Ambiguous Human Existence and the Ethics of Authenticity : Exploring Tensions of Freedom and Solidarity in Contemporary Scandinavian Art Film and Beyond

This thesis develops an ethical framework called the ethics of authenticity and puts it to work through concrete engagement with seven contemporary Scandinavian films. It starts by tracing the contradictory developments of modern freedom, highlighting the tensions of freedom and solidarity and how this comes to the fore in ethics, politics and film aesthetics. Inspired by Simone de Beauvoir’s existentialist ethics and political Marxist theory, I develop the ethics of authenticity in response to this. I then explore and further develop this framework through engagements with films and the way they give form to – and handle –tensions of autonomy, authenticity, and conditions of standardisation in our contemporary moment.