Film Intertextuality In 'A Midsummer Night's Dream'

Table 10.8 Susanna – Intertextuality and Signification Film Intertextuality
(with screen duration ) Signified Meaning
9 Susanna Scene: Superimposition :
What are you doing to me?
I didn’t bow down to you (Soma)
I bowed down to all the suffering of humanity
Dostevsky ( Crime and Punishment P.279 ).
(screen time: 00:00:05 to 00:00:16 ) This opening note is a paratextuality; This connotes to the viewer about social alienation, and it is the primary theme of Crime and Punishment . In the novel, first, Raskolnikov’s protagonist pride separates him from society. He sees himself as superior to all other people and so cannot relate to anyone. Within his personal philosophy, he sees other people as tools and uses them for his own ends (Roth,

The consummation of marriage is how power over a woman changes hands from father to husband, and this connotes the plight of women in a male dominated society. Scene: Prof Noor Mohammed reciting “ As love is full of unbefitting strains all wanton as a child, skipping and vain formed by the eye and therefore like the eye, full of strange shapes or habits and of forms.”
(screen time: 00:54:07 to

This work of Shakespeare speaks about an imagistic theory of love with real emotions, countering the fakery of academic rhetoric (Londre, 2001). Scene: Susanna mentions Kazantzakis’s “Last Temptation of Christ” to the priest. (screen time: 00:57:33 to 00:57:56) The Last Temptation of Christ (1953) is a controversial novel written by Nikos Kazantzakis. The novel depicts the life of Jesus Christ and his struggle with various forms of temptation including fear, doubt, depression, reluctance and lust. This connotes the life of Jesus Christ on humanistic plane (Kazantzakis, 1988).
This approach makes people understand Susanna on a humanistic plane.

Scene:Susanna mentions the writings of VKN to Ramesh. (screen time: 01:09:09 to 01:09:21)

Vadakkke Koottala Narayanankutty Nair, commonly known as VKN, was a Malayalam writer, noted mainly for his high-brow satire. He wrote novels, short stories and political commentaries (VKN, 2008). His works are noted for their multi-layered humour, trenchant criticism of the socio-political classes and ability to twist the meanings of words contextually and lend a touch of magic to his language. Susann’s mentioning of VKN, signals her versatility in reading, and intellectual