Approaches to Film Criticism is a survey course that will build on the experience of Com 204, Film as Art. The course will examine critical approaches to film in the classical, modern, and post-modern periods. In passing, you will examine the roles of the film industry, the audience, and the culture as they influence and are affected by the kind of movies we make and watch. In examining these critical approaches, you will adopt a very “hands-on” stance by first evaluating the merits of the theories and then by applying them to films, film industry, audience, and culture. The introduction to film criticism will provide the occasion for looking at key issues in current criticism: the director as author, genre, spectator, gender, race, culture, and audience reception as they arise in the flow of film criticism.
Course Objectives:
- You will evaluate the common assumptions that we share about movies.
- You will grasp the norms used in evaluating films.
- You will recognize the plurality of critical approaches found in film studies today.
- You test these approaches as applied to popular films with which you are familiar.
- You will also examine other styles of filmmaking and film criticism from older periods of film and from different national cinemas.
- You will develop an awareness of the relationship of aesthetic and social, political and cultural issues regarding film and approaches to them.
Course Requirements:
- Two short, 6-8 page papers applying a critical approach to a film not used in class.
- A mid-semester and final examination.
- Occasional and unannounced quizzes on assigned readings.
- Attendance: this class will adopt a seminar approach to the topic and will count on your consistent attendance, careful preparation and rigorous participation in the class discussions. Because you cannot participate if you are not present, two points will be deducted from your final grade for each unexcused absence.
- Academic ethics: academic misconduct will not be tolerated. If you cheat, you will fail the assignment and probably the course. Further, you will be reported to the dean’s office for appropriate disciplinary action, which could lead to expulsion from the university.
Academic misconduct includes the following behaviors:
- using another student’s work on either papers or tests,
- using ideas from other sources (encyclopedia, books, journals, on-line data bases) with out crediting the source,
- coping large (more than six consecutive words) portions from other sources without giving credit to the source.
- Using papers which have been written in previous semesters,
- Using notes or “crib sheets” during an examination.
This course will be offered in the Fall of 2000
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