CINEMA STUDIES

CINEMA STUDIES
(AS) {CINE}

SM 061. (FNAR061, FNAR661) Film/Video I. (C) Staff.

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.

SM 062. (FNAR062, FNAR662) Film/Video II. (C) Staff.

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

SM 063. (FNAR063, FNAR663) Documentary Video. (C) Heriza. Prerequisite(s): CINE 061.

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.

SM 065. (FNAR065, FNAR665) Cinema Production. (C) Mosley.

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.

105. (RELS105) Religion and Film. (M) Distribution Course in Arts & Letters. Class of 2009 & prior only. Staff.

Introduction to different ways in which religion is represented in film. Emphasis upon religious themes, but some attention to cinematic devices and strategies. Although most films studied will deal with only one of the major historical religious traditions (Hinduism, Buddhism, Judaism, Christianity and Islam), the selection will always include at least two of those traditions.

SM 115. (ENGL292) Study of An Author. (C) Staff.

This topic course explores aspects of a Cinema author intensively. Specific course topics vary from year to year. See the Cinema Studies website at <http://cinemastudies.sas.upenn.edu/> for a description of the current offerings.

SM 116. (ENGL116) Screenwriting Workshop. (C) Staff.

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.

160. (ENGL061) British Cinema. (M) Beckman. Penn-in-London.

Fran_ois Truffaut once famously suggested that there was a certain incompatibility between the terms cinema and Britain ; Satyajit Ray declared, I do not think the British are temperamentally equipped to make the best use of the movie camera ; and throughout the history of film criticism, British cinema has been condemned for its theatrical style, lack of emotion, imitation of Hollywood and/or European cinema, and failure to achieve a national character. Yet in spite of this history of dismissal, British cinema has a long and complex history that we will begin to explore through film screenings, critical reading, and visits to archives and museums. Topics covered will include: Early Cinema of Attractions ; British cinema s relation to other countries; war propaganda and the British documentary film; cinematic adaptations of British literature; British film theory; British experimental film/moving images in the art gallery; British cinema and identity. Requirements: attendance at screenings/discussions/trips; final paper; film journal.

SM 201. (ENGL291, GRMN259) Topics in Film History. (M) Distribution Course in Arts & Letters. Class of 2009 & prior only. Katz, Corrigan, Decherney, Beckman.

This topic course explores aspects of Film History intensively. Specific course topics vary from year to year. See the Cinema Studies website at <http://cinemastudies.sas.upenn.edu/> for a description of the current offerings.

SM 202. (ARTH290, COML292, ENGL292) Topics in Film Practice. (M) Distribution Course in Arts & Letters. Class of 2009 & prior only. Katz, Corrigan, Decherney, Beckman.

This topic course explores aspects of Film Practice intensively. Specific course topics vary from year to year. See the Cinema Studies website at <http://cinemastudies.sas.upenn.edu/> for a description of the current offerings.

203. (COMM140) Introduction to Film, Form, and Context. (C) May be counted as a General Requirement Course in Arts & Letters. Class of 2009 & prior only. Messaris.

This course will trace the development of the classical Hollywood cinema, as well as significant alternatives to this dominant mode of representation, by relating analyses of the formal elements of film texts to discussions of film industries and audiences as well as the larger social, historical context. A variety of analytical methods and perspectives will be applied to films drawn from different times and countries in order to consider the cinema as a cultural construction.

204. (COMM262) Visual Communication. (C) Messaris.

Examination of the structure and effects of visual media (film, television, advertising, and other kinds of pictures).

208. (ARTH292, GSOC228, GSOC234) Topics in Gender and Cinema. (C) Beckman.

This topic course explores aspects of Gender in Film intensively. Specific course topics vary from year to year. See the Cinema Studies website at <http://cinemastudies.sas.upenn.edu/> for a description of the current offerings.

SM 210. Topics in Narrative Cinema. (M) Met.

This topic course explores aspects of Film Narrative intensively. Specific course topics vary from year to year. See the Cinema Studies website at <http://cinemastudies.sas.upenn.edu/> for a description of the current offerings.

SM 211. (ENGL295) Topics in Film Theory. (M) Distribution Course in Arts & Letters. Class of 2009 & prior only. Decherney.

This topic course explores aspects of Film Theory intensively. Specific course topics vary from year to year. See the Cinema Studies website at <http://cinemastudies.sas.upenn.edu/> for a description of the current offerings.

L/R 220. (EALC125) Chinese Cinema. (B) May be counted as a General Requirement Course in Arts & Letters. Class of 2009 & prior only. Staff.

This topic course explores aspects of Chinese Cinema. Specific course topics vary from year to year. See the Cinema Studies website at <http://cinemastudies.sas.upenn.edu/> for a description of the current offerings.

SM 225. (ASAM275, ENGL256, GSOC275, THAR273, THAR275) Topics in Theater and Cinema. (M) Distribution Course in Arts & Letters. Class of 2009 & prior only. Staff.

This topic course explores aspects of Film and Theater intensively. Specific course topics vary from year to year. See the Cinema Studies website at <http://cinemastudies.sas.upenn.edu/> for a description of the current offerings.

SM 232. (COLL223, COML226, LALS240, PRTG240, SPAN223) Luso-Brazilian Film. (M) Arts & Letters Sector. All Classes. Gouveia.

This course will survey films from different Portuguese-speaking countries. Still unknown to many viewers, Luso & Brazilian films include a variety of genres and styles. We will explore films from the cultural perspective of Portugal, Cape Verde, Mozambique, and Brazil. The first segment of this course will expose students to theoretical approaches to the study of film. The second segment of the course will focus on Portugal and Portuguese-speaking countries in Africa. We will also discuss emblematic Portuguese filmmakers such as Manuel de Oliveira and African writers whose work has been translated to the screen such as Mia Couto and Germano de Almeida. The third segment will focus on Brazilian films produced since the mid 1990s.

In the early 1990s, there was a virtual collapse of Embrafilme (the state agency that funds most Brazilian films). Brazilian cinematic production only resumed around 1995. Throughout the last 8 years numerous quality films have been released, many of them directed by a new generation of filmmakers. Films like Cidade de Deus, Carandiru, Onibus 174 present a critical view of political, social and economic issues in post-dictatorial Brazil. Most of the films also provide commentaries on (and are themselves part of) the effects of economic and cultural globalization. Inequality, corruption, poverty, violence, crime, drugs, and prejudice are themes that permeate all of these films. The course will be conducted in English.

SM 270. (ENGL270, LALS270) Latino-American Cinema. (M) Staff.

This topic course explores aspects of Latin-American Cinema intensively. Specific course topics vary from year to year. See the Cinema Studies website at <http: offerings.

SM 272. (ASAM150, ASAM202, ENGL272) Asian-American Literature and Film. (M) Staff.

This topic course explores aspects of Asian-American Literature and Cinema intensively. Specific course topics vary from year to year. See the Cinema Studies website at <http://cinemastudies.sas.upenn.edu/> for a description of the current offerings.

SM 295. (ENGL266) Topics in Cultural Studies. (M) Distribution Course in Arts & Letters. Class of 2009 & prior only. Decherney.

This topic course explores aspects of Film Cultural Studies intensively. Specific course topics vary from year to year. See the Cinema Studies website at <http://cinemastudies.sas.upenn.edu/> for a description of the current offerings.

SM 300. Cinema and Other Arts. (C) Distribution Course in Arts & Letters. Class of 2009 & prior only. Beckman.

This topic course explores aspects of Film in others arts intensively. Specific course topics vary from year to year. See the Cinema Studies website at <http://cinemastudies.sas.upenn.edu/> for a description of the current offerings.

329. (COML282, NELC159) Modern Hebrew Literature and Film. (C) Arts & Letters Sector. All Classes. Gold.

Topic varies semester to semeester. Past topics have included: Film and Literature: Childhood in Times of Peace and War; War and Love: Heroism and Anti-Heroism in Israeli Writings; Jewish Film and Literature: Childhood Memory; Fantasy, Dreams & Madness in Hebrew Literature: Escape or Solution; Voices (of Others) of Israel; Jewish Film & Literature: History & Memory. Fall 2005: Holocaust in Literature and Film: The momentous Holocaust narrative, "The Diary of Anne Frank," appeared in 1947, one year prior to the establishment of the Jewish State. The Israeli psyche and therefore Israeli art, however, "waited" until the 1961 public indictment of a Nazi war-criminal to hesitantly begin to face the Jewish catastrophe. The Zionist wish to forge a "New Jew" was in part responsible for this suppression. Aharon Appelfeld's understated short stories were the first to enter the modernist literary scene in the 1960s, followed in 1970 by the cryptic verse of Dan Pagis, a fellow child survivor. Only in 1988 did the Second Generation of survivors reveal themselves. Indeed, two Israeli-born pop singers--haunted children of survivors--broke the continuous practice of concealing the past and its emotional aftermath in the watershed documentary "Because of That War."

SM 330. (COML282, ENGL279, GRMN261, JWST262) Jewish Film and Literature. (M) Staff.

SM 340. (COML300, HIST322, ITAL300, ITAL380) Topics in Italian Cinema and Culture. (M) Distribution Course in Hist & Tradition. Class of 2009 & prior only. Staff.

Modern Italy has added to the traditional belle arti of painting, sculpture and architecture new fields like fashion, industrial design and film. "Made in Italy" has come to stand all over the world for quality workmanship and fine design. Yet this same country has been involved in the last hundred years in two terrible world wars, a brutal fascist dictatorship, violence both political and criminal and a flood of emigration. In this course we will review that history, its triumphs and disasters, by combining film and written tests. Both media are equally important and ought to enrich each other. The weekly film is part of that work and you will be expected to do the assigned reading as well. This course will be open to seniors and juniors, and sophomores (with special permission).

L/R 352. (COML241, GRMN256, RELS236) Devil's Pact Literature and Film. (C) Arts & Letters Sector. All Classes. Richter.

For centuries the pact with the devil has signified humankind's desire to surpass the limits of human knowledge and power. From the reformation chap book to the rock lyrics of Randy Newman's Faust, from Marlowe and Goethe to key Hollywood films, the legend of the devil's pact continues to be useful for exploring our fascination with forbidden powers.

SM 370. (AFRC400) Blacks in American Film and Television. (C) Bogle.

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."

SM 392. (ARTH489, ENGL392) Topics in Cinema Studies. (M) Corrigan.

This topic course explores aspects of Cinema Studies intensively. Specific course topics vary from year to year. See the Cinema Studies website at <http://cinemastudies.sas.upenn.edu/> for a description of the current offerings.

SM 550. (COML552, GRMN550) Topics in German Cinema. (K) Staff.

This graduate topic course explores aspects of German Cinema intensively. Specific course topics vary from year to year. See the Cinema Studies website at <http://cinemastudies.sas.upenn.edu/> for a description of the current offerings.

SM 619. (COMM619) The Politics and Practices of Representation. Sender.

This course engages with the following question from both theoretical and practical perspectives: Who says what about whom, under what circumstances, in which medium, with what effects? We will spend the first two thirds of the semester investigating different approaches to this question, looking at insider accounts, processes of othering, realism and other narrative conventions, the ethics of consent, "objective" and "biased" shooting techniques, the politics of editing, the role of the intended audience in the production of a work, and so on. We will simultaneously cover the technical aspects of production that will enable you to produce digital video projects: shooting (Canon GL1s), lighting, sound, editing (Final Cut Pro on Mac), graphics, music, and so on. During the final third of the semester all students will produce short (5-10 minute) documentary and/or experimental digital videos.

SM 680. (COML595, FREN680) Topics in French Cinema. (M) Met.

This graduate topic course explores aspects of French Cinema intensively. Specific course topics vary from year to year. See the Cinema Studies website at <http://cinemastudies.sas.upenn.edu/> for a description of the current offerings.

SM 694. (SPAN694) Mexican Cinema. (M) Staff.

This seminar will address the specificity and uniqueness of Spanish America's cultural production, that is, those elements that make the Spanish American case differ from the paradigmatic postcolonial situation, and which make recent developments in postcolonial studies not fully applicable to it. We will explore these issues in the context of the literary production of the twentieth century in Spanish America from roughly the twenties to the present, that is, the epoch encompassing the larger metropolitan cultural phenomena of Modernism and Postmodernism.

SM 793. (ASAM510, COML653, ENGL591, ENGL797, SAST610) Topics In Film Studies. (M) Staff.

Topic varies.