Below is the list of questions for the two short essays. Please, choose only two essay questions from the list and prepare your responses thoughtfully. Please proofread the responses before you submit them. Thank you.
1) ESSAY GUIDELINES:
I. FORMATTING
1. Each response needs to be 2 pages (= 4 paragraphs) minimum, TYPED in 12-point font (Times New Roman), double-spaced, with one-inch margins.
2. Please include your first and last name at the top of the page.
3. Type out the question number and the title of the film you’ll be talking about before you begin writing your response. I.e.: “#1 Modern Times.”
II. CONTENT
4. Your answer should be minimum four (4) thoughtfully written paragraphs. Draw upon lecture, discussion, screenings, and readings. Be sure to correctly use specific film studies terminology.
5. The answer should include a brief description of the film in general (1-2 sentences maximum) as well as discussion of specific scenes, sequences, and moments from the films to elucidate your points. The more detailed your answer, the more points you will receive.
6. Please, bold the key terms of your response.
2.) ESSAY QUESTIONS:
Choose two questions and write a thoughtful, detailed and well-organized response.
1.) Modern Times (1936)
Define:
a) Why we describe cinematic language as “invisible” and
b) What are the narrative and aesthetic devices that enable it?
c) Explain and analyze:
How does Charlie Chaplin’s Modern Times (1936) deploy cinematic invisibility to both critique the industrialized mechanization of labor as well as emotionally engage the viewer?
Identify and discuss THREE specific (narrative and/or aesthetic) devices allowing for cinematic invisibility in Modern Times and discuss them in relation to concrete scenes from the film.
2.) Persepolis (2007)
Define:
a) What are we talking about when we discuss film images in terms of their explicit and implicit meaning?
b) What is a film’s cultural invisibility?
c) Explain and analyze:
Choose TWO scenes from Marjane Satrapi’s and Vincent Paronnaud’s Persepolis (2007) and discuss them in terms of their explicit and implicit meanings. Consider also the elements constituting their cultural invisibility of these two scenes. In relation to the latter (cultural invisibility), you might also want to discuss how do the two filmmakers ensure that people with other cultural backgrounds than their own understand what Perspolis attempts to convey?
3.) Casablanca (1942)
Define:
a) Narrative devices and
b) Visual style used in Classical Hollywood Style.
c) Explain and analyze:
Discuss TWO narrative and TWO stylistic Classical Hollywood deviceS deployed in Michael Kurtiz’s Casablanca (1942).
Use concrete examples (shots, scenes, or sequences) from the film to discuss these devices and, most importantly, their effects on the meaning of the film.
4.) Fruitvale Station’s (2013)
Explain and analyze:
What elements of Ryan Coogler’s Fruitvale Station’s (2013) narrative and mise-en-scène seem to be inspired by Italian Neorealism? Refer to concrete examples (shots, scenes, or sequences) in the film and give an interpretive analysis of how both narrative and design choices influence the overall meaning of the film. To answer this question, please:
a) Identify and analyze TWO instances of Italian Neorealist influence on the Fruitvale Station’s narrative structure.
b) Identify and analyze Italian Neorealist influence on ONE of the elements of mise-en-scène.
5.) Citizen Kane (1941)
Explain and analyze:
a) Can we say that Orson Welles’s Citizen Kane (1941) is a Film Noir? Identify and describe TWO elements of Film Noir style that Citizen Kane incorporates. To do that, choose two relevant scenes form the film.
b) Identify and describe ONE innovation that Orson Welles’s Citizen Kane’s (1941) brought to cinematic language. Discuss what kind of novel interpretations might this innovation offer that Classical Hollywood filmmaking style didn’t? To illustrate your idea please give concrete examples from the film.
REVIEW OF SCREENINGS AND FILM TERMS YOU NEED TO BE FAMILIAR WITH FOR THE MIDTERM EXAM:
LIST OF SCREENINGS:
Modern Times (dir. Charlie Chaplin, 1936)
Persepolis (dir. Marjane Satrapi & Vincent Paronnaud, 2007)
Casablanca (dir. Michael Curtiz, 1942)
Pulp Fiction (dir. Quentin Tarantino, 1994)
Blade Runner (dir. Ridley Scott, 1982)
Fruitvale Station (dir. Ryan Coogler, 2013)
Citizen Kane (dir. Orson Welles, 1941)
FILM TERMS AND CONCEPTS:
Chapters 1 and 2
Implied / explicit meaning
Form / content
Familiar image
Theme
Motif
Cultural invisibility
Cinematic invisibility
Parallel editing – patterns
Time/space – expand, condense, real-time
Montage
Realism/antirealism
Verisimilitude
Chapter 3 – Film Types
Narrative
Narrative Structure: Exposition, Rising action, Climax, Falling action, Denouement
Documentary – instructional, persuasive, propaganda, direct cinema
Experimental film
Hybrid film
Genre – story formulas, themes, character types, setting, presentation, stars
Gangster, film noir, science fiction, horror, the western, the musical
Animation – hand-drawn, digital, stop motion
Chapter 4 – Narrative
Narration
Narrative
Narrator – direct address, first-person, voice-over, third person, omniscient, restricted narration
Characters (round/flat) – protagonist, antagonist, anti-heroes, obstacles
Narrative structure – three-act structure: Act 1: exposition & set up – inciting incident,
Act 2: Conflict and obstacles – rising action – crisis & climax, and Act 3: Resolution – falling action & denouement.
Non-linear narrative
Story/plot
Cause/effect
Diegetic/non-diegetic elements
Plot order
Major/minor events
Duration – story, plot, screen duration – summary (screen duration = shorter than plot duration), stretch (screen duration = longer than plot duration), real-time (screen duration corresponds directly to plot duration).
Repetition – familiar image, motif, themes
Surprise/suspense
Setting
Scope
Chapter 5 – Mise-en-scène
Design (setting, décor, properties, lighting, costume, makeup, hairstyle)
Composition (framing: off-screen/on-screen space, open/closed frames; kinesis-camera movement and movement within the frame: figures-blocking/proximity).
Chapter 6 – Cinematography
Properties of the shot (Film Stock, Black and White, Color, Lighting-high-key/low-key)
Implied Proximity (extreme long shot, long shot, medium shot, medium close-up, close-up, extreme close-up)
Depth (deep composition, deep focus photography, rule of thirds)
Camera Angle and Height (eye level/high/low/dutch/aerial/scale)
Camera Movement (pan, tilt, dolly, tracking, zoom, crane, handheld, steadicam)
Framing and Point of View (omniscient POV, character POV, and group POV)
Speed and Length of Shots (slow motion, fast motion, long take)
Special Effects (in-camera, mechanical-effects, laboratory-effects, CGI)
Other terms:
Self-reflexivity
Intertextuality
Alternative Cinema – non-linear; polyphonic narratives; jumbled plot
Film Movements: German Expressionism, Italian Neorealism
Classical Hollywood Cinema
Film Noir
Ideology/Interpellation
Important film theorists:
André Bazin; David Bordwell; Kristin Thompson