The Pervert’s Guide To Ideology (2012)

I’m certainly glad this exists, possibly more than I actually enjoyed watching it. The Pervert’s Guide is essentially a filmed lecture on cinematic ideology, as given by renegade cultural theorist Slavoj Zizek (sort of the Frank Zappa of cultural theorists, if you will). Zizek’s observations are strongest when he attaches them to specific films, and these interpretations are generally interesting and enlightening. Unfortunately, his broader theories, filtered through obtuse academic language (as well as his own unusual vocabulary and dialect), feel too theoretical, or like simple truisms shrouded in cryptic language. But the film is well-mounted, with Zizek inhabiting dreamily-realized tableaus from the very films he explores. I’m glad there are movies like this one and the wonderful Room 237 that rip cinematic theory off the textbook page and thrust it into the very theaters from which it spawned.