Module Identifier |
TF30720 |
Module Title |
FILM ANALYSIS AND INTERPRETATION |
Academic Year |
2001/2002 |
Co-ordinator |
Professor Martin Barker |
Semester |
Semester 2 |
Other staff |
Ms Tricia Rhodes |
Pre-Requisite |
TF10210 , TF31920 |
Course delivery |
Lecture | 20 Hours |
|
Seminar | 5 Hours |
|
Practical | Viewing sessions |
Aims
To introduce students to number of competing approaches to film, paying particular attention to: the role of ancillary materials and commentaries (reviews, controversies, merchandising and narrative extensions); issues of taste and the problems of judgements of quality; the porousness of films to other systems of meaning (for instance, star meanings); and debates about the purposes of film analysis, in particular with reference to the way film analyses make claims about the nature of audiences.
Learning Outcomes:
Typically, upon completion of the module, students will be able to:
- Address a range of film texts more deeply, and particularly by reference to the ways in which the `meanings? of films are a
function of processes and contributions from outside the individual film;
- Demonstrate an understanding of different approaches to film analysis, and take up a critically thought-out position in relation
to them;
- Explore the significance of satellite materials for our understanding of films;
- Demonstrate the ability to think critically about the concepts of `taste?, and to connect these to thinking about your own film
preferences;
- Evaluate `figures of the audience?, both for their role in debates around films, and their claim on actual audiences.
Content:
The module takes a number of (in the main recent) films, and uses them to examine a series of processes not normally given much attention within film studies: the role of publicity, marketing, merchandising, reviews, interviews, debates and gossip around films in shaping audiences? expectations and ways of responding; the ways films fit within taste-cultures, and the implications of these for understanding, for examples, controversies over some films; the way analyses of films (both academic and non-academic) import `figures? of the audience to support their claims about films? `meanings?, `messages?, or `effects?; and how, in the light of these, we may ourselves make claims about the purpose, quality, function and effectivity of films.
Reading Lists
Books
** Essential Reading
Barker, Martin & Austin, Thomas. (2000)
From Antz to Titanic; Reinventing Film Analysis. London, Pluto Press
Bordwell, David. (1989)
Making Meaning: Inference and Rhetoric in the Interpretation of Cinema,. Boston: Harvard UP
Thompson, Kirstin. (1988)
Breaking the Glass Armour. Princeton University Press
Hollows, Joanne & Jancovich, Mark, eds.. (1995)
Approaches to Popular Film. Manchester University Press
Kuhn, Annette (ed). (1990)
Alien Zone: Culture Theory and Contemporary Science Fiction Cinema. London: Verso
Staiger, Janet. (1990)
Interpreting Films. Princetn UP
Maltby, Richard. (1983)
Harmless Entertainment. London: Scarecrow Press
Kerr, Paul. (1986)
The Hollywood Film Industry: A Reader. London: RKP
Wasko, Janet. (1995)
Hollywood in the Information Age. Austin: University of Texas Press
Barker, Martin & Sabin, Roger. (1996)
The Lasting of the Mohicans: History of an American Myth. Jackson: University of Mississippi Press
Horton, Andrew & McDougal, Stuart Y,. (1998)
Play it Again, Sam: Retakes on Remakes. Berkeley: University of California Press
Dyer, Richard. (1979)
Stars. London: BFI
Dyer, Richard. (1987)
Heavenly Bodies: Film stars and Society. Basingstoke: Macmillan
Sconce, Jeffrey. (1995)
'"Trashing" the academy: taste, excess, and an emerging politics of cinematic style' Screen. Winter
Neale, Steve, & Smith, Murray, eds.. (1998)
Contemporary Hollywood Cinema. London: Routledge
Wells, Paul. (1998)
Understanding Animation. London: Routledge