REQUIREMENTS
CINE 101 - Film History
Cross-listed: ENGL 091, ARTH 108
This course is an introduction to the history of cinema from 1895 to the present. In demonstrating how history energizes and complicates the movies, we will examine numerous film cultures and historical periods, including early short films from Europe and the US, Hollywood silent cinema, Italian neo-realism, the French New Wave, New German Cinema, recent Iranian and Taiwanese cinema, and a variety of other film movements from different historical epochs and cultures. Our aim is to establish a broad historical and global foundation for the understanding of film as a complex exchange between art, technology, politics, and economics. Screenings are mandatory.
W 5:00 - 8:00
MAZAJ Meta
CINE 102 - Film Analysis and Methods
Cross-listed: ENGL 092, ARTH 109
This course is an introduction to the analysis of film as both a textual practice and a cultural practice. We will examine a variety of films—from Fritz Lang's M (1931) to Julia Dash's Daughters of the Dust (1991)--in order to demonstrate the tools and skills of "close reading." We will concentrate on those specifically filmic features of the movies, such as mise-en-scene, cinematography, editing and sound strategies, as well as those larger organizational forms, such as narrative and non-narrative structures and movie genres. Because our responses to the movies always extend beyond the film frame, we will additionally do "close readings" of the complex business of film distribution, promotion, and exhibition to show how the less visible machinery of the movie business also shapes our understanding and enjoyment of particular films. Along the way, we will discuss some of the most influential and productive critical schools of thought informing film analysis today, including realism, auteurism, feminism, postmodernism, and others.
TR 12:00 - 1:30
CORRIGAN Timothy
PRIMARY FILM COURSES
CINE 110 - TOPICS IN FILM AND SOCIETY: Copyright and Culture
Cross-listed: ENGL 105
In this course, we will look at the history of copyright law and explore the ways that copyright has both responded to new media and driven art and entertainment. How, for example, is a new medium (photography, film, the Internet, etc.) defined in relation to existing media? What constitutes originality in collage painting, hip hop music, or computer software? What are the limits of fair use? And how have artists, engineers and creative industries responded to various changes in copyright law? A major focus of the course will be the lessons of history for the current copyright debates over such issues as file sharing, the public domain, and fair use.
TR 10:30 - 12:00
DECHERNEY Peter
CINE 115 - STUDY OF AN AUTHOR: Alfred Hitchcock
Cross-listed: ENGL 292.602
This course focuses upon Alfred Hitchcock, one of the greatest filmmakers of the 20 th century. We will explore his films and authorship, from his early British works to his late Hollywood films, and how he helped to develop, refine, and expand the repertoire of cinema technologically as well as dramatically. Spanning over half a century, Hitchcock's films participate in social and political history--bridging two world wars--as well as in the development of cinema, from silent film to sound, from black and white to color, from expressionism to classical Hollywood cinema; from the challenges of censorship and the introduction of the studio system to the concept of the director as auteur. With these formal and historical considerations, we will examine how Hitchcock realizes the artistic and commercial possibilities of film, attracting critical as well as popular audiences. We will also explore how Hitchcock similarly engages with scholarly film critics, particularly in the development of formalist, psychoanalytic, and feminist film theory and criticism. Screenings will include: The Lodger, Blackmail, 39 Steps, Rebecca, Strangers on a Train, Notorious, Vertigo, Rear Window, North by Northwest, Marnie, Psycho, The Birds.
W 5:30 - 8:30
ROSS Valerie
CINE 118 - Iranian Cinema
Cross-listed: NELC 118
Post-Revolutionary Iranian cinema has gained exceptional international reception in the past two decades. In most major national and international festivals, Iranian films have taken numerous prizes for their outstanding representation of life and society, and their courage in defying censorship barriers. In this course, we will examine the distinct characteristics of the post-revolutionary Iranian cinema. Discussion will revolve around themes such as gender politics, family relationships and women's social, economic and
political roles, as well as the levels of representation and criticism of modern Iran's political and religious structure within the current boundaries. There will be a total of 12 films shown and will include works by Kiarostami, Makhmalbaf, Beizai, Milani, Bani-Etemad and Panahi, among others.
MW 2:00 - 3:30
MINUCHEHR Pardis
CINE 201.401 - TOPICS IN FILM HISTORY: Contemporary International Film
Cross-listed: ARTH 290.401; ENGL 291.401
This is a course in contemporary international film cultures and national cinemas. We will examine the idea of world cinema and set up a model of how it can be explored by studying contemporary film in various countries. We will explore ways in which cinemas from around the globe have attempted to come to terms with Hollywood, and look at forces which lead many filmmakers to define themselves in opposition to Hollywood norms. We will also consider an equally powerful tendency in such films to explore the language of cinema independent of Hollywood influences, and we will keep this in mind as we see films which are distinctive in their style and their creativity. Finally, we will engage with the question of which films/cinemas get labeled as “world cinema” and what determines entry into the sphere of world cinema.
TR 9:00 - 10:30
MAZAJ Meta
CINE 202.402 - TOPICS IN FILM PRACTICE: Poets of Cinema
Cross-listed: ARTH 290.402; ENGL 292.402
This course will be a study of key filmmakers who made a distinct mark on the cinema of the twentieth century. The course will explore how in the face of massive commercial success of Hollywood cinema, directors such as Yasujiro Ozu, Andrei Tarkovsky, Theo Angelopoulos, Miklos Jansco, Krzysztof Kieslowski, and Ildiko Enyedi created a new form of cinema that challenges our dominant conceptions and understanding of film styles, and opens up new frontiers of creativity and filmic expression. Together, these filmmakers were so influential that they not only shaped their specific national cinemas, but they had a profound influence on filmmakers around the world. They are unique in that their work fits neither the narrative mode nor the experimental or avant-garde one. They defy dominant theories of films and open up discussions of poetics and philosophy. Through their work, this course will also explore important connections between cinema, the study of language and narrative, visual arts, literature and philosophy.
TR 3:00 - 4:30
MAZAJ Meta
CINE 215 - INDIAN CINEMA: Indian Cinema and Society
Cross-listed: SAST 221
This course explores the history of cinema in India since 1896 and locates some fascinating ways cinema is related to society and history. We will ground our explorations in an understating of visual and narrative formations--in line with earlier cultural and artistic traditions. W will examine various films (entire films and clips) from different decades, regions, and studios; different "waves" and schools will be studied for an understanding of the ongoing exchanges between the medium and the social, political, religious and cultural histories of the country. We will paint a broad picture of the intense relationship between Indian cinema and society through some close studies of films. We will also touch on the business of film finance, production, exhibition, and distribution (at home territories and in foreign markets), with additional inputs related to state decisions and foreign policies that mark cinema, cinephilia and film scholarship in ways that shape how Indian films are made and viewed at home and abroad--culminating in the phenomenon of 'Bollywood' and the present moment of globalisation.
TR 12:00 - 1:30
MAJITHIA Sheetal
CINE 230 - SPANISH FILM: Introduction to Spanish Film
Cross-listed: SPAN 285
An introduction and overview of Spanish film from its roots in the late nineteenth century to its recent rise to international prominence. Special attention will be paid to the social and political movements that led to the growth and development of Spanish film. Screenings include works by Segundo de Chomón (The Golden Beatle and Hotel Electric), Fernando Reyes (The Cursed Village), Juan Antonio Bardem (Death of a Cyclist), Carlos Saura (The Seventh Day), Julio Medem (Vacas), Pedro Almódovar (Bad Education), and Alejandro Amenábar (Tesis). This course is taught in ENGLISH. All screened films will be subtitled or simultaneously translated. For more information, follow this link to the course website: <http://ccat.sas.upenn.edu/romance/spanish/solomon/film/UGSF05/Home06.htm>
T 5:30 - 8:30
SOLOMON Michael
CINE 240.401 - ITALIAN CINEMA: Italian Cinema and the Sacred
Cross-listed: ITAL 213
This course will focus on the way Italian cinema related to the dimension of the sacred. The word “sacer” in Latin means both "sacred" and "accursed, defiled": thus, the experience of the sacred encompasses both sanctity and religion as well as abjection, excess, defilement and violence. From The Gospel According to St. Matthew to Salò, we will follow the trajectory of these double aspects of the sacred in Italian cinema, exploring a range of directors (from Rossellini to Pasolini, from Visconti to Fellini), and genres (from religious films to spaghetti western) through the lens of the different visions of the sacred of thinkers such as Eliade, Caillois, Bataille, Girard and others. The course will be conducted in English. Films will be in Italian with English subtitles. Italian majors may arrange to do readings and final paper in Italian.
MWF 12:00 - 1:00
BENINI, Stefania
CINE 240.402 - ITALIAN CINEMA: Introduction to Italian Cinema
Cross-listed: COML 080; ITAL 080
This course will introduce major directors, movements, and genres in Italian cinema from World War II to the present. Both classic "auteurs" (Blasetti, Rossellini, De Sica, Fellini, Visconti, Antonioni) and newer directors (Olmi, Scola, Amelio, Moretti) will illustrate trends over the last fifty years through screenings of a variety of film types, from the historical drama to commedia all’italiana. The distinct national identity of Italian cinema will be emphasized with reference to the Risorgimento (Unification), Mussolini’s Fascism, regional diversity, gender roles, and minority communities. Readings will be on Italian cinema, modern Italian history, and the vocabulary of film analysis.
T 6:00 - 9:00
KIRKHAM Victoria
CINE 245 - FRENCH CINEMA: Masterpieces of French Cinema
Cross-listed: FREN 230
The purpose of this course is to provide an introduction to the history and scope of French cinema all the way to the present time through the analysis of key works of the French film canon. Particular attention will be paid to successive period styles (“poetic realism”, “French quality”, “the New Wave”, “le cinéma du look”, cinema de banlieue …) and a variety of critical lenses will be used (psychoanalysis, socio-historical and cultural context, politics, aesthetics, gender…) in an effort to better understand the specificities and complexities of French cinematic culture.
GENERAL LEC: TR 3:00 - 4:30 (OFFERED IN ENGLISH)
REC Section 402: Freshman Seminar (OFFERED IN ENGLISH)
REC Section 403:
French Majors and Minors (OFFERED IN FRENCH)
REC Section 404: Open to all
(OFFERED IN ENGLISH)
MET Philippe
CINE 250 - GERMAN CINEMA: German Cinema
Cross-listed: GRMN 258; COML 270
An introduction to the momentous history of German film, from its beginnings before World War One to developments following the fall of the Berlin Wall in 1989 and German reunification in 1990. With an eye to film's place in its historical and political context, the course will explore the "Golden Age" of German cinema in the Weimar Republic, when Berlin vied with Hollywood; the complex relationship between Nazi ideology and entertainment during the Third Reich; the fate of German film-makers in exile during the Hitler years; post-war film production in both West and East Germany; the call for an alternative to "Papa's Kino" and the rise of New German Cinema in the 1960s.
MW 2:00 - 3:30
WOLMART Gregory
CINE 310 - TOPICS IN SOUTH ASIA CINEMA: Mediating Diaspora
Cross-listed: SAST 306
Michel Foucault has argued that, space exceeds time in our understanding of the present. Starting with this claim, this course considers how globalization and its new formations of diaspora and the trans-national inflect how we think of South Asia. Of particular interest will be the role of sexuality, eroticism, masculinity, femininity, and kinship in the construction of new global identities. How do practices of stereotyping and gender mediate migration, community, and citizenship? How do we newly think of concepts such as belonging, community, the nation, and the state, given the “epochal” change that globalization inaugurates? We will view films such as Gurinder Chaddha’s Bhaji on the Beach, Deepa Mehta’s Fire, and Mira Nair’s Mississippi Masala and 9”11’01: September 11 and others in their respective historical contexts of the UK, Canada, and the US. Critical readings will draw on work in ethnic studies, postcolonial studies, feminist studies, and globalization studies.
M 3:00 - 6:00
MAJITHIA Sheetal
CINE 392 - TOPICS IN CINEMA STUDIES: Cinematic Travel
Cross-listed: ENGL 392
This course will engage one of the most prominent and important figures in film history: travel. We will investigate this figure as it evolves historically from 1895 to the present and at the same time examine the particular practices and permutations it has inspired as travelogues and documentaries, movie genres such as the road movie, and film’s ideological and economic engagements with borders and globalization. Such a rich vehicle will additionally open numerous theoretical questions in film aesthetics: for example, about mobile and immobile spectatorship, about “traveling shots” and aesthetic realism, and about subjectivity and ethnographic filmmaking. Since our topic parallels the 2006-07 theme of the Penn Humanties Forum, we will also take advantage of the various university lectures, presentations, and exhibitions around the university as a way of broadening and complicating the issues we find in film history. In addition to gaining more intellectual mobility about film and the larger implications of “travel” as a mode of experience, we will, I am certain, become better writers and more independent researchers.
TR 9:00 - 10:30
CORRIGAN Timothy
INTERDISCIPLINARY FILM COURSES
CINE 009.301 - CRITICAL WRITING SEMINAR IN CINEMA STUDIES: Personal Film in the Age of the Blockbuster
This course fulfills the writing requirement for all undergraduates.
Supposedly we live in the age of the blockbuster, in which films are made by committee and by the numbers, with more interest paid to the bottom line than personal expression. Critics routinely bemoan a lack of creativity and foresee the end of the medium, but despite all the forecasts of gloom and doom many filmmakers seem able to survive and thrive in this climate, creating deeply
personal, idiosyncratic works, whether small in scope and budget or utilizing the resources of the majors. We will examine films by
Richard Linklater, Robert Rodriguez, Werner Herzog, Jonathan Caouette, Wong Kar-Wai, Steven Spielberg and others along with readings illuminating the current film climate. We will also do quite a bit of writing ourselves, from a number of perspectives: critical analysis, film review, essays, screenplays. Revision of written work is an essential component of the class; grades are based on final portfolio.
TR 1:30 - 3:00
DONOVAN Cristopher
CINE 009.302 - CRITICAL WRITING SEMINAR IN CINEMA STUDIES: Arrested Development: The Punk Bildungsroman
This course fulfills the writing requirement for all undergraduates.
A Bildungsroman is commonly translated as a "narrative of development." This writing-intensive course will use punk-inspired films such as Trainspotting, Fight Club, American History X, A Clockwork Orange, Ghost World, and La Haine as an occasion to explore the development of punk artists, and the worldview that brought about their unique vision. There will be many short papers, written with an eye to using small pieces as "building blocks," with students learning to combine and expand these into longer essays.
MW 2:00 - 3:30
BAUMLI Kristina
CINE 009.303 - CRITICAL WRITING SEMINAR IN CINEMA STUDIES: Destination Rock and Roll
This course fulfills the writing requirement for all undergraduates.
The road trip and rock and roll; two quintessentially American experiences that will form occasions for writing in this course. We will use films like A Hard Day's Night, Almost Famous, Festival Express, Easy Rider, Woodstock, Thelma and Louise, and Rock and Roll Circus to explore the aesthetic relationship between the vast American spaces and the great American music idiom: rock. There will be numerous short writing exercises, designed with an eye to using short pieces of writing as building blocks for larger pieces.
MW 5:00 - 6:30
BAUMLI Kristina
CINE 009.304 - CRITICAL WRITING SEMINAR IN CINEMA STUDIES: In the Zone
This course fulfills the writing requirement for all undergraduates.
The ancient Greeks immortalized their athletes in praise poems and marble sculptures, whereas we tend to use film, play-by-play commentary, and talk radio to celebrate, describe, or critique feats of physical wonder. In this course, we will explore the links between writing and doing, between the mind and the body. We will examine a range of films (possible titles include The Loneliness of the Long Distance Runner, The Natural, and Blue Crush), as well as essays and news articles. We will disregard unreasonable coaches, love interests, and other distracting plot elements to address the problem of “translating” physical form, motion, and experiences into images and words. Students need not be athletes to enroll, but personal experience will form the basis of several writing assignments.
TR 12:00 - 1:30
SADASHIGE Jacqueline
CINE 009.305 - CRITICAL WRITING SEMINAR IN CINEMA STUDIES: Of Sentences and Samurai
This course fulfills the writing requirement for all undergraduates.
This course's gamble is that there's more to learn from samurai films than flashing swordplay. Indeed the figure that the samurai
cuts might well be seen as writerly, from the discipline with which he holds himself, to, yes, even the prowess of his swordmanship. Whether as a royal warrior serving a feudal lord or as a wandering sword-for-hire, the samurai inscribes himself in a larger scriptural history that runs through patronage to free-lance work - all the while scraping out an existence with his blade and showing us what it takes to do something well while most others do it badly. What better lesson for a writing course? Yosh!
TR 5:00 - 6:30
CASCIATO Arthur
CINE 009.306 - CRITICAL WRITING SEMINAR IN CINEMA STUDIES: Cinema of Paranoia
This course fulfills the writing requirement for all undergraduates.
While cinema may be understood as nothing else but a medium for the representation of systematized delusions and the projection of personal, political, and social conflicts, this course explores films that provide an especially fruitful opportunity to write about the phenomenon of paranoia. Students will be given the opportunity to recognize and write according to the principles of other genres of film criticism, including auteur, political, and mise-en-scène styles. The contemporary rhetoric of the superlative will be explored in the one polished film review for the course. Is there a difference between individual anxiety and mass hysteria? What kinds of strategies do societies develop to cope with fear? How does someone become a person beset by pervasive distrust and suspiciousness? Is there more to fear than fear itself? Films and readings include Birth of a Nation, Metropolis, Invasion of the Body Snatchers, Night of the Hunter, and The Manchurian Candidate.
TR 5:00 - 6:30
BURRI Michael
CINE 009.307 - CRITICAL WRITING SEMINAR IN CINEMA STUDIES: Strange Bedfellows
This course fulfills the writing requirement for all undergraduates.
In this seminar, we will consider films, short stories, and essays that foreground the relationship between politics and perversion. Focusing on 20th-century Latin America, we will reflect on how the state defines, manipulates, and seeks to control behavior that it defines as perverse or deviant. We will explore such questions as: What constitutes perversion? When is a text considered political? How does this differ by country or region? We will view such films as Lone Star and Y tu mamá también, and will read short stories by Julio Cortázar and Horacio Quiroga, among others. Writing requirements will include journal entries, Blackboard postings, in-class workshops, and frequent drafts and revisions of papers. Readings will be in English, and films will be subtitled as necessary.
MW 5:00 - 6:30
LAHR-VIVAZ Elena
CINE 202.601 - TOPICS IN FILM PRACTICE: Road Books, Road Movies
Cross-listed: ENGL 292.601
Taking to the road is often a subversive activity, and a traveler can be a social critic as well as a tourist, a refugee or an outlaw. This course will bring together a variety of British, American, French, and Latin American journeys, real and fictitious. The key question in the course will be: What do books and films as different as the following have in common: Henry Fielding's Tom Jones, Vladimir Nabokov's Lolita, John Steinbeck's Grapes of Wrath, Che Guevara's Motorcycle Diaries, Voltaire's Candide, Callie Khourie's Thelma and Louise, and Karen Muller's Hitchhiking 'Vietnam?' Among the literary traditions of travel we'll consider are exile, the picaresque, the satirical, and the pastoral. We'll also look closely at what happens to a novel when it is made into a film. Course work will include short response papers, a mid-term essay, and a research paper on a novel/film of one's choice.
T 5:30 - 8:30
ESPEY David
CINE 204 - Visual Communication
Cross-listed: COMM 262
Examination of the structure and effects of visual media (film, television, advertising, and other kinds of pictures).
TR 4:30 - 6:00
MESSARIS Paul
CINE 222 - JAPANESE CINEMA: Contemporary Fiction and Film in Japan
Cross-listed: COML 256; EALC 257/657
This course will explore fiction and film in contemporary Japan, from 1945 to the present. Topics will include literary and cinematic representation of Japan s war experience and post-war reconstruction, negotiation with Japanese classics, confrontation with the state, and changing ideas of gender and sexuality. We will explore these and other questions by analyzing texts of various genres, including film and film scripts, novels, short stories, manga, and academic essays. Class sessions will combine lectures, discussion, audio-visual materials, and creative as well as analytical writing exercises.The course is taught in English, although Japanese materials will be made available upon request. No prior coursework in Japanese literature, culture, or film is required or expected; additional secondary materials will be available for students taking the course at the 600 level. Writers and film directors examined may include: Kawabata Yasunari, Hayashi Fumiko, Abe Kobo, Mishima Yukio, Oe Kenzaburo, Yoshimoto Banana, Ozu Yasujiro, Naruse Mikio, Kurosawa Akira, Imamura Shohei, Koreeda Hirokazu, and Beat Takeshi.
F 2:00 - 5:00
KANO Ayako
CINE 225 - TOPICS IN THEATER AND CINEMA: The Cult of Celebrity: Icons in Performance, Garbo to Madonna
Cross-listed: ENGL 274; THAR 275
Celebrity is a common commodity in the performing arts. But some celebrities become icons. Their craft and personalities are so remarkable that they alter our perceptions of their art form, and place an indelible stamp on our culture. Garbo, Valentino, Chaplin and James Dean did it for film; Laurence Olivier and Ethel Merman did it for the theatre. Enrico Caruso and Maria Callas did it for opera. Pavlova, Nijinsky and Suzanne Farrell did it for dance. Judy Garland, Frank Sinatra, Johnny Cash, Elvis and Madonna did it for popular music (and every season, AMERICAN IDOL hopes to produce another winner to do it!). This course will consider perhaps twenty performing artists (actors, singer and dancers, some chosen by the class) in two ways. We will analyze their artistry; and we will also examine how and why they come to be regarded as legends. In other words, it is a course about celebrities, as well as the concept of celebrity itself. To support our work, we will use film footage, biography, criticism and analytical essays.
W 6:00 - 9:00
FOX David
CINE 272 - South Asians in the U.S.: Beyond Bollywood
Cross-listed: ASAM 150
This interdisciplinary survey course explores the history and experiences of Asian Indians in the United States. The course pays
particular attention to the cultural politics of Indian American Film. The course is divided into thematic sections. Section I provides
background information on the Indian American community. Section II will broaden the picture by considering issues of class, the model minority myth, family lives, and patterns of acculturation. Sections I and II set the stage to further examine how Indian Americans negotiate new forms of identity. Section III explores popular culture among second generation youth, religious maintenance and adaptation, gender and sexuality, and cultural politics. The course format is a mixture of discussions and presentations. We will view films to compliment presentations and class discussions. The class will be run as a seminar. Reading assignments will include historical, ethnographic and other scholarly texts. This class fulfills the Distribution I: Society requirement.
M 5:30 - 8:30
GWAK S.
CINE 330 - JEWISH FILM AND LITERATURE: The Holocaust: Problems of Representation in Literature and Film
Cross-listed: ENGL 261; JWST 262
This course is about the enormous difficulties faced by those who felt the urgent need to describe their own or others' experiences during the genocide of the European Jews, 1933-1945. We will explore the complex options they have faced as narrators, witnesses, allegorists, memoirists, scholars, teachers, writers and image-makers. Some linguistically (or visually) face the difficulty head on; most evade, avoid, repress, stutter or go silent, and agonize. Part of the purpose of the course is for us to learn how to sympathize with the struggle of those in the latter group. This is not a history course, although the vicissitudes of historiography will be a frequent topic of conversation. Although the course will meet Tuesdays and Thursdays from 1:30 to 3, there will be several required sessions outside those times. Students who enroll in the course must make themselves available for these. One will be a one-day screening of the 9.5-hour film SHOAH on a Sunday in October. Another special session will involve meeting with someone who will report first-hand from a contemporary genocide (in Darfur). Students will write frequent short papers, called "position papers," due often and always before class in order to provide a basis for discussion. The manner of teaching will be discussion, never lecture. Students need not know anything about the Holocaust in order to take the course, although enrollees should consider historical reading over the summer. More information at <http://www.writing.upenn.edu/~afilreis/Holocaust/fall06.html>.
TR 1:30 - 3:00
FILREIS Alan
CINE 365 - TOPICS IN RUSSIAN CINEMA AND CULTURE: Winners and Losers in Film and Literature
Cross-listed: RUSS 449
We will explore a concept of decision making as applied to a wide range of characters in literature and cinematography. In modern approach, the question of one's success and failure is linked to the decision makers' capability, their inner qualities, their ability to set goals, as well as their skills in elaborating strategy and tactics that would prevent them from disasters. In this course, we will refer to folkloric sources from a series of Indo-European traditions (Greek, Russian, East-European), considering different approaches
to success and failure in them. Subsequently, we will examine characters from major European literary and dramatic works-and especially Russian works that exploited the topic of decision making to structure the plot and narrative and to illuminate the role of an individual. Analysis will be informed by classical and contemporary theoretical tools (from ancient philosophers to Upenn's own Prof. Aron Kastenelinboigen). Our investigations will lead ultimately to analytical insight into major works of the western literary and filmic canon.
W 5:30 - 8:30
ZUBAREV Vera
CINE 370 - Blacks in American Film/TV
Cross-listed: AFAM 400
An examination and analysis of the changing images and achievements of African Americans in motion pictures and television. The first half of the course focuses on African-American film images from the early years of D.W. Griffith's "renegade bucks" in The Birth of a Nation (1915); to the comic servants played by Steppin Fetchit, Hattie McDaniel, and others during the Depression era; to the post-World War II New Negro heroes and heroines of Pinky (1949) and The Defiant Ones (1958); to the rise of the new movement of African American directors such as Spike Lee (Do the Right Thing), Julie Dash (Daughters of the Dust), Charles Burnett, (To Sleep With Anger) and John Singleton (Boyz N the Hood). The second half explores television images from the early sitcoms "Amos 'n Andy" and "Beulah" to the "Cosby Show," "Fresh Prince of Bel Air," and "Martin." Foremost this course will examine Black stereotypes in American films and television--and the manner in which those stereotypes have reflected national attitudes and outlooks during various historical periods. This course will also explore the unique "personal statements" and the sometimes controversial "star personas" of such screen artists as Sidney Poitier, Dorothy Dandridge, Paul Robeson, Richard Pryor, Oscar Micheaux, Spike Lee, Bill Cosby, Eddie Murphy, and Whoopi Goldberg. The in-class screenings and discussions will include such films as Show Boat (1936), the independently produced "race movies" of the 1930s and 1940s, Cabin in the Sky (1943), The Defiant Ones (1958), Imitation of Life (the 1959 remake), Super Fly (1972), and She's Gotta Have It (1986) and such television series as "I Spy," "Julia," "Good Times," "The Jeffersons," "Roots," "A Different World," "I'll Fly Away," "LA Law," and "Hangin' With Mr. Cooper."
M 4:30 - 7:10
BOGLE Donald
PRODUCTION AND RELATED FILM COURSES
CINE 061 - Film Video I
Cross-listed: FNAR 061/661
This class offers film and video production as a means of personal expression. Students will be assisted in translating ideas into movies. Super-8 and/or digital video equipment will be provided; students must provide film stock, processing and/or video tapes.
Several sections and times, please check registrar
CINE 062 - Film Video II
Cross-listed: FNAR 062/662
Film/Video II is a hands-on course in super 8mm and/or digital video movie making in which each student plans and creates three short productions. Techniques learned in FNAR 061 will be refined while exploring the role of sound and aesthetics in the flimmaking/video process. Auditors not permitted.
W 4:30 - 7:30
HIRONAKA Nadia
CINE 063 - Documentary Video
Cross-listed: FNAR 063/663
A digital video course stressing concept development and the exploration of contemporary aesthetics of the digital realm, specifically in relation to the documentary form. Building on camera, sound and editing skills acquired in Film/Video I and II, students will produce a portfolio of short videos and one longer project over the course of the semester. Set assignments continue to investigate the formal qualities of image-making, the grammar of the moving image and advanced sound production issues within the documentary context.
M 5:00 - 8:00
HERIZA A.
CINE 065 - Cinema Production
Cross-listed: FNAR 065/665
This course focuses on the practices and theory of producing narrative based cinema. Members of the course will become the film crew and produce a short digital film. Workshops on producing, directing, lighting, camera, sound and editing will build skills necessary for the hands-on production shoots.Visiting lecturers will critically discuss the individual roles of production in the context of the history of films.
W 2:00 - 5:00
HIRONAKA Nadia
CINE 116.401/601 - Screenwriting
Cross-listed: ENGL 116.401/601
This course will look at the screenplay as both a literary text and a blue print for production. Several classic screenplay texts will be critically analyzed (REBEL WITHOUT A CAUSE, DOCTOR STRANGELOVE, PSYCHO, etc.) Students will then embark on writing their own scripts. We will intensively focus on: character enhancement, creating "believable" cinematic dialogue, plot development and story structure, conflict, pacing, dramatic foreshadowing, the element of surprise, text and subtext and visual story-telling. Class attendance is mandatory. Students will submit their works-in-progress to the workshop for discussion.
Section 401: M 2:00 - 5:00
Section 601: M 5:00 - 8:00
LAPADULA Marc
CINE 116.402 - Screenwriting
Cross-listed: ENGL 116.402
This is a workshop-style course for those who have thought they had a terrific idea for a movie but didn't know where to begin. The class will focus on learning the basic tenets of classical dramatic structure and how this (ideally) will serve as the backbone for the screenplay of the aforementioned terrific idea. Each student should, by the end of the semester, have at least thirty pages of a screenplay completed. Classic and not-so-classic screenplays will be required reading for every class, and students will also become acquainted with how the business of selling and producing one's screenplay actually happens. Students will be admitted on the basis of an application by email briefly describing their interest in the course. <kathydemarco@writing.upenn.edu>
T 1:30 - 4:30
DE MARCO Kathleen
CINE 120 - The Role of the Producer
Have you ever wondered why the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences presents the Oscar for Best Picture to a film's producer and not its director, writer, or production company? What, exactly, do producers do to deserve the Academy's highest honor? This course examines the multiple facets of film production through the lens of the producer, demystifying their role by revealing the day-to-day management and operation of a feature film. Accompanying weekly class discussions will be autobiographical readings, screenings of non-fiction television & documentary film, as well as guest lectures from working entertainment professionals providing innumerable examples of the challenges producers face in all stages of filmmaking.
W 6:00 - 9:00
FRANK Stefan
CINE 130.401 - Advanced Screenwriting
Cross-listed: ENGL 130.401
This is a workshop-style course for students who have completed a screenwriting class, or have a draft of a screenplay they wish to
improve. Classes will consist of discussing student's work, as well as discussing relevant themes of the movie business and examining classic films and why they work as well as they do. Classic and not-so-classic screenplays will be required reading for every class in addition to some potentially useful texts like *What Makes Sammy Run*? Students will be admitted on the basis of an application by email. Please send a writing sample (in screenplay form), a brief description of your interest in the course and your goals for your screenplay, and any relevant background or experience. Applications should be sent to <kathydemarco@writing.upenn.edu>
M 2:00 - 5:00
DE MARCO Kathleen
CINE 130.402 - Advanced Screenwriting
Cross-listed: ENGL 130.402
Creative Writing Program in the Center for Programs in Contemporary Writing (CPCW) and the Cinema Studies Program are co-sponsoring a fall 2006 advanced screenwriting workshop to be taught by ALEC SOKOLOW. Sokolow has written 47 screenplays, including TOY STORY (1995), GOODBYE, LOVER (1999), and CHEAPER BY THE DOZEN (2003). For TOY STORY he received an Academy Award nomination. Sokolow lives and works in Los Angeles. He will make three extended visits to Penn. Students must be available for meetings on Thursday evening, all day Friday, and Saturday morning during these three periods:
September 14-16
October 26-28
December 7-9
In addition, the class will meet Fridays with teaching assistant Blake Martin and will confer with Alec Sokolow by phone/conference call. Mr. Sokolow will also work individually with each student by email and phone.
Students will be admitted to this course by permission of the instructor. Applications should be sent to: screenwriting@writing.upenn.edu
Applications should include: a short note describing your interest and relevant experience (coursework and otherwise) and a brief (8 pages max.) sample of your writing. Those with resumes can send one also, but it's not required.
F 2:00 - 5:00
SOKOLOW Alec / MARTIN Blake
CINE 261 - Computer Animation
Cross-listed: FNAR 267/567
Through a series of studio projects, this course will focus on 2D and 3D computer animation. Emphasis is placed on time-based design and storytelling by developing new sensitivities to movement, cinematography, editing, sound, color, and lighting. Compositing software covered in the course will be used to combine 2D graphics, 3D animation, and sound.
MW 4:00 - 7:00
GOLDSTEIN Julie
ENGL 059 - Modernisms and Modernity
Description click <http://www.english.upenn.edu/Courses/Undergraduate/2006/Fall/English-059.001>
McGRATH, Caitlin
MWF 1:00 - 2:00
GRADUATE FILM COURSES
CINE 515 - PROSEMINAR IN CINEMA STUDIES: The Field of Cinema Studies
Why do movies exist? What is most historically significant, theoretically compelling, emotionally gripping, and aesthetically exciting about them? Why do we watch them, and what do we get out of it? This proseminar introduces and debates the big ideas in film studies, including concepts from realism, formalism, feminism, psychoanalysis, cognitive psychology, auteur theory, phenomenology, structuralism, modernism, postmodernism, and popular film criticism. We test theories against a wide range of movies and compare perspectives from a variety of sources and historical periods.
T 6:00 - 8:40
CHARNEY Leo
CINE 793 - TOPICS IN FILM STUDIES: Media, Culture, and Citizenship
Cross-listed: COMM 820
This graduate seminar asks students to engage the varied literature on citizenship in media and cultural studies. Readings include some foundational texts in political theory as well as works by such scholars as Michel Foucault, Toby Miller, Aiwa Ong, Nikolas Rose, Meghan Morris, Chantal Mouffe, Laurie Ouellette, Micki McGee and Lisa Duggan Our orientation within this material is evaluative with respect to (at least two) questions: How can we understand media and culture as arenas for the reproduction of forms of civic discourse and paradigms of the citizen/person. How do researchers, critics, activists and engaged intellectuals move from the macrolevel of theory (e.g. "governmentality"), populated by conceptual monoliths (e.g. the institution, the state, the corporation), to the messy and contradictory microworlds of practice and experience in which subjects and citizens make--and remake--themselves? We will focus on the ways that civic discourse and cultural discourse enmesh across a range of sites, including media texts and realms of production, distribution, and reception. Screenings and assignments emphasize methods and practices in applying theories of media citizenship to visual culture, including short exercises in archival research designed to develop skills in working with primary sources.
M 5:00 - 7:00
McCARTHY Anna
