constellate a divine form? When a character becomes aware of their
experiences as fulfilling the structure of an otherwise superhuman constellation, this character
has gained an archetypal awareness of their situation. As a kind of second sight that suggests
the primacy of what is only subsequently revealed (cf. Aristotles discussion of priority in his
Metaphysics), archetypal awareness is a gradual process. Such that awakening to the
superhuman forms structuring the meaning of the scenes of life is tantamount to entering into
communication with the divine. And, the result of this communion is a more poetic dwelling in
the everyday.

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At the opening, then, of scene of five we see, for first time, the lovers arrive home to their
everyday dwelling and the setting for the remainder of the film. We view this scene through the
hallway, and it is dominated by the theme that someone has broken into their dwelling place.
The mystery of this scene: we gain evidence that some other being has already been where these
lovers now are. Experiencing this mystery Anne imagines, i.e. envisions, dying during the night.
Hence, the mystery of the end in the beginning of Amour focuses our attention to an archetypal
communication. What is communicated through filming pathways into their dwelling which
they did not open? Portentously Anne asks, Whats gotten into you? Are we witnessing a
kind of communion with the presence of Orpheus? It is as if Orpheus has entered through the
front door and exited out the bedroom window.
III. Nothing, Viola! I call to you
Of course, as foreshadowed in scene six, Chapter 2 of the film opens (scene seven)
finding Anne awake in the middle of the night. Thus begins a series of expressions by Anne of
nothing. In scene seven Anne notes nothing is wrong. In scene eight she embodies the
emptiness of lost time as she cannot remember what just took place in the kitchen. As Chapter 2
ends Anne speaks of the protagonists concern to cease the change she is suffering as though it is
torturing her. She requests to be left in peace. We learn later she has had a stroke, and
during her request to not be taken back to the hospital Chapter 3 ends with Anne noting there is
nothing to say, Nothing, viola! Similarly, Chapter 4 begins with her suggestion You dont
need to hold my hand all the time. Hence, Amour reveals the plight of a character struggling
between living and dying, and the strife between the desires of the living and those of the dead.
Whereas Ovid and Rilke portray the infamous backward glance of Orpheus and the
subsequent death of Eurydice as nearly instantaneous, for Haneke it is as if the temporality of the
backward glance maps onto the temporality of the film. In this way, Annes last words fall

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through the film as Eurydice fell away from Orpheus. Recall that in looking back Orpheus
succeeds in seeing Eurydice once more, though at the cost of losing her again. Taking Annes
return to their dwelling as the beginning of the backward glance, Chapters 3 through 6
constitutes the celebratory phase of the backward glance, i.e. Orpheus beholds Eurydice once
more. Chapter 4 ends, then, by foreshadowing the end of the backward glance. The protagonist
asks, what is my image? Anne responds, Sometimes youre a monster But youre nice.
Chapter 5 begins with Anne reading her horoscope, and it is heard as if from the god of
distant messages (Rilke, 2009, p. 201) insofar as it foreshadows the steps leading to the
culmination of the backward glance. Chapter 5 ends with Anne voicing, what amounts to,
suicidal ideation representing an inversion of love and suicide as earlier juxtaposed by her
daughter, i.e. a shift from Eros to Orpheus. Chapter 6 portrays the backward movement of the
steps announced in her horoscope, i.e. from high class conversation and pizzazz to not
proceeding with [enough] care. Just prior, then, to Annes fall from bed the protagonist plays
a J.S. Bach prelude (#639 in the catalog of Bachs works), a musical choice Haneke highlights
in an interview (cf. O Hehir, 2013; cf. Mellers, 1987). The title of the Bach work invokes the
prayer I call to you, Lord Jesus Christ, and this distressful beseeching signifies an ominous
awareness. Hence, the celebratory phase of the backward glance draws to a close, initiating the
closing, i.e. dismembering, phase and foreshadowing the films conclusion.
IV. Perchance to Dream: ma / mal
Chapter 7 strikingly begins with the protagonists dream. The dream shows him
wandering in the outer hallway; the exit blocked; anxiously questioning into empty darkness, Is
there anyone there? Is he alone? Startled to find he must traverse a water-filled hallway, he
marvels across this blind lake at the exit beyond. Suddenly, as if from out of another

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dimension, a hand covers his mouth, and vanishing, he wakes beside Anne. Has this dream
foreshadowed his Orphic fate beyond that shown in the film?
Now, just as the middle of Platos dialogs hold a prized position, at the precise middle of
this film Haneke has Anne examine a photo album and declare life is beautiful and life is
long. As Chapter 7 closes we see, what we will later learn is, Annes second stroke. In
Chapter 8 Anne has withdrawn to such an extent that she is no longer capable of coherent
speech. Her daughter sobbingly declares, She only talks gibberish. And, Shes
unrecognizable. Confined now to her bed, it is as if her steps [are] constrained by long
winding-sheets (Rilke, 2009, p. 201). Recall Rilkes description: She was deep within herself
Like a fruit suffused with its own mystery and sweetness, she was filled with her vast death,
which was so new, she could not understand that it had happened (Rilke, 1989, p. 51). Further,
Annes state speaks to what Ovid described as a huge chaos of vast silent realms (Ovid,
1986, p. 225).
The transition of Chapter 8 to 9 shows the protagonist daydreaming of Anne playing at
the piano. This shade-version of Anne appears to be dressed as she will be at the end of the film.
In an interview Haneke suggested both this and the prior dream sequence function to prepare the
audience to understand the ending (O Hehir, 2013). Chapter 9, then, emphasizes both Annes
continual descent and the protagonists increasing attempts to retain her presence, e.g. in the
form of hiring a second nurse and enlisting the help of neighbors. For example, Annes cries
become polyphonic, as if between two worlds. This works well for Haneke in French, since
given her diminished capacity to speak the characters and audience are forced to decide the
meaning of Annes cries; is she struggling to say ma or mal, i.e. it is unclear whether
confused and bemused she calls for her mother or trapped and suffering she cries out in pain or
of evil? Without registering his translation of the cries, yet invoking Rilkes view that her

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hands had been so weaned from marriage, even the light gods infinitely soft, guiding touch hurt
her (Rilke, 2009, p. 203), the protagonist begins a practice in Chapter 9 of caressing Annes
hand to quiet her cries.
V. Closing of the Backward Glance: It was nice
Chapter 10 begins a series of releases. A bird wanders into their dwelling and the
protagonist sets it free; this is the first time, and the second will occur in Chapter 13. Also, the
second nurse is released from her duties after she holds a mirror in front of Annes face, and
given Annes attempt to avert her gaze the nurses action seems monstrous. Moreover,
Chapter 10 contains scene fifty. In this scene Anne is refusing to take food or water, and the
protagonist eventually slaps her face. Recalling Chapter 4 this seems like one of those times in
which she might perceive him as a monster. The slap is followed by shots of landscape paintings
in their apartment, which Haneke in the screenplay describes as views on various realities
(Conrad, 2012, p. 55). Lastly, the transition into and all the way through Chapter 11 functions as
the protagonist releasing the character of the daughter from the agony of the situation.
At the close, then, of his discussion with the daughter in Chapter 12 the film transitions to
what will constitute the closing of the backward glance. Though Anne has neither portrayed a
playful affect nor spoken coherently since her second stroke, the protagonist has some success
enlivening Anne by singing to and with her. This calls to mind not only Orpheus, famous as a
poet musician, but also the manner in which Orpheus was able to convince the King and Queen
of the Underworld both to let him enter and to attempt to retrieve Eurydice to the world of the
living. Anne moves from singing the words very serious in their song into what then reveals
itself as their final conversation. Admitting his relation to have been serious and sincere to
Anne, she, in a final gesture communicating both love and forgiveness, caresses his hand and,
not without struggle, whispers a faint farewell (Ovid, 1986, p. 226), It... was nice.

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In terms of the Orpheus myth, this scene, of course, mimics the closing of the backward
glance and Eurydices return to the Underworld. Such a harmony between the two stories
conditions the interpretation that Annes forgiveness extends beyond forgiving monstrosity, as if
Hanekes Eurydice communicates to Orpheus that despite the pain she also forgives him for
failing to retrieve her and for even attempting. Hence, for Haneke a euthanized Eurydice and a
self-dismembered Orpheus appear as shades together once again at the films end.
VI. New Philadelphia: the Elusive community
So, stated directly: Affirming Wurzers notion of filming, I am taking Kants notion of
the free play of imagination (Kant, 2006, pp. 102-103) as a point of departure (cf. Wurzer,
1990, p.51; cf. Nancy, 2005, p. 80; cf. Nancy, 2001, p. 83). The idea here is that film qua film
can engage a spectators judgment through the free play of imagination such that judgments
determining ground, beyond a concept of an object, reaches an archetypal dimension
(Kant, 2006, p. 116; Wurzer, 1990, p. 71). This links with Nancy in that we spectators, as
such, are no longer able to understand ourselves as a determined step within a determined
process (Nancy, 1994, p. 166). Hence, the archetypal communication figures and feels itself
as the very poiesis of sense (Nancy, 1997, p. 162).
In this way, Amour through free play of the imagination allows one to sense oneself as
the engenderment of sense (Nancy, 1997, p. 162). This is a sense of community, of course, in
that it refers one to the transcendental or existential condition comprised by the taking-placethere of all things (Nancy, 1997, p. 157). Nancy reminds us that, We share what divides us
(Nancy, 1993, p. 95). And, in this sense Nancy locates the divinity indicated by archetypal
communication: the love and glory of God are deposited right at the level of what is created;
that is, creatures are the very brilliance of Gods coming to presence (Nancy, 2000, p. 17).
Another way to describe the different time register of the archetype, i.e. the relation between the

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presence of Orpheus and the characters of Amour, is to say: an archeology of the trajectory of
archetypal discourse points to a tracing of a limit that spaces time that opens up a time within
time [and each] time, what is opened up is a world (Nancy, 1994, p. 163). Hence, archetypal
communication directly points to Nancys notion that a world is neither space nor time; it is the
way we exist together (Nancy, 1994, p. 163; cf. Nancy, 2001b, p. 103; cf. Wurzer, 1997, p. 91).
Amour signifies a filming of the impossible, then, in that it cathartically presences a
community of love. Amour brings the spectators of the film into an archetypal communication,
like an initiation through the dismal visions of death witnessed in the ancient Eleusinian
mysteries (Reinach, 1909, p.88). The purging and purifying into the freedom of imaginations
play reveals a sense of community, as the sense that opens the world in which we dwell (cf.
Blanchot, 1988, pp. 47-56). In fact, according to Nancy, the Being of the Dasein is nothing
other than the Being of this sharing (Nancy, 2001a, p. 103). Put another way, Hanekes film
cathartically presences abandonment, and according to Nancy, it is by the possibility of
abandonment that one knows the possibility, inverted or lost, of love (Nancy, 1994, p. 41).
Indeed, The trembling of the soul is the difference of love (Nancy, 1994, p. 30). Juxtaposed
here with filming, the Orpheus archetype illuminates somewhere beyond any point of view
with a lens that would aim for life from the vantage of the secret of death (Nancy, 1997, p. 52;
cf. Blanchot, 1981, p. 104). We may refer to this community of love as a New Philadelphia
(cf. Nancy, 2001a, p. 99; cf. Nancy, 2001b).
Discussion
Audience Member 1: I like your use of Orpheus. I like the idea of Orpheus with this film, and I
wonder: Where is the underworld? Is it the apartment? Is it the film itself? Are they stuck in
the underworld the entire time until the backward glance was finished?
Frank Scalambrino: Thank you. Thats an excellent question. Theres definitely room for play
here. In particular where I was interested in going with this was toward the relation between a
film and its audience. So, the question is something like: Is there a sense in which film can be
thought of as therapeutic, or is there a way in which the film can induce a sense of poetic
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dwelling in its audience? So, again, Im not trying to suggest this is the one and only reading of
the film, rather I was exploring the way the film presents a discourse that exceeds. Regarding
the Underworld, then, we might say it is not there. It is not there, and yet, at the same time, the
film brings to presence that which is not there. And, in talking about this bringing to presence
that which is not there we begin to notice that it [the Underworld] has a different time register.
So, by recognizing this different time register, I am suggesting there is a way to read the
excessive discourse of the film.
Josef Frchtl, Panel Chair: Early in the paper you mention a quote suggesting that film could
have the power of a discourse exceeding the usual discourse focused on representation. What
makes Hanekes Amour a discourse that exceeds our usual way of discourse? For example, the
discourse we are having right now. What makes this film a discourse?
Scalambrino: Thank you. Thats an excellent question. I would say it is both/and, rather than
either/or. Just like the Eleusinian mysteries, the witnessing of suffering and death, especially
because what we see here is and this, of course, seemed to invoke Orpheus the attempt to
keep that suffering and death from happening. Thats, of course, Orpheus love for Eurydice.
So, I would say: on the one hand, we could say, perhaps on an ontic level, what an audience is
doing is witnessing images of suffering and death. Yet, in particular it is suffering and death
associated with love. On the other hand, regarding the both/and piece, at the same time it is a
presencing, and I tried to speak to this even in the section titles such as the presencing of The
Mystery of the End in the Beginning. The existential piece here being, you see, all lovers must
die.
Audience Member 2: I wonder what you would do with the following. In some sense, in the
Orpheus myth he definitely wants to keep her alive but fails because of his own issues. In
Hanekes film because he [the protagonist] loves her he must kill her. Thats even difficult for
me to say. Thats what I took from that film. So, what do you do with the end when she leads
him to death herself? The way I read the end of the film is that she is taking him with her
because he has followed her. That doesnt seem like Orpheus to me.
Scalambrino: This is also something I meditated on quite a bit, and I think you touch on a
fascinating aspect of the relation between the film and the myth. The Orpheus myth is told as if
it is the story of Eurydice who has died and of course she has, but we are following Orpheus into
the Underworld; and, there is a sense in which he never truly escapes the Underworld. So, you
can ask the question of who is leading who? When Eurydice re-turns and heads deeper into the
Underworld, Orpheus is shortly thereafter to follow.
Audience Member 2: To follow up, what about this other piece? Orpheus wants to save
Eurydice. Yet, the protagonist in the film has to kill her. It kills him to do it, but he has to do it
because he loves her. How do you see the relation between the film and the myth there?
Scalambrino: You see this in the being a monster and yet being nice piece. When I read
this, the closing of the backward glance occurs when she is actually able to communicate
coherently to him. So, there is a sense in which he is euthanizing her, and there is a sense in
which she is already gone.

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Audience Member 2: In Rilkes poem she says Who? She is like, why am I leaving? She has
no recollection of Orpheus, its about her.
Scalambrino: Right. And, Im reading her incoherency as this already being gone.
Audience Member 3: Thank you. I really truly enjoyed listening to your paper. I particularly
enjoyed the way in which you elaborated on the possibility of archetypal time within time
revealing itself in the world. My thoughts sort of scattered in a very useful way at that point, and
I started thinking about the final coda. And, I am reading it as a coda perhaps because of
Hanekes very deep engagement with music, for example. It also made me think about a kind of
eternal return in thinking about the possibility of an archetypal time within time. That implies a
kind of circularity to structure of the film and to the archetypal structure in time, and possibly
being that you were talking about. To me, that offers a possible structure for thinking about the
film which allowed me to recuperate within my understanding of what a Haneke film is in that I
initially found Amour too redemptive and too difficult to reconcile personally in terms of its
cathartic possibilities with his other films. So, that made me think about this idea and, Im
sorry to be appropriating this language of an eternal return in the sense of time returning in on
itself, so actually this following of Orpheus by Eurydice folds back-in on itself, perhaps like a
Mbius strip, so that then Orpheus follows Eurydice. I wonder whether this has some potential
in terms of thinking, what I think you are gesturing toward, about a cyclical structure within the
archetype.
Scalambrino: Thank you. Thats an excellent question. How I would enter into that is by asking
the question: To what extent does it [a cyclical structure to the archetype] illuminate for each
individual us as beings subjected to that which we would understand as an eternal return, and
subjected to the presence of the divine, in a sense? So, yes; regarding this a-lethic, cathartic kind
of coming to awareness of the presence of this higher structure that is eternally returning, the
extent to which one can translate this into ones everyday dwelling, there is a sense in which we
can interpret and we can interpret a film this way being in the presence of this other time
register. At least, that is one quick way to reference it.

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