Year One
In your first you will be introduced to the foundations of film and television analysis theory and history
You will also encounter new exciting topics which allow you to specialise in your degree
These include
Theories for Film Studies
Visual Cultures
Screen Technologies
Year Two
In your second you will study modules in World Cinema and Hollywood Cinema History Theory Industry These modules will develop your understanding of specific world and transnational film cultures You will also choose one (or a maximum of two) of the following modules
• Silent Cinema
• Television History and Criticism
• Film and Television Stardom
• Audio-Visual Avant-Gardes
• National Cinema
You may be able to select one further optional module from within the Faculty of Arts subject to approval from the Head of Department
Year Three
In your final you will be able to specialise in a wide range of topics led by staff with specific expertise These will be taught alongside the compulsory-long core module on Film Aesthetics 1 and Film Aesthetics 2
You can also apply to make a short film on our Film Production module in partnership with London Film School Alternatively you can choose to write and research an independent dissertation project of your choice
Year One
Film and Television Analysis
Look closely No closer still Let’s watch that again
In this module the text is king We want to give you intensive practice in looking at and listening closely to films and television programmes Lectures will equip you with the technical and analytical vocabulary of textual analysis In the discussion-based seminars that follow you’ll get to practice using and applying these terms yourself in a supportive environment building up your confidence and command of the terminology that will be your academic language for the next three Written work is designed to build you up to a point where you can create your own reasoned and carefully argued interpretations of film texts We’ll set readings each week that introduce you to the best of critical scholarship and get you to begin to evaluate and reflect upon other accounts and interpretations of film
We think it’s really important that you are exposed to a variety of films from different times in different styles and from different nations Each we carefully choose our film screenings to offer you the chance to experience and compare different approaches to the expressive use of film form and mise-en-scène We want you to be able to examine in detail the ways in which stylistic choices create meaning and affect interpretation
What might you watch? Sunset Boulevard (Billy Wilder US 1950) Elephant (Gus Van Sant US 2002) La Règle du jeu (Jean Renoir France 1939) Uncle Boonmee Who Can Recall His Past Lives (Apichatpong Weerasethakul Thailand 2010) Edge of Heaven (Germany Turkey Fatih Akin 2007) M (Fritz Lang Germany 1931) The West Wing (NBC 1999-2006) Miranda (2009-2015) This Morning (ITV 1988- present) The Wire (HBO 2002-2008)
Read more about the Film and Television Analysis moduleLink opens in a new window including the methods of teaching and assessment (content applies to 2021 22 of study)
Film and Television Criticism
In this module you will be introduced to key critical debates in Film and Television Studies You will explore a range of approaches to critical writing about film as well as the key critical turns in the study of television There will be a historical focus to this work which will think about the development of film and television scholarship over time
As your skills develop you will be encouraged to make reasoned and carefully argued interpretations and to reflect upon the validity of other accounts and interpretations both in group discussion and through reading of critical scholarship on module films and programmes
What might you watch? The Wizard of Oz (Victor Fleming 1939) Gun Crazy (Deadly is the Female) (Joseph H Lewis 1950) Thelma and Louise (Ridley Scott 1991) Alice in den Städten (Wim Wenders 1974) Texas Chainsaw Massacre (Tobe Hooper 1974) Gogglebox (Channel 4 2013-) Ghostwatch (BBC Television 1992) The Royal Wedding (BBC1 2011); London 2012 Olympic Opening Ceremony Isles of Wonder (BBC1 2012); Dallas (Lorimar Productions CBS 1978-1991); 24 Hours in A&E (The Garden Productions Channel 4 2011-present); CSI Crime Scene Investigation (Jerry Bruckheimer Television Alliance Atlantis CBS 2000-present); Seinfeld (Castle Rock Entertainment NBC 1989-1998)
Read more about the Film and Television Criticism moduleLink opens in a new window including the methods of teaching and assessment (content applies to 2021 22 of study)
Film History
You will connect your growing understanding of film’s technological development with its industrial and social history In exploring the relationship between cinema and society you will increase your understanding of the role of the state in film production and the place of cinema in mass culture These fundamental theoretical approaches will be accompanied by case studies giving you a firm grounding in film history as well as an enhanced understanding of different ways of analysing the historical record
Read more about the Film History moduleLink opens in a new window including the methods of teaching and assessment (content applies to 2021 22 of study)
Film Theory
Film Theory introduces key theoretical concepts related to film form spectatorship and politics The module will enable you to read film theory as a written text and a historical document and to use it as a theoretical tool for interpreting screen media As a theory course the module will give you the skills needed to approach theoretical texts and we will be focusing as much on analysing written arguments as discussing the screenings
By the end of the module you will be familiar with some of the key theoretical frameworks and debates in film scholarship and their position within broader interdisciplinary contexts You should be able to read complex critical writing with confidence and precision and to deploy theoretical arguments in your own writing with similar confidence and rigor You will be able to apply theoretical frameworks to screen media texts in both oral and written communication
What might you watch? Le Crime de Monsieur Lange (Jean Renoir 1939) The Gleaners & I (Agnès Varda 2000) The Bourne Ultimatum (Paul Greengrass 2007) Il posto (Ermanno Olmi 1961) Written on the Wind (Douglas Sirk 1956) Gilda (Vidor 1956) Mahogany (Berry Gordy 1975) Starship Troopers (Paul Verhoeven 1997)
Read more about the Film Theory moduleLink opens in a new window including the methods of teaching and assessment (content applies to 2021 22 of study)
The Business of Film
In this module you will gain a historical conceptual and practical grounding in the nature of film as a national transnational and global industrial and economic practice It will introduce you to a range of key issues and approaches that have shaped global film industries from the end of the Second World War through to the present day You will explore many of the elements by which film may be understood as not just a cultural but also a socio-economic phenomenon These will include such themes as the evolution of international trends in film finance production distribution exhibition and marketing and the application of enduring concepts such as authorship genre and stardom to many of these aspects
You will also examine matters related to political economy and film policy with weekly topics that might include the role of government policy funding and support; the intervention of state and cross-cultural organisations such as the British Film Institute Channel 4 the BBC and the EU; questions of censorship and regulation; and the management of issues related to social and cultural diversity
Overall the module will help you to contextualise much of the foundational teaching and learning from across your first
Read more about the The Business of Film moduleLink opens in a new window including the methods of teaching and assessment (content applies to 2021 22 of study)
Theories for Film
In this module you will explore theoretical models that have been taken up by scholars within Film Studies but were originally developed in other subject areas These include English Literature Philosophy and Psychology You will engage with a range of theories that offer different constructions of textuality meaning and interpretation You will gain knowledge of major shifts in theorisation by addressing key paradigms such as structuralism psychoanalysis Marxism semiotics deconstruction and postmodernism You will also apply these theoretical models to specific film texts adding a conceptual dimension to your textual analysis
Read more about the Theories for Film moduleLink opens in a new window including the methods of teaching and assessment (content applies to 2021 22 of study)
Screen Technologies
Cinema didn’t get to where it is today by standing still
There are innovations that changed cinema forever – its invention the introduction of synchronised sound digital imaging technology But these events didn’t happen overnight and nor did they happen in a vacuum
This module will connect an understanding of film’s technological developments with its industrial and social history You’ll gain new perspectives upon the history of moving image media by studying key moments of transition You’ll become familiar with important theoretical and historiographical approaches to technological change By the end of the module you’ll have a firm grounding in technological film history and will be able to apply these new ways of thinking to the other films you encounter as you progress through your degree
What might you watch? 2001 A Space Odyssey (Stanley Kubrick 1968); Sortie d’usine (Louis Lumière 1895); The Jazz Singer (Alan Crosland 1927) Citizen Kane (Orson Welles 1941) Leave Her to Heaven (John M Stahl 1945) Lola Montès (Max Oplüls 1955) Jurassic Park (Steven Spielberg 1994) Festen (Thomas Vinterberg 1998) Tangerine (Sean Baker 2015)
Read more about the Screen Technologies moduleLink opens in a new window including the methods of teaching and assessment (content applies to 2021 22 of study)
Visual Cultures
In this module you will explore the relationships between different types of visual media including film photography video games and artwork and develop a wider understanding of them to complement and extend that gained in the Year One film modules You will also explore the basics of television studies a strand that you will have the option to continue as you progress through your degree programme
Read more about the Visual Cultures moduleLink opens in a new window including the methods of teaching and assessment (content applies to 2021 22 of study)
Year Two
Hollywood Cinema History Theory Industry
This core module will build on what students have learned about Hollywood in first modules (such as Film History and Screen Technologies) by expanding their knowledge about Hollywood as an industry its history (depending on when it is taught this may extend from the classical period into the post-classical and contemporary period) and theoretical concepts that engage with Hollywood cinema The module will illustrate important aspects about the Hollywood industrial filmmaking system including style genre and stars By first focusing on Hollywood as an industry examining the practices and cultures of film production the module will then consider its ideological influence by promoting specific American values and traditions through political issues such as race and ethnicity
Read more about the Hollywood Cinema History Theory Industry moduleLink opens in a new window including the methods of teaching and assessment (content applies to 2022 23 of study)
World Cinema
The category of ‘world cinema’ represents a point of convergence for both the flattening impulses of a universalizing neoliberalism and the more radical bents of internationalist coalition-building In other words such cinema figures large in affective negotiations of global culture world community and international human rights This module looks at the wide range of fictional feature films including the work of Deepa Metha Akira Kurosawa Samira Makhmalbaf and Satyajit Ray among others This course addresses several specific topics including transnational marketing the touristic gaze the politics of dubbing subtitling and the slow cinema debates
This module reassesses ‘world cinema’ in light of globalization and global crises Since the term ‘world cinema’ has always simultaneously invoked industrial generic and aesthetic categories our reckoning of the field hopes to expose otherwise unseen geopolitical fault lines We investigate the historical and current contexts for the widening distribution of non-Hollywood films We also examine the renaissance of international art cinema practices in recent decades including new waves from East Asia Latin America and the Middle East
What you might watch? Run Lola Run (Tom Tykwer 1998); Aguirre the Wrath of God (Werner Herzog 1972); Ali Fear Eats the Soul (Rainer Werner Fassbinder 1974); Good Bye Lenin! (Wolfgang Becker 2003); The Baader Meinhof Complex (Uli Edel 2008); Stray Dog (Akira Kurosawa 1949); Sansho Dayu (Kenji Mizoguchi 1954); Tokyo Story (Yasujiro Ozu 1953); Crazed Fruit (Ko Nakahira 1956); Face of Another (Hiroshi Teshigahara 1966); Ring (Hideo Nakata 1998); My Neighbour Totoro (Hiyao Miyazaki 1988); Still Walking (Hirokazu Kore-eda 2008); Pather Panchali (Ray 1955); Riso Amaro Bitter Rice (Giuseppe De Santis 1949); Rashomon (Kurosawa 1950); De cierta manera One Way or Another (Sara Gómez 1977); The Apple (Samira Makhmalbaf 1998); What Time Is It There? (Tsai 2001); Fire (Deepa Metha 1996); Lan Yu (Stanley Kwan 2001); Peking Opera Blues (Tsui 1986)
Read more about the World Cinema moduleLink opens in a new window including the methods of teaching and assessment (content applies to 2021 22 of study)
Year Three
Film Aesthetics
You will begin by exploring overarching ideas about aesthetics and how these relate to evaluative historical and political discourses The study of film aesthetics will subsequently see you applying these tenets to the evaluation and interpretation of film particularly in the light of considerations of representation mode and genre and social context By bringing together philosophical and theoretical questions of aesthetics with detailed textual analysis of a range of films you will learn to apply such concepts to your understanding of contemporary international cinema
Read more about these modules including the methods of teaching and assessment (content applies to 2021 22 of study)
Film Aesthetics 1Link opens in a new window
Film Aesthetics 2Link opens in a new window
Optional modules
Optional modules can vary from to Example optional modules may include
Dissertation
The Practice of Film Criticism
British Film and Television Fiction
The Art of Animation
Postmodernism and Hollywood
Horror and the Gothic in Film and TV
Television History and Criticism
Postwar Japanese Cinema
Issues in Documentary
Screenwriting
Queer Screens
Science Fiction Theory as Film
Choice of modules offered by the English Department and the Faculty of Arts (subject to agreement)
Film Production
Ecocinema
Global Visions
Film and Social Change
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