Badiou’s articulation of cinema as a possible raison d’etre of philosophy, which offers paradoxical/impossible relations saving philosophy from being in vain is also an outcome of Badiou’s own definition of cinema that seems to me a bit whimsical. Prior to stating why it seems whimsical to me, let me introduce again what cinema is for Badiou.
As Badiou argues via contrasting it with the avant-garde art, cinema is a “mass art” in the sense that the masterpieces of cinema are unquestionable and are seen and liked by millions from diverse social groups as soon as they are created. Badiou makes a special emphasis on the notion of at the very moment of their creation.
Badiou sets forth such a definition in order to support and justify his beforehand conception or articulation of cinema. He does this in such way that as if his definition of cinema precedes his articulation of it. But the real situation is vice versa. Anyway, via introducing two terms – viz. mass and art which may be taken as contrary to each other – in a syntagm, Badiou tries to show how cinema can offer paradoxical/impossible relations. Since, for Badiou, mass is a political and art is an aristocratic category, and form of the definition already offers a paradoxical/impossible relation.