Introduction to film studies:
Answer TWO questions. Word limit 1000 words per question.
Total 2000 words (excluding bibliography). 10% over or under the work limit is
acceptable.
Harvard style is also
permitted; all quotations and paraphrasing must include page numbers of the
original text. eg. (Schatz 2004, p. 691). Marks will be determined according to
the extent to which your essays adhere to or depart from the guidelines. NOTE:
You cannot write on the same films in both essays.
Submit both your essays in a single document. Make sure that
the document you submit is the correct version. Do not contact your tutor with
an updated or corrected file. This will not be marked. Include the question
number on the first page of each essay. SELECT TWO OF THE FOLLOWING QUESTIONS
Word Limit: 1000 words each question (total 2000 words)
1. Mise-en-scène Film openings are thresholds: they mark a
passage from an everyday world to a world constructed in cinematic terms.
Traditionally, the mechanics of this process are hidden; this is to create the
impression that the world that forms the basis of the story has always been
there. Analyse two films screened in the course where the operations of
mise-en-scène render this process of world-building explicit, rather than
implicit. How does this shift our experience of the film? Your answer needs to
include detailed and accurate analysis of specific scenes and the formal
elements that comprise mise-en-scène.
2. Auteurism In its most progressive guise, the auteur is an
effect of style, rather than simply a biographical person. With reference to
the films of two auteurs studied in the course, explain what is of value in
this reconceptualization. How does it shift the assumptions and practices of
filmic analysis that underpin an auteurist approach to cinema? Your answer
needs to include detailed and accurate analysis of specific scenes and the
formal elements that comprise an ‘authorial signature.’
3. Narrative & Narration ‘A film’s narration not only
manipulates degrees of knowledge but also manipulates the depth of our
knowledge. . . Just as there is a spectrum between restricted and unrestricted
narration, there is a continuum between objectivity and subjectivity.’
(Bordwell, 85) Discuss how this relationship between restricted and
unrestricted narration as well as objectivity and subjectivity operate in two
films screened during the course. Your answer needs to include detailed and
accurate analysis of specific scenes and formal elements.
4. Editing & Montage David Bordwell and Kristin Thompson
cite Eisenstein as the basis for their claim that discontinuity editing, in
contrast to classical continuity editing, invites the viewer to make emotional
and conceptual connections between shots (Film Art, 12th edition, p.259).
Explore this claim via Eisenstein’s various forms of montage, explaining how
they produce effects that are different from continuity editing style. Your
answer needs to include detailed and accurate analysis of specific scenes and
formal elements related to both Soviet montage and continuity editing in two
films studied in the course.
5. Sound In a good
film, the heard space is, at the very least, as dynamic as the visual space.
This is to say that with all films we need to look closely at the construction
of not only the optical, but also the auditory point of view or, better, the
‘point of audition.’ The idea of a point of audition is concerned with the
matter of where a sound comes from and whose auditory capacities a film invites
us to share. Analyse two films screened in the course where the possibility of
identifying a point of audition is questioned. In what ways does this occur?
Your answer must provide an accurate and detailed analysis of specific filmic
moments and evidence a close engagement with the ideas and concepts presented
in the lecture.
