Presented by the Centre for Cinema Studies and Cinema Thinks the World, the Critical Thinkers Series features research talks by notable and emerging scholars in Cinema and Media Studies. Join us for the final talk in the Fall 2025 Series by Dr. Wayne Wapeemukwa, Izaak W. Killam Postdoctoral Fellow at the Department of Philosophy, UBC.
The Problem of Humanism in Atrocity Cinema
This talk explores the theme of humanism in Jonathan Glazer’s The Zone of Interest and extends the discussion to my own sophomore feature film, Manhunt. While some critics claim that I “humanize Nazis,” I argue—much like Glazer—that my films invert this perception: they do not show that Nazis are human, but rather expose how humans can become Nazis. Engaging with questions of atrocity in cinema, I draw comparisons between genocide in Europe and Canada, and consider how filmmakers can respond with a critical cinema that resists empathy for perpetrators while confronting the structures of violence itself.
About Wayne Wapeemukwa
Wayne Wapeemukwa is a Canadian-Métis filmmaker and philosopher from Vancouver. I has expertise in Indigenous philosophy, Social and Political Philosophy, and nineteenth-century philosophy (especially Marx), an intersectional nexus of frameworks I use to analyze settler-colonialism, “racial capitalism,” and social relations to land. At UBC, he is developing his dissertation––Journey to a Critical Theory of Discovery––into a book. He recently published an award-winning essay on Marxism, pre-capitalism, and Indigenous dispossession in the Journal of Speculative Philosophy. In 2024, Wayne earned his PhD from Pennsylvania State University, where he was the Mellon Just Transformations Pre-Doctoral Fellow. He is a citizen of the Métis Nation of British Columbia and serves his local Chartered Community as a Board Secretary. For more, visit www.waynewapeemukwa.com.
This event is free and there is no need to RSVP.
