A walk suspended in mid-air, a fall at breakneck speed towards a fatal impact with the ground, an upside-down flip into space, the drift of an astronaut in the void… Analysing a wide range of films, this book brings to light a series of recurrent aesthetic motifs through which contemporary cinema destabilizes and then restores the spectator’s sense of equilibrium. The ‘tensive motifs’ of acrobatics, fall, impact, overturning, and drift reflect our fears and dreams, and offer imaginary forms of transcendence of the limits of our human condition, along with an awareness of their insurmountable nature. Adopting the approach of ‘Neurofilmology’—an interdisciplinary method that puts filmology, perceptual psychology, philosophy of mind, and cognitive neuroscience into dialogue—, this book implements the paradigm of embodied cognition in a new ecological epistemology of the moving-image experience.

Adriano D’Aloia is an Associate Professor of Film and Media studies at the University of Bergamo, Italy. His research and publications focus on aesthetic forms of expression and perception in contemporary media experience and visual culture.

Acknowledgments
1. VERTIGO. Towards a Neurofilmology
2. ACROBATICS. On the wires of empathy
3. FALL. Descent to equilibrium
4. IMPACT. Experiencing the unrepresentable
5. OVERTURNING. Upside-down dissimulations
6. DRIFT. Ungraspable environments
7. FLIGHT. Towards an Ecofilmology
Bibliography
List of films cited
Index