English 373S:  Film Theory and Criticism  Fall 2003 Jefferson Hendricks Centenary College of Louisiana

Texts:

• Steven Prince, Movies and Meaning:  An Introduction to Film.  3rd ed.   (MM)
• Jim Kitses and Gregg Rickman, The Western Reader  (WR)
• Annette Insdorf, Double Lives, Second Chances:  The Cinema of Krzysztof Kieslowski  (KK)

Syllabus:
 

Unit 1:  Elements of the Cinema:  How Movies Mean

Week 1:

Tu      Aug 26:       Introduction to class

Th      Aug 28:       The Apartment (USA, 1960.  Dir. Billy Wilder)

• MM:  Chapter 1:  "Film Structure"
• review/essay -- The Apartment -- Roger Ebert, Chicago Sun-Times
• "The Apartment"  --  Tim Dirks, Greatest Films
  
• review/essay -- The Apartment -- Andrew Chan, Film Written Magazine
• "Billy Wilder: The Chiaroscuro Artist" -- Anna Dzenis, Senses of Cinema
• "The One Who Liked it Hot" -- Stephen Hunter, Washington Post
• Billy Wilder -- Richard Armstrong, Senses of Cinema
• Billy Wilder -- The German-Hollywood Connection
• "The Writer Speaks: Billy Wilder" -- compiled by Melville Shavelson, Written By Magazine
• Billy Wilder:  A Bibliography of Materials in the UC Berkeley Library

Week 2:        The Hours  (USA, 2002.  Dir. Stephen Daldry)

Tu      Sep 2

• MM:  Chapter II:  "Cinematography"

• MM:  Chapter III:  "Production Design and Performance Style"
• review -- The Hours -- Roger Ebert, Chicago Sun-Times
• review -- The Hours -- Phillip French, Guardian
• review -- The Hours -- Peter Bradshaw, Guardian

Week 3:       Klute  (USA, 1971.  Dir. Alan J. Pakula)

Tu     Sep 9

• MM:  Chapter IV:  "Editing:  Making the Cut"
• "Detective/Mystery Films"  -- Tim Dirks, Greatest Films
  

Th    Sep 11

• MM:  Chapter  V:  "Principles of Sound Design"

Week 4:       The Night of the Hunter   (USA, 1955.  Dir.  Charles Laughton)

Tu     Sep 16

• MM:  Chapter VI:  "The Nature of Narrative in Film"
• MM:  Chapter VII:  "Modes of Screen Reality"

Th     Sep 18      ***  Quiz #1  (on chapters 1-7 of Prince's Movies and Meaning)

• MM:  Chapter X:  "Film Criticism and Interpretation" 
  
• "The Night of the Hunter"  --  Roger Ebert, Chicago Sun-Times
• "The Night of the Hunter"  -- Tim Dirks, Greatest Films
• "The Night of the Hunter"  -- Andrew Chan, Film Written Magazine
• "Long Shadows" -- Jonathan Romney, The New Statesmen
• "The Night of the Hunter" -- Gerald Peary, Boston Phoenix
  

Week 5:       Beau Travail  (France, 2000.  Dir. Claire Denis)  

Tu     Sep 23

• MM:  Chapter  VIII:   "Hollywood International"
  
• MM:  Chapter XI:  "Models of Film Theory" -- "Realist Models"
  
• "Claire Denis:  An Interview"  -- Aime Ancian, Senses of Cinema
• "Desire is Violence:  An Interview with Claire Denis"  -- Chris Darke, Sight and Sound
• "Claire Denis Interviewed by Jonathan Romney"  -- The Guardian
  

Th      Sep 25

• MM:  Chapter IX:  "The Cinema in an International Frame" 
  
• MM:  Chapter XI:  "Models of Film Theory" -- "Auteurist Models"
• "Poetic Labor:  Beau Travail"  --  Jonathan Romney, The New Statesmen
• "Beau Travail:  Some Call It Loving"  --  Helen Bandis, Senses of Cinema
• "Beau Travail"  -- Charles Taylor, Salon
• "Unsatisfied Men:  Beau Travail"  -- Jonathan Rosenbaum
• "Melville Unbound:  Love, Rage and Exile in Claire Denis’ Beau Travail"   --  Brendan Bernhard, LA Weekly

Week 6:        Peeping Tom  (United Kingdom, 1960.  Dir. Michael Powell)

Tu      Sep 30   

• MM:  Chapter XI:  "Models of Film Theory" -- "Psychoanalytic and Ideological Models"
• MM:  Chapter XI:  "Models of Film Theory" -- "Feminist and Cognitive Models"

Th       Oct 2        ***  Quiz #2  (on all of Prince's Movies and Meaning and the films we've seen so far in class--up through Peeping Tom)

• "Peeping Tom" -- Jaime Christy, Film Written Magazine
• "Peeping Tom"  -- Laura Mulvey
• "Shudder Bug:  Peeping Tom Looks at the Primal Screen"  -- Peter Keough, The Boston Phoenix
  
• "Michael Powell and Emeric Pressburger" -- Adrian Danks,  Senses of Cinema
• "Who's Looking at Who?  Peeping Tom -- Cinema's Visual Pleasures and Discontents"  -- Derek Baldwin
  
• links to reviews of Peeping Tom -- The Powell and Pressburger Pages

Week 7:            Visiting Filmmakers Week -- Sam Green and Jeffrey Goodman will introduce and lead discussions on their films)

Tu      Oct  7        The Weather Underground  (USA, 2002.  Dirs. Sam Green and Bill Siegel)

• the "official" The Weather Undergrouind site
  
• "The Weather Underground"  -- Roger Ebert, Chicago Sun-Times
• "Notes from Underground"  -- J. Hoberman, Village Voice
• "Left Out in the Cold"  --  Tom Smucker, Village Voice
• "When Terroism Was Cool"  -- Andrew O'Hehir, Salon.com
  
• "A Trip Back to the Contradictions of the Stormy 60's"  --  Elvis Mitchell, New York Times
• "Day of Rage:  The Weather Underground and Civil Brand"  -- Ernest Hardy, LA Weekly
  
• "Forecast:  Anarchy:  'The Weather' Captures 1960s Activism"  -- David Sterritt, Christian Science Monitor
• "The Weather Underground"  -- Tim Merrill, Film Threat
  
• "Sam Green and Bill Siegel's "The Weather Underground" -- Quiet Storytelling About Radical Subjects" -- Ray Pride, Indiewire.com

Th      Oct 9         A Matter of Principal  (USA, 2003.  Dir. Jeffrey Goodman)

• "The Passion of Jeffrey Goodman is 'A Matter of Principal'" -- Rusty White
• "Shreveport Native to Direct Feature Film"   --  Amy Mercer,  Shreveport Times
• "official" Max Allan Collins site
• "Killers, Cover-Ups, and Max Allan Collins" -- J. Kingston Pierce, January Magazine
• a Max Allan Collins bibliography
  

***   Essay #1 due:  Friday, October 10 by 2:00 pm in Jackson Hall 307
 
 
 

Week 8:         NO CLASS -- FALL BREAK

Tu      Oct 14

Th      Oct 16
 

Week 9:            My Darling Clementine  (USA, 1946.  Dir. John Ford)

Tu       Oct 21       

• "Introduction:  Post-modernism and The Western"  -- Jim Kitses  (WR)
• "Movie Chronicle:  The Westerner"  -- Robert Warshow (WR)
  
• "The Evolution of the Western"  -- Andre Bazin  (WR)
  
• "John Ford" -- Richard Franklin, Senses of Cinema
• "Introduction" to John Ford Interviews -- Gerald Peary
  

Th      Oct 23

• "A Home in the Wilderness:  Visual Imagery in John Ford's Westerns"  -- Michael Budd (WR)
• "Concerning the Weary Legs of Wyatt Earp:  The Classic Western According to Shakespeare" -- Scott Simmon  (WR)
  
• "My Darling Clementine"  -- Roger Ebert, Chicago Sun-Times
  
• "My Darling Clementine"  -- Tim Dirks, Greatest Films
  

Week 10:                Rio Bravo  (USA, 1959.  Dir. Howard Hawks)

Tu       Oct 28   

• "Authorship and Genre:  Notes on the Western"  -- Jim Kitses  (WR)
  
• "Six Creeds that Won the Western"  -- Raymond Durgnat and Scott Simmon  (WR)
  
• "Howard Hawks" -- David Boxwell, Senses of Cinema
• Howard Hawks bio -- Petri Liukkonen
• "Howard Hawks:  The Grey Fox of Hollywood" -- Todd McCarthy 
  

Th      Oct 30

•  "Pilgrims and the Promised Land:  A Genealogy of the Western"  --  Doug Williams  (WR)
• "Inventing Monument Valley:  Nineteenth Century Landscape Photography and the Western Film"  --  Edward Buscombe  (WR)
• "Rio Bravo and Retrospect"  -- Robin Wood (WR)
  

Week 11:                Unforgiven  (USA, 1992.  Dir. Clint Eastwood)

Tu       Nov 4

• "How the Western was Lost"  -- J. Hoberman  (WR)
• "A Fistful of Memories:  Interview with Clint Eastwood"  --  Kenneth Turan  (WR)
• "He Went Thataway:  The Form and Style of Leone's Italian Westerns"  --  Marcia Landy  (WR)
  
• "Clint Eastwood:  'Scraps of Hope'"  --  Henry Sheehan, Film Comment
  

Th      Nov 6

• "'Maybe He's Tough But He Sure Ain't No Carpenter':   Masculinity and In/competence in Unforgiven"  --  Janet Thumim  (WR)
  
• "Unforgiven"  -- Tim Dirks, Greatest Films
• "'We all Have it Coming, Kid:   Clint Eastwood and the Dying of the Light"  -- Tim Groves, Senses of Cinema
• "The Un/forgiven Director" -- Tim Groves, Screening the Past
• "Eastwood:  'Go Ahead, Punk;  Go Ahead, Clint'"  --  Greg Wahl, Images
  

Week 12:            The Ballad of Little Jo  (USA, 1993.  Dir. Maggie Greenwald)

Tu       Nov 11

• "Women and the Western"  -- Pam Cook  (WR)
• "Saloon Girls and Ranchers' Daughters:  The Woman in the Western"  --  Blake Lucas  (WR) 
  

Th      Nov 13

• "Our Heroes Have Sometimes Been Cowgirls:  An Interview with Maggie Greenwald"  --  Tania Modleski  (WR)
• "An Examplary Post-Modern Western:  The Ballad of Little Jo"  --  Jim Kitses  (WR)
  
• "The Ballad of Little Jo"  -- Roger Ebert, Chicago Sun-Times
• "The Ballad of Little Jo"  --  B. Ruby Rich
  
• "The Ballad of Little Jo"  -- Linda Lopez McAlister
  

Week 13:            Three Colors:  Blue  (France/Poland/Switzerland/UK, 1993.  Dir. Krzysztof Kieslowski)  

Tu       Nov 18

• "Remembering Krzystof:   A Photographic Exhibition"  -- Piotr Jaxa
• "Krzysztof Kieslowski" --   Doug Cummings,  Senses of Cinema

Th      Nov 20

• "Kind of Blue"  -- Nick James, Sight and Sound
• "Reading Three Colours:  Blue"  -- Richard Rushton, Senses of Cinema

Week 14:          NO CLASS -- THANSGIVING BREAK

Tu       Nov 25

Th      Nov 27
 
 
 
 

Week 15:            Three Colors:  White  (France/Poland/Switzerland/UK, 1993.  Dir. Krzysztof Kieslowski)

Tu       Dec 2

Th      Dec 4

• "Three Colors:  White"  -- Roger Ebert, Chicago Sun-Times
• "Three Colors:  White"  -- James Berardinelli
  
• "Three Colors:  White"  -- Rumsey White
• "White"  -- Edwin Jahiel
  

Week 16:            Three Colors:  Red   (France/Poland/Switzerland/UK, 1994.  Dir. Krzysztof Kieslowski)

Tu       Dec 9

Th      Dec 11

• "The Three Colors Trilogy"  -- Toh Hai Leong, Kinema
• "The Three Colors Trilogy"  -- Roger Ebert, Chicago Sun-Times
• "The Three Colors Trilogy"  -- Michael S. Smith, PopMatters
  
• comments on The Three Colors Trilogy and other Kieslowski films -- Acquarello,  Strictly Film School
• "We Live in the World Lacking Idea on Itself":  Krzysztof Kieślowski's Art of Film" -- Tadeusz Miczka, Kinema
• review of Kieslowski on Kieslowski -- Jan Uhde, Kinema
  
• links for photos, articles, dissertations, and more on Kieslowski  @  Kino Kieslowski