Chapters in this book

1. Frontmatter i
2. Contents v
3. Introduction: Envisioning the Unwatchable 1
4. Part I. Violence and Testimony
5. 1. Theorizing the Unwatchable
6. Unwatchable 35
7. The Gaze from Within 39
8. The Unwatchable and the Unwatchable 45
9. Melting into Visibility 48
10. Pro Forma 52
11. 2. Spectacles of Destruction
12. Terminal Radiance 59
13. Unwatched/Unmanned: Drone Strikes and the Aesthetics of the Unseen 63
14. Breakaway 68
15. The Watchability of the Unwatchable: Television Disaster Coverage 73
16. 3. Bearing Witness
17. The Incommensurable 82
18. Not Seeing Is Believing: The Unwatchable in Advocacy 86
19. Even If She Had Been a Criminal: A Past Unwatched 92
20. Deframing Evidence: A Transmission from Los ingrávidos 97
21. Alan Kurdi’s Body on the Shore 102
22. 4. Visual Regimes of Racial Violence
23. Held Helpless in the Breach: On American History X 110
24. The Flash of History: On the Unwatchable in Get Out 115
25. Nothing Is Unwatchable for All 121
26. Empathy .Complicity 126
27. 5. Spectacularization and Resistance
28. Entertainment Value 132
29. Holocausts, Hallowe’en, and Headdresses 136
30. Unwitnessable: Outrageous Ableist Impersonations and Unwitnessed Everyday Violence 141
31. Part II. Histories and Genres
32. 6. The Tradition of Provocateurs
33. The Two Unwatchables 151
34. Real Horrorshow 155
35. Asymmetries of Desire: Salò, or the 120 Days of Sodom 160
36. Unstomachable: Irréversible and the Extreme Cinema Tradition 165
37. 7. Enduring the Avant-Garde
38. Unwatchability by Choice: Isou’s Venom and Eternity 172
39. The Refusal of Spectacle: Debord’s Howls for Sade 178
40. Warhol’s Empire: Unwatched and Unwatchable 184
41. Warhol’s Empire 189
42. Watching Paint Dry 194
43. 8. Visceral Responses to Horror
44. “Peekaboo”: Thoughts on (Maybe Not) Seeing Two Horror Films 201
45. Why I Cannot Watch 207
46. Apotropes 213
47. 9. Pornography and the Question of Pleasure
48. I Am Curious (Butterball) 220
49. At the Threshold to the Void 225
50. 10. Archives and the Disintegrating Image
51. Restoring Blood Money 231
52. Turning Garbo Watchable: From Swedish Bread Bun to Hollywood Goddess 237
53. Twilight of the Dead 244
54. Part III. Spectators and Objects
55. 11. Passionate Aversions
56. “Sad!”: Why I Won’t Watch Antichrist 253
57. Transforming Nihilism 258
58. Oh, Inventiveness! Oh, Imaginativeness! Precious Cinema and Its Discontents: A Rant 263
59. The Biopic Is an Affront to the Cinema 269
60. 12. Tedious Whiteness
61. White Men Behaving Sadly 274
62. “You Is Kind, You Is Smart, You Is Important”; or, Why I Can’t Watch The Help 280
63. Two Tables and a Ladder: WCGW? 286
64. 13. Reality Trumpism
65. TV Trumps 293
66. The Once and Future Hillary: Why I Won’t Watch a TV Miniseries about the 2016 U.S. Presidential Election 299
67. 14. Pedagogy and Campus Politics
68. Why We Can’t Take a Joke 307
69. The Bridge and Unteachable Films 312
70. Squirming in the Classroom: Fat Girl and the Ethical Value of Extreme Discomfort 317
71. 15. The Triggered Spectator
72. What Is an “Unwatchable” Film? (With Reference to Amour and Still Alice) 325
73. Watch at Your Own Peril 331
74. Sects, Fries, and Videotape 334
75. Off Watch 341
76. Acknowledgments 347
77. Filmography 349
78. Bibliography 355
79. Notes on Contributors 375
80. Index 389