Heart of the Matter: Bodies without Organs and Biopolitics in Organ Transplant Film

In this essay I will look at four recent films that have organ transplantations "at their heart": 21 Grams (Alejandro González Iñárritu, 2003), L'Intrus (Claire Denis, 2001), Dirty Pretty Things (Stephen Frears, 2002) and Heart of Jenin (Leon Geller and Markus Vetter, 2008). Each film in its own way shows how Nancy's concept of the intruder balances in a different dynamics between biopolitical and biophilosophical concerns and proposes in various ways a changed concept of sacrifice, transforming sacrifice from religious offering into political or ethical resistance and allowing a-religious strivings to persist.