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Published in:
2020 | OriginalPaper | Chapter
5. Mobility, Instantaneity and the Desert Island: Cast Away and Lost
Author : Barney Samson
Published in: Desert Islands and the Liquid Modern
Publisher: Springer International Publishing
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Abstract
This chapter considers the desert island settings of the film Cast Away (2000) and the TV series Lost (2004–2010). Each represents a tension between solid and liquid modernity, as described by Zygmunt Bauman. In Cast Away, Chuck Noland is a radically mobile agent of liquid modern repression. His relationship with a Wilson volleyball speaks to commodity fetishism, but exists alongside his continued preoccupation with repressive time. The film critiques repressive aspects of liquid modernity but endorses a life strategy that depends on those aspects. Lost sets up a desert island governed by repressive control, as abjected characters learn to conform to communal norms. The series’ ‘liquid cinematography’ and the island’s topological and temporal fluidity destabilise this solid modern paradigm, but it is ultimately reasserted.