The Production of Law (and Cinema)

The essay addresses the emergence of the law and cinema discourse, its methodological limits, and its intellectual and pragmatic potential. The essay suggests that current arguments within the discourse can be classified into structural arguments (referring to the manner in which cinematic and judicial practices are structured in society), methodological arguments (referring to law and cinema as methodological instruments for the examination of certain clashes of interests), and hermeneutic arguments (referring to law and cinema as engaged in interpretative functions that illuminate aspects of the human condition). Beyond taxonomy, the essay suggests that situating law alongside cinema is important because it reveals a hidden aspect of the law: legislation, adjudication, negotiation, and neighboring practices do not just “occur”; they are produced. Without understanding this dimension an incomplete picture of the law is depicted, and, to an extent, legal practice itself is misunderstood