CONCORDIA UNIVERSITY MEL HOPPENHEIM SCHOOL OF CINEMA 2009-2010 FILM STUDIES SUMMER SESSION, SEMINARS, NEW COURSES, SPECIAL TOPICS, AND ROTATIONAL LECTURE COURSES This Film Studies Bulletin is designed to assist you with your course selection during registration. For example it contains information on rotational lecture courses which are not normally offered every year. Some may be offered once every two years, while others may not be offered again while you are at Concordia. Use this Bulletin along with the Undergraduate Class Schedule and the Undergraduate Calendar as you select your courses. This Bulletin does not contain the full list of Film Studies courses to be offered in 2009-10. Courses such as Studies in Film Directors and History of Film Since 1959 are described in the Calendar, listed in the Class Schedule and are offered every year. You should consider the full range ofFilm Studies courses as you make your selection. Seminars are described in section III of this Bulletin. Seriously consider taking a Seminar if your grades in Film Studies classes have been at least at the B+ level. Seminars allow a small group of students to follow topics in detail outside the large classroom environment. Film Studies advisors can give you the required written permission to register and can provide more information about Seminars. Phone the School of Cinema Office (514-848-2424 Ext. 4666) to make an appointment with a Film Studies advisor. I. SUMMER 2009 FMST 335K/i ASPECTS OF NATIONAL CINEMAS (3 credits) Special Subject: New Directions in Contemporary European Cinema Prerequisite: Second-year standing. Instructor: Rosanna Maule Monday and Wednesday: 13:15-17:15 This course proposes an overview ofEuropean cinema since the 1980s,with specific focus on: 1. Changes in national and trans-national film systems and industries. 2. Cultural identity in 1980s and 1990s European films. 3. New film aesthetic in European cinema. In the introduction and in the first part of the course we will analyze systems of film production, distribution, and exhibition that have been developed over the past two decades by European governments, national film industries, and trans-national film production, agencies and programmes, as well as individual film producers and filmmakers. Case studies: mainstream European films; Euro-American films; post-socialist Eastern European cinemas; Luc Besson’s production and distribution studio Europa Corp. In the second part of the course we will concentrate on European film forms, styles, genres, and movements that have recently proposed innovative techniques or aesthetics. Case studies: French cinema du look, Dogma films. In the third part of the course, we will analyze film movements and films that deal with issues of political and cultural identity, with specific focus on issues of gender, sexual preference, post-colonialism, and nationalism. Case studies: Claire Denis; New Scottish cinema; Irish cinema. In the final part of the course we will analyze the work of a number of filmmakers who have become established in their national film contexts, as well as in the international film scene. Case studies: Alejandro Amenábar, Nanni Moretti, Fath Akin, and Olivier Assayas. FMST 398R11 SPECIALTOPICS IN FILM STUDIES (3 credits) Special Subject: Luis Buñuel and Mexican Cinema Instructor: TBA Tuesday and Thursday: 18:00-22:00 A course which provides an opportunity for the study of limited and more specialized aspects offilm studies. NOTE: The registration date for Summer courses is March 18 until May 12. II. FALL/WINTER 2009-10 FMST 325 4 FILM ACTING (3 credits) Prerequisite: Second-year standing. Instructor: TBA Monday: 13:15-17:15 The course begins with a basic analysis of “Method” acting, using three films directed by Elia Kazan. We discuss the various techniques that are considered part of “Method” acting and the history ofthose techniques, starting with the work of Konstantin Stanislavky. The course then moves onto a study of improvisation in performance, and the second wave of Method performances potentially including actors such as: Al Pacino; Jane Fonda; Bruce Dern; Jon Voight; and Gena Rowlands. Other topics to be covered under the rubric ofperformance studies are: British performance and how it differs from Method acting; self- consciousness and excess; minimalism; films about performance (which will focus on films in which performers are part of a film or theatre project.) A term paper is required. FMST 335T/2 ASPECTS OF NATIONAL CINEMAS (3 credits) Special Subject: TBA Instructor: TBA Wednesday: 18:00-22:00 An examination offilms as reflections ofnational cultures. Films by a range of directors representing one or several national groupings such as Japan, Brazil, Eastern Europe, Great Britain, or contemporary West Germany are discussed in the context of their aesthetic, cultural, and political aspirations. Weekly screening. The specific topic will be announced as soon as possible in the online version of this Film Studies Bulletin. FMST 348F/4 SPECIAL TOPICS IN ART AND FILM (3 credits) Special Subject: TBA Wednesday: 8:45-12:45 A comparative examination of some aspects offilm studies and art history. Contact the Art History Department for information about this course. FMST 391 2 SEXUAL REPRESENTATION IN CINEMA. (3 credits) Prerequisite: 24 credits completed; or 6 credits completed in the Minor in Interdisciplinary Studies in Sexuality program. Instructor: TBA Monday: 13:15-17:15 This large enrolment interdisciplinary course is designed for students in the programs in sexuality, film studies and communication studies, as well as for any student interested in sexuality, cinematic representation and cultural studies. Topics included: sexual imagery as art, communication and socio-cultural phenomenon; utopia, taboo, fantasy, commodity. Films and videos range from mainstream features and explicit erotica to experimental & documentary shorts, scanning a century offilm history. Four-hour weekly lecture-screenings. Course requirements include a group research project and a choice of research termpaper, take-home exam or screenings/readingsjournal. FMST 392/4 REPRESENTATION AND SEXUALITY: QUEER CINEMA I (3 credits) Instructor: TBA Wednesday 18:00-22:00 This eclectic and interdisciplinary introduction to lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender moving images ranges over almost a century offilm history and several cultural frameworks. Queerness filmed and film queered, with an emphasis on queer directors. In the past, course assignments have included a group research project plus a choice of research paper,journal or take-home. The main course text is Now You See It (Richard Dyer with Julianne Pidduck,2003). Students of all faiths are welcome. III. SEMINARS FMST 4194 SEMINAIRE SUR LE CINEMA QUEBECOIS (3 credits) Prerequisite: FMST 215 Instructor: TBA Wednesday: 18:00-22:00 Un séminairedans lequel des aspects sélectifsdu cinema québécoissont analyses et discutés. Les sujets d’étude choisis varient d’annéeen annéeselon Ia spécialisationde l’instructeur. This Seminar is given in French. FMST 4222 SEMINAR IN FILM THEORY AND CRITICISM (3 credits) Prerequisite: FMST 212 and written permission ofthe School ofCinema Instructor: Martin Lefèbvre Wednesday: 8:45-12:45 This seminar will focus on some of the major figures of what is now referred to as “Classical Film Theory”. The course is addressed first and foremost to students who want to learn about the history offilm theory and the development of ideas about film from the silent period to the 1960’s. Classical Film Theory concerns a period in the study of the cinema that pre-dates the full blown emergence of a discipline offilms studies, one that, for the most part, precedes the development of a film studies curriculum in universities, the emergence of specialized academicjournals, the rise of professional film studies associations, etc. Thus film theory was left to a group of individual thinkers often initially trained in either philosophy, psychology, art history, sociology, or other disciplines within the Humanities and working in isolation, but whose vision nonetheless introduced some of the most important and lasting debates about the nature offilm and its relation to reality and the other arts. The course will center on the writings of 5 important figures of classical Film Theory: Hugo Munsterberg, Sergei M. Eisenstein, RudolfArnheim, AndréBazin and Siegfried Kracauer. Students will be asked to read the works of these theorists which will then be discussed in class. Lectures will situate the different theories in their intellectual context. And since film theory does not develop out of “thin air”, but in relation to films, films and film excerpts will be screened so as to contextualize and/or exemplify the work of each of the theorists considered. FMST 423/4 SEMINAR IN COMPARATIVE STYLISTIC AND FORMAL ANALYSIS (3 credits) Special Subject: Orson Welles and Alfred Hitchcock Prerequisite: Written permission ofthe School ofCinema. Instructor: John Locke Wednesday: 13:15 17:15 This seminar examines the work of Orson Welles and Alfred Hitchcock. Each week a film by Welles or Hitchcock is screened and then discussed using detailed analyses of video segments. The seminar is about the use offormal analysis to understand film style. An additional aim of the close analysis of these films is to question familiar critical views about them. These films have been discussed so frequently in the literature that an effort needs to be made to break with the conventional views and look again at the films themselves. The principal written work required is an essay about a particular Welles or Hitchcock film selected by the student at the beginning ofthe term. The student concentrates on this one film during the entire term. FMST 498S/2 SPECIAL TOPICS IN FILM STUDIES (3 credits) Special Topic: Advanced Studies in Film Acting Instructor: Carole Zucker Thursday: 13:15-17:15 This course will cover both fundamental and advanced topics in performance, so it is appropriate for students who have taken FMST 325 (Film Acting) as well as those who have not taken the undergraduate lecture course. Amoungst the topics to be studied are: the Method vs. classical performance; improvisational techniques; masculinity; the body; in-depth analyses of television and theatre performances using two different performances of the same text; meta-textual performance (films about acting); and sociological views of performance. Oral presentations and written work will be required.