Lichtspiele des Seins

Cinema has the power to profoundly change people. It shapes the ways they understand themselves and how they relate to others – including God. These diverse interconnections are fundamentally influenced by cinema as a place of artistic presentation and film aesthetics. This study presents a new approach to the research area of religion and film, identifying human existence as a foundational concept. The theology of Rudolf Bultmann, which discusses human existence in relation to God, intertwines with the philosophy of Martin Heidegger. Referring to the works of both thinkers, the study places the human being as a creation of God at the center of an existential-theological film theory developed within this investigation, which is exemplified through two films.