INTRODUCTION TO CINEMA: FOCUS ON HORROR FILM
NB:
– Some screenings and readings listed below are subject to change
– The use of laptop computers and other electronic devices during class is NOT permitted. Notes can be taken the old-fashioned way, with paper and pen.
Week 1: What is Cinema?
Screening: Funny Games (Michael Haneke, 1997)
Readings:
1) Film: A Critical Introduction, chapters 1 & 2 (pp. 3-36).
2) Thomas Elsaesser and Malte Hagener, "Cinema as Window and Frame," in Film Theory: An Introduction Through the Senses (Routledge, 2010), pp. 13-34.
Week 2: Narrative: Classical Hollywood Cinema
Screening: The Spiral Staircase (Robert Siodmak, 1946)
Readings:
1) Film, chapter 4 (pp. 65-90) & chapter 11 (pp. 343-350).
2) David Bordwell, "Classical Narration: The Hollywood Example," in Narration in the Fiction Film (University of Wisconsin Press, 1985), pp. 56-204, excerpts.
Week 3: Mise-en-Scene
Screening: Rosemary's Baby (Roman Polanski, 1968)
Reading:
1) Film, chapter 5 (pp. 91-128).
2) TBC
Week 4: Cinematography and Camera Movement
Screening: The Shining (Stanley Kubrick, 1987)
Readings:
1) Film, chapter 6 (pp. 129-190).
2) James Naremore, "Stanley Kubrick and the Aesthetics of the Grotesque," Film Quarterly 60, no. 1 (2006).
Week 5: Film Sound
Screening: Carrie (Brian De Palma, 1976)
Readings:
1) Film, chapter 8 (pp. 227-274).
2) Michel Chion, The Voice in Cinema (Columbia University Press, 1999), excerpts.
Week 6: Editing
Screening: Don't Look Now (Nicholas Roeg, 1973)
Readings:
1) Film, chapter 7 (pp. 191-226) & chapter 11 (pp. 350-364).
2) André Bazin, "The Virtues and Limitations of Montage," in What is Cinema? Vol. 1 (University of California Press, 2004), 23-40.
3) Sergej Eisenstein, "A Dialectic Approach to Film Form," in Film Form (Harcourt Brace, 1977), 45-63.
Week 7: Mid-Term Review
1) Class exercise: Writing a Film Analysis
2) MIDTERM EXAM
Reading: Film, chapter 3 (pp. 37-64).
Recommended reading: Timothy Corrigan, A Short Guide to Writing About Film (Pearson/Longman, 2007)
Week 8: Genre
Screening: Come and See (Elem Klimov, 1985)
Readings:
1) Film, chapter 13 (pp. 381-406).
2) TBC
Week 9: Authorship
Screening: The Tenant (Roman Polanski, 1976)
Readings:
1) Film, chapter 14 (pp. 407-428).
2) Andrew Sarris, "Notes on the Auteur Theory," in Film Theory and Criticism: Introductory Readings (OUP, 2004).
3) TBC
Week 10: Gender & Sexuality
Screening: Peeping Tom (Michael Powell, 1960)
Readings:
1) Film, chapter 10 (pp. 309-342).
2) Laura Mulvey, "Visual Pleasure and Narrative Cinema," in Film Theory and Criticism: Introductory Readings (OUP, 2004).
3) TBC
Week 11: Race & Ethnicity
Screening: Night of the Living Dead (George A. Romero, 1968)
Readings:
1) bell hooks, "The Oppositional Gaze: Black Female Spectatorship," in Film and Theory: An Anthology (Blackwell, 2000).
2) Richard Dyer, "The Matter of Whiteness," in White (Routledge, 1997), 1-40.
Week 12: Documentary Film
Screening: Earthlings (Shaun Monson, 2005)
Readings:
1) Film, chapter 9 (pp. 275-290).
2) Bill Nichols, Introduction to Documentary (Indiana UP, 2001), excerpts.
3) TBC.
PAPER DUE
Week 13: Avant-Garde Film and Video
Screening: Un Chien Andalou (Luis Bunuel/Salvador Dali, 1929); Rose Hobart (Joseph Cornell, 1936); Window Water Baby Moving (Brakhage,1959); Scorpio Rising (Kenneth Anger, 1964); Walden (Jonas Mekas, 1969); Serene Velocity (Ernie Gehr, 1970); Associations (John Smith, 1975); Outer Space (Peter Tscherkassky, 1999); Decasia (Bill Morrison, 2000).
Readings:
1) Film, chapter 9 (pp. 291-306).
2) P. Adams Sitney, "Structural Film," in Visionary Film.
Week 14: Final Exam Review
FINAL EXAM, exact date TBC.
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