Film Style and Form 2

Subject is not scheduled Not scheduled

Code Completion Credits Range Language Instruction Semester
311FSF2 exam 3 2 hours (45 min) of instruction per week, 54 to 69 hours of self-study English summer

Subject guarantor

Name of lecturer(s)

Department

The subject provides FAMU International

Contents

The spring term will focus 1/ on sound, the often neglected aspect of film style, and 2/ on narration. The students will watch films in their entirety on their own and short extracts illustrating particular topics in the class. The discussion is an important part of each lesson. Mutual exchange of ideas and artistic experiences enables the students to gain as much inspiration as possible. Students should ask anything that is not clear enough, bring their own ideas and participate actively in the whole course. (The course partially covers the topics for CDM final exam.)

  1. Sound: Introduction
  2. The Functions of Dialogue in Narrative Film
  3. Dialogue in Melodrama and other genres
  4. Music in Film I: Dance Music
  5. Music in Film II: Musique concrète
  6. Noise and silence
  7. Point of Audition
  8. Narration: Introduction
  9. Point of View
  10. Spectator in the Text
  11. Network Narratives
  12. Voice-over narration: First-person narrator + Third-person narrator
  13. Complex TV: narration in TV series
  14. Theme: Final Test / Feedback

Learning outcomes

By the end of the course students will:

Prerequisites and other requirements

Preferably Film Style and Form 1, however it is not a condition of attending no. 2.

Students must attend all classes. If a student is sick or has another duty (e.g. needs to be present on the shooting), they need to apologize to the professor ahead, otherwise, the absence is treated as unexcused. A student with the extensive absences, i.e. five and more (whether excused or unexcused) may fail the course.

Literature

Recommended Reading:

Bordwell, David, and Kristin Thompson. Film Art. An Introduction. McGraw-Hill, 2010. 78-101, 269-298.

Bordwell, David. ”Mutual Friends and Chronologies of Chance.” Poetics of Cinema. New York and London: Routledge, 2008. 189-250.

Branigan, Edward. “The Point of View Shot.” Movies and Methods, vol. II. Ed. by Bill Nichols. Berkeley, Los Angeles, London: University of California Press, 1985. 672-691.

Brickman, Barbara Jane. “Coming of Age in the 1970s: Revision, Fantasy, and Rage in the Teen-Girl Badlands.” Camera Obscura 22:66 (September 2007), 24-59.

Browne, Nick. “The Spectator-in-the-Text: The Rhetoric of Stagecoach.” Film Quarterly 29.2 (Winter 1975-76): 26-38. (see http://faculty.washington.edu/cbehler/glossary/browneSpec.html)

Coyle, Rebecca. “Point of Audition. Sound and Music in Cloverfield.” Science Fiction Film and Television 3:2 (2010), 217-238.

Hexel, Vasco. “The use of dance music and the synergy of narrative vehicles in Run Lola Run.” The Soundtrack 3.2, 83-96.

Koizumi, Kyoko. “Creative Soundtrack Expression. Tôru Takemitsu’s Score for Kwaidan.” Genre, Music, and Sound: Terror Tracks: Music, Sound, and Horror Cinema. Ed. by Philip Hayward. London: Equinox Publishing Ltd., 2009. 88-100.

Kozloff, Sarah. Invisible Storytellers: Voice-Over Narration in American Fiction Film. University of California Press, 1989. 41-102.

Kozloff, Sarah. Overhearing Film Dialogue. Ewing, NJ: University of California Press, 2000. 33-63, 235-266.

Mittell, Jason. Complex TV : the poetics of contemporary television storytelling. New York: New York University Press, 2015.

Nardelli, Matilde. “Some reflections on Antonioni, sound, and the silence of La Notte.” The Soundtrack 3:1 (2010), 11-23.

Evaluation methods and criteria

The final grade will be calculated as follows: Class attendance and participation (33,33%); presentation (33,33%); final test (33,33%)

Note

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Further information

No schedule has been prepared for this course

The subject is a part of the following study plans