I am excited to take this journey with you. It is my honor and privilege to teach this class. -Harrison

Transcription

1 1 Cinema 3 / James Mission College / PUC Triumph Charter, Fall 2014 Harrison James Adjunct Assistant Professor of Cinema harrisonjames7676@gmail.com Mobile: Section 6802 Monday and Wednesday 3:30-5:35 Office hours: Monday and Wednesday 2:30-3:30, by appointment. The purpose of this class is to experience, understand, be moved, expanded, and transformed by art in the medium of film. Our journey will involve analyzing and studying films (and the language of film) from their inception to present day, with the intention of catharsis and coming closer to our own humanity and hearts. I am excited to take this journey with you. It is my honor and privilege to teach this class. -Harrison Cinema 03 SLO#1Students will analyze a variety of American feature films in relation to artistic, economic, and technological history of motion pictures. Suggested ancillary text: A History of Narrative Film, Fourth Edition, David A Cook, Published by W.W. Norton and Company. Grading: Weekly tests: 40% Paper 1: 15% Paper 2: 15% Final Paper: 30% Both weekly tests and papers must be typed, double-spaced. Please turn in hard copies.

2 2 Class 1: Introduction to film language. Begin class study of Ordinary People. History of story telling. What is a narrative? The invention of moving pictures. Lumiere Films. Homework: Pages in the text. DW Griffith, Birth of a Nation Class 2: Silent Comedy. City Lights. Homework: Pages Buster Keaton, Steamboat Bill Class 3: German Expressionism. The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari Homework: Pages Murnau, Nosferatu Class 4: Soviet Montage. Strike by Eisenstein. Homework: Pages Battleship Potempkin PAPER #1 DUE FOR CLASS 5. Class 5: Out of the Silent Era: Pre-code Hollywood. TheDivorcee. Homework: Pages Pick one: The beginning of genre: Early gangster or early musical. Pick one: Scarface, Public Enemy, Little Caesar, 42nd St., Gold Diggers. Class 6: WB vs. MGM: Low Road vs. High Road. Grand Hotel.(MGM) Homework: Angels With Dirty Faces. (WB) Class 7: 40 s Golden Age Hollywood: Spotlight on Stagecoach Homework: Pick one: Mr. Smith Goes to Washington, Gone With the Wind,Goodbye Mr. Chips, Hunchback of Notre Dame, Wizard of Oz, The Women.

3 3 Class 8: Golden Age continued Citizen Kane Homework: Pages Beginning of Noire: Casablanca THESIS PAPER PROPOSAL DUE FOR CLASS 9. Class 9: Noire: Maltese Falcon Homework: Pages Pick one: The Big Sleep, To Have and Have Not, The Third Man. Class 10: Italian Neo-Realism: Rome: Open City Homework: Pages The Bicycle Thief Class 11: Hollywood in the 50 s, plus Method acting. On the Water Front. Homework: Pages Pick one: Psycho, North by Northwest, Streetcar named Desire, Judgment at Nuremburg. Class 12: French New Wave: Auteur. 400 Blows Homework: Pages Pick one: Breathless, Contempt, Jules et Jim, Murmur of the Heart, Les Amants, Claire s Knee. Class 13: Italian Auteur: The Flip Side. L Aventura. Homework: Pages Pick one: 8 1/2, La Dolce Vita, The Passenger, Red Desert. PAPER #2 DUE FOR CLASS 14. Class 14: Death of Hollywood Studio: The Great Age of the 70 s- American Classic Cinema. Chinatown Homework: Pages Pick one: Taxi Driver, The Godfather, Apocalypse Now

4 4 Class 15: Blockbuster. Jaws Homework: Pick one: The Fugitive, The Exorcist, Titanic FINAL PAPER DUE CLASS 16. Class 16: The 80 s. Fatal Attraction, Terms of Endearment, Fast Times at Ridgemont High Cinema 3 Paper Topics / Harrison James / 2015 All papers must be typed. Please use correct spelling and grammar, as these will reflect in your grade. Please italicize film titles. Paper 1: Comparative. Soviet Montage, German Expressionism, American Silent Comedy. Watch two movies, BOTH from Soviet Montage, German Expressionism or American Silent Comedy. Why did these movies happen in this particular time in history? What are the similar elements that speak to the movement of the time? Place these questions in a HISTORICAL CONTEXT, including FILM LANGUAGE. 3 5 pages. OR: Comparative. New School / Old School. Choose 1: Battleship Potempkin with Apocolypse Now and God Father 2 (compare montage only); Cabinet of Dr. Caligari and Nosfaratu with Psycho and Batman Returns (compare in terms of German Expressionism style and film language); City Lights with Manhattan (compare the work of Charlie Chaplin with the work of Woody Allen). 3-5 pages.

5 5 Paper 2: Either: Investigate the term Auteur - what does this mean? Choose a director from above mentioned and unpack his work. Make sure to talk about the work from director s history and origin, director s voice, prominent themes in director s work, visual statement, lighting, color, camera, editing, performance, etc. Or: Politics of the Golden Age in Hollywood: Investigate the hierarchy and politics of Warner Brothers during the 1940 s. What was the world of the studio like then? Who were the players? What were their relationships? What did they want, and what did they do to get what they wanted? This is a research paper. Please use at least 5 sources and document them. Or: Post WW 2. Films and their significance. A Gentleman s Agreement, Best Years of our Life. Watch these films and break them down. Meditate upon them. How did they reflect the post WW II climate in terms of visual language (camera, lens, lighting, editing, blocking, production design), tone, mood, story, performance and dialogue? In addition, research this question: How did these films help shape or change future films, politics or world viewpoints? Please footnote your research. Any choice is 3 5 pages. Final Paper: Independent study- Thesis paper. (must be approved). Choose either one director or one time period or one global region or one genre, and explore. Paper must include research, discussion of at least 3 films, and bibliography. 3-5 pages.

6 6 Weekly Test 1, Cinema 3 James 1. Describe some differences you saw between the Lumiere films and Birth of a Nation. 2. Why was Birth of a Nation so controversial 3. Do you think Birth of a Nation should be banned? Why or why not? 4. What was the climax of Birth of a Nation? (*Extra Credit) 5.What about Birth of a Nation made you feel something or changed your way of thinking? How did you get inside the film? What tools did you use from class if any?

7 7 Test #2, Cinema 3, James 1. Describe the historical events that precipitated the films of Charlie Chaplin and Buster Keaton and how these events influenced their work. 2. What is Mise en Scene? Describe. 3. What does David Cook mean when he says, Chaplin and Keaton understood that comedy lives very close to tragedy? How do these directors express this statement in their films? 4. How does City Lights make a departure from Birth of a Nation? 5. Compare/Contrast either City Lights and Steamboat Bill. (or anything of Keaton s films). Discuss film language.

8 8 Test #3 Cinema 3, James 1.What did German Expressionism filmmakers attempt to express through subjectivism? 2. Why did the German Expressionists prefer to work in a studio as apposed to the street? 3. How did this period in German history affect the content of the films? 4.Who was your Expressionist painter? Describe 3 paintings and tell me what makes them indicative of Expressionistic art. What similarities did you find between these paintings and Expressionist films? 5. Compare and contrast Nosferatu with the homework film you watched. Be sure to talk about the language of film (camera, lighting, editing, performances, etc.) and not just the story line! (Continue on back page).

9 9 Test #4, Cinema 3, James 1. Describe the philosophy of Marxism and its influence on the films of Eisenstein. 2. Describe how the proletariat was to be educated and how this education was portrayed in Battleship Potemkin. 3. Describe the political climate in Russia from and how what was going on historically influenced Soviet montage films. 4. Describe thesis, antithesis, and synthesis as it applies to Soviet montage. 5. Choose a sequence of shots from either Battleship, REDS, or Strike, and break in terms of camera placement, lighting, editing, mise en scene, etc. Describe how these elements create meaning. 6. If you did the extra credit assignment, describe the montage in either Apocalypse Now or Godfather 2, and how said montage gave meaning to film.

10 10 Test #5, James, Cinema 4, Pre-Code Era 1.Describe in detail why the two pre-code films you saw were indicative of the pre-code era and could not have been made after the Hayes Code. 2. Explain in detail why Eisenstein and other formalist filmmakers were opposed to the introduction of sound films. Why were Hollywood producers for it? 3. Describe a sequence of 5 shots in one of the films you saw, and break down how the film language of these shots creates meaning.

11 11 Test #6, James, Cinema 3 1. Unpack the psychologies of Kane and Susan, and describe how Orson Welles uses the camera and film language to express these. 2. Describe three film language/story telling techniques for which Welles was responsible. 3. Based on class discussion, research, and watching Casablanca, discuss why Casablanca is considered to be the beginning of Film Noire.

12 12 Test #7, James Film Noir 1. Describe what constitutes a noir film, what cinematic lineage it evolved from, and how its historical context affects its content and aesthetic. 2. The male characters in The Big Sleep, Double Indemnity, and the Maltese Falcon were all anti-heroes. Describe why. 3. Discuss the ambiguous moral ground of the Noir films you watched as it applies to both the male characters and the femme fatales they play against.

13 13 Test #8, James Italian Neo Realism 1. Describe how the political climate in Italy before the inception of Neo-Realism, and how Italian Neo-Realism organically grew out of this political ground. 2. Describe in detail the stylistic qualities of Neo-Realism, and what ideological yearnings they are rooted in. 3. Describe how either Rome, Open City of Bicycle Thieves fit the Italian Neo-Realist paradigm in terms of their film language and story. 4. How do the Italian Neo-Realists differ from the filmmakers of Film Noire in terms of their response emotionally and stylistically to W.W.II?

14 14 Test 9, Cinema 3, James 1. Describe the teachings of Stanislavski, Lee Strasberg and Stella Adler, and describe how Method acting influenced American cinema. 2. Research a Method actor and watch a film he or she is in. What can you observe about the performance that makes it indicative of the Method? 3. Describe your own experience with the Method exercises - what did you learn about yourself? 4. How did On The Waterfront and the films of Hitchcock reflect the political climate of the 50 s in America?

15 15 Test #10, Cinema 3, James 1. Describe the auteur theory and how and where it originated. 2. What makes an auteur director and auteur? 3. How did the auteur movement differ from and bring about the fall of the studio system in American cinema? 4. What are some stylistic elements from either Truffaut or Fellini that you felt made him an auteur director?

16 *Students with Disabilities: Disabled Students Programs and Services (DSP&S) at Los Angeles Mission College is a support system that enables students to fully participate in the college s regular programs and activities. DSP&S provides a variety of services from academic and vocational support to assistance with Financial Aid. If you are a disabled student and need a modification, special assistance or accommodation in order to participate in this class, alert the instructor promptly and contact the DSP&S office at or Modifications, special assistance or accommodations can only be made with proper documentation and coordination with DSP&S. 16