Undergraduate Film Courses 2021/22

This course explores the foundational role that the image plays in film, especially as filmmaking shifts from using celluloid and photography to digital cameras and CGI. Through Zoom meetings and PowerPoint lecture slides, you will learn about many key aspects of film’s visual style, including cinematography, mise-en-scene, editing, special effects, and animation. This course is designed to show the relationships between film technologies, representation, and social life. It is divided into two sections. Part 1 covers the history of film form and photography, including such classic films as Citizen Kane and Singin’ in the Rain. Part 2 looks at major changes in film since the introduction of digital cinema in films such as Fight Club and Inception. Overall, this course is an introduction to the essentials of film style and technology. It includes weekly tutorials beginning in week 2, along with regular film viewing, screening notes, and written assignments.

In addition to the lecture, students are required to attend a screening and a tutorial. Note that tutorials begin in Week 2.

A comparative study of the development of the techniques and themes in the work of at least three representative major film directors in the post-war international art cinema. Special consideration will be given to questions of the origins of the notion of the film director as "artist" and how and where the notion of an "art film" arises. Filmmakers to be studied may include Jean Cocteau, Ingmar Bergman, Yasujiro Ozu, Alain Resnais, Jean-Luc Godard, Agnes Varda, K. Kieslowski, Wong Kar-wai, Fatih Akin, Andrea Arnold and Zacharias Kunuk.

In addition to the lecture, students are required to attend weekly screenings.

Exclusion: FS243

This course surveys the history of narrative film since 1950. We will explore various national movements and their transnational repercussions within industrial, technological, aesthetic, political and socio-cultural contexts. Filmic traditions, trends and genres to be examined include Italian Art Film, French New Wave, New Hollywood, and so on. We will also explore such important questions as: What is film history? What do film historians do? And how do we read, write and appreciate film history?

In addition to the lecture, students are required to attend weekly screenings.

Pre-requisite: one of FS101, FS102, or FS103

Exclusion: FS247

A study of themes and techniques of selected films in French (with English subtitles) from silent film to the present, in relation to their cultural, social and political contexts.

In addition to the lecture, students are required to attend weekly screenings.

Exclusions: FR348, FS385, FR480

A study of film comedies and comedy genres in the silent and sound eras, with special attention to American and European cinemas.

In addition to the lecture, students are required to attend weekly screenings.

Exclusion: FS351

A study of the science fiction genre in popular film. This course will focus on the development of the genre from silent to contemporary film. Consideration may also be given to science fiction as a literary and television genre.

Exclusion: FS343m

Given the global prominence and influence of Hollywood cinema, a knowledge of film studies is incomplete without an understanding of the Classical Hollywood era (~1920-1960). This course offers an exploration of key developments in the history of classical Hollywood cinema, including industrial (e.g., vertically integrated studios), technological (e.g., sound, color, and widescreen), aesthetic (e.g., film style), and ideological (e.g., standardization and self-censorship). In addition, the course considers the complex relationship of Hollywood film to key social crises, including the Great Depression, World War II, The Red Scare, and Civil Rights. Case studies on the course will feature popular genres and movements (e.g., B-movies, musicals, screwball comedies, westerns, film noir, and melodrama), as well as important filmmakers (e.g., Alfred Hitchcock and Orson Welles) and iconic stars (e.g., Barbara Stanwyck and Cary Grant). Students will perform close textual analysis of specific films, exploring issues of aesthetics and representation; however, students will also investigate the commercial, socio-historical, and economic contexts that affect and govern the production of American film. Films screened on the course may include King Kong (Cooper and Schoedsack, 1933), The Magnificent Ambersons (Welles 1942), The Hitch-Hiker (Lupino 1953), North by Northwest (Hitchcock 1959), and Imitation of Life (Sirk 1959).

Exclusion: FS343n

Tartan Films created the Asia Extreme label during the 2000’s as a way to market primarily J-Horror and K-Horror films in the North American market. However, extreme Asian cinema has a long cinematic tradition. This course examines Asian ghost, gothic, war, thrillers, slasher, and erotica films since the post-WWII period, by situating the development of the genre within the historical, regional, industrial, and socio-cultural contexts that gave rise to the different stylistic variations of the extreme Asian film genre. In addition to examining the thematic concerns and narrative structures of select extreme Asian films, we will also explore the cross-cultural and cross-regional flows of talent, capital, images and ideas. In order to ground our discussions of these processes, this course will interrogate extreme Asian films’ responses to modernization, nationalism, urbanization, wartime traumas, and globalization.

Note: This course counts toward the National Cinema requirement for the Honours and Combined Honours Fim Studies programs.

Pre-requisites: 1.0 credit from 100- and/or 200-level FS courses.

An introduction to the major theoretical debates around film and the analysis of film texts that emerged up to 1968. Theorists to be studied include Rudolph Arnheim, Andre Bazin, Sergei Eisenstein, Hugo Munsterberg, and Dziga Vertov.

In addition to the lecture, students are required to attend weekly screenings.

Pre-requisites: 1.0 credit from 100 and/or 200 level FS courses.

A study of the principles and techniques of digital non-linear video editing, including video capture, raw footage management, working with audio, and the compilation of clips into films for export and distribution.

Prerequisites: 1.0 credit from 100 and/or 200 level FS courses.

Exclusions: FS309b and FS343d

A study of the role of storytelling in filmmaking practice, including the techniques used by screenwriters to craft stories in film and other media, in addition to the techniques used by the director, including pre-visualization, production planning, and directing.

Prerequisites: 1.0 credit from 100 and/or 200 level FS courses.

Exclusion: FS309g

This course examines the four elements of audio for film (dialogue, effects, soundscapes and music) and how they work together to support and enhance the visual elements of film. Students will engage in the hands-on construction of a short film soundtrack both by recording audio live and by sourcing audio from sound libraries. They will use both audio and video software and technology to manipulate the audio elements in order to create a cohesive, foundational-level soundtrack for a short film.

Important notes: This is a Conestoga College course that is being offered on Laurier’s Waterloo Campus. The normal $60 fee is waived. At the same time, students must successfully complete a Letter of Permission form and submit it to our Registrar’s Office. Please note that registration ends on September 16. Upon completion of the course, click on this link and arrange for Conestoga College to mail an official transcript to: Wilfrid Laurier University, Enrolment Services, Attn: Anita Velanoff, 75 University Ave. W., Waterloo, ON, N2L 3C5.

For more details, please contact Dr. Katherine Spring, Film Studies Advisor.

This course will take place on Tuesdays from 8:30-11:20 am.

This seminar examines the ways in which queer cinema may be said to resist and subvert mainstream modes of narrative filmmaking around the world. Beginning with films released in the late 1980s, when the term “queer” came to define the disruption of normative modes of representation, the course will center on a series of case studies from international and transnational cinemas. In each case, we will situate the film and its filmmaker in their geopolitical, cultural, and aesthetic contexts. Assigned films may include work by Pedro Almodóvar, Mohamed Camara, John Greyson, Stanley Kwan, Lucrecia Martel, Tsai Ming-Liang, Amir Muhammad, Onir, Francois Ozon, Ventura Pons, Léa Pool, Dee Rees, Marlon Riggs, Céline Sciamma, and André Téchiné. As we explore these works, we will engage with foundational texts of queer theory.

In addition to the lecture, students are required to attend weekly screenings.

In this course, students will study the films of acclaimed Black American filmmakers and how they represent and help shape American identities in contemporary cinema. Despite the systemic inequalities of the Hollywood industry, Black American filmmakers have attained increasing visibility in recent years. The aim of this course is not to focus on the stereotypes or dearth of representation of Black Americans in mainstream film but, rather, to study Black filmmakers, including those working both within and outside of the mainstream industry, in terms of their innovative film style, their address of racial history and injustice, and their articulations of empowered representations of Black Americans. Students will analyze how ideologies of race, gender, class, sexuality, capitalism, nation, and film style intersect. Films on the course may include Night Catches Us (2010), Pariah (2011), 12 Years a Slave (2013), Creed (2013), Selma (2014), Straight Outta Compton (2015), Moonlight (2016), Get Out (2017), and BlacKkKlansman (2018). Readings may include works by Christina N. Baker, Robin R. Means Coleman, Henry Louis Gates, Jr., Racquel Gates, Breanna Wynn Greer, bell hooks, and Ronald L. Jackson.

In addition to the lecture, students are required to attend weekly screenings.

An introductory study of film through film genres. Along with general elements of filmmaking (cinematography, mise-en-scène, editing, sound) and film analysis (film narrative, characters, themes), this course explores the question “what is film genre?” Films are assumed to belong to a genre if they have similar characters, settings, iconography, and conventions: e.g., westerns have cowboys, guns, and horses. While audiences often like to see the same kind of film, they do not want to see the same film—and innovation and change are as much a part of genre film as familiar conventions. Genre hybridity (blending conventions) and parody (sending up conventions) have become widespread practices in order to make genre films fresh for audiences. We will also explore the social, historical, and economic contexts that define and shape the various trends and shifts in genres (e.g., 1950s sci-fi as Red Scare allegories). While this course explores Hollywood genres (screwball, musical, noir), it also considers some international re-imaginings of those genres (e.g., samurai films as Japanese westerns). Laurier’s first-year FS courses are an excellent introduction for majors and non-majors alike, with an emphasis on critical film analysis, effective reading, and academic writing and argumentation. These fundamental skills are highly valued in many academic disciplines and in a wide variety of professions. FS courses provide students with a platform for success by helping them to become strong and attentive film critics, more compelling and adaptable writers, and more confident in addressing such essential questions as: What is cinema? What does it mean to be a spectator or critic at different moments in history? How do film narratives influence our lives, personally and collectively? Students are introduced to a variety of genres, national cinemas, and directors, and are sure to find something of personal interest, along with new favorites.

In addition to the lecture, students are required to attend a screening and a tutorial. Note that tutorials begin in Week 2.

This course surveys the history of primarily narrative film since 1950. We will explore various national movements and their transnational repercussions within industrial, technological, aesthetic, political and socio-cultural contexts. Film traditions, trends and genres to be examined may include the French New Wave, Italian Neo-realism, American Avant-Garde, New Hollywood, and Bollywood musicals. We will also explore such important questions as: What is film history? What do film historians do? And how do we write film history?

In addition to the lecture, students are required to attend weekly screenings.

Pre-requisites: one of FS101, FS102, or FS103.

A study of Canadian film, from 1895 to the present, based on the screening and analysis of selected films.

In addition to the lecture, students are required to attend weekly screenings.

This course offers students a focused study of the evolution of the Hollywood detective film from the silent era through to the millennial serial killer/criminalist film. The detective film is one of the several genres (including gangster, courtroom, and prison films) that fall under the umbrella term ‘crime film.’ While all crime films feature a focus on some aspect of the relationship of the victim, villain, and detective, what distinguishes the detective film is its alignment of the viewer with law enforcement and its reassurance that the society spun into chaos by a crime can always see order restored. The course explores the social, historical, economic, and industrial contexts that define and shape the various subgenres of the detective film, which account for shifting trends in the representation of heroism and villainy in terms of gender, sexuality, class, and race, as well as the on-screen depiction of sex and violence. The Hollywood detective has seen different trends: from the classical sleuth of the Great Depression to the hardboiled private eye of World War II; from the conservative cop of the Cold War to the vigilante of the Vietnam era; from the cop action hero of the 1980s to the criminalist of the new millennium. Films screened on the course may include Naked City (1948), In the Heat of the Night (1967), Manhunter (Mann 1986), Lethal Weapon (Donner 1987), and The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo (2011).

An examination of the cinematic representation and/or production of the ‘dark side' of post-WWII youth-oriented popular culture in a broad selection of Hollywood and international films.

In addition to the lecture, students are required to attend weekly screenings.

Exclusion: FS343q

The key to a film’s commercial success is strongly linked to its ability to draw in audiences. This course provides a practical introduction to film and media audience research for those looking to create and market their own film productions. It includes approaches drawn from classical audience reception theory, along with contemporary work from the exciting new subfield of fan studies. Along with historical and theoretical criticism, it also introduces students to some core methodologies of audience research. As such, students will be given hands-on tools for conducting audience analysis, such as survey design, test screenings, and virtual ethnography.  Assignments are heavily based on group work, so come prepared to collaborate with your classmates.

Exclusion: FS309h

A study of the representation of gender in film and gender theory through the reading of primary theoretical texts, secondary criticism, and the screening of films from a range of periods. Theorists to be studied include Judith Butler, Mary Ann Doane, Jane Gaines, Laura Mulvey, and Yvonne Tasker.

In addition to the lecture, students are required to attend weekly screenings.

Pre-requisite: 1.0 credit from 100- and/or 200-level FS courses.

Exclusions: FS343s, FS362

According to sound designer Gary Rydstrom, “Film sound is the side door to people’s brains.” This course analyzes the film soundtrack and its constituent elements —dialogue, music, and sound effects—in a variety of cinematic contexts. It follows an historical trajectory, beginning with the origins of film sound in the late 19th century and ending with contemporary sound design and film music. Along the way, it addresses key historical and theoretical studies in film sound, including those relating to the hierarchy of image and sound, star-song performances in the musical genre, the emergence of sound design in the post-Dolby era, and challenges to classical conventions of sound. Course screenings have been selected to illustrate the changing conventions of film sound over the course of international film history. Screenings will likely include A Man Escaped, Applause, Mildred Pierce, An American in Paris, Scott Pilgrim vs. the World, and PTU.

In addition to the lecture, students are required to attend weekly screenings.

Pre-requisite: 1.0 credit from 100- and/or 200-level FS courses.

This course examines the interflows of capital, talent, imagery, and ideology between the film industries of first, second and third world cinemas. In particular, our exploration of the history, politics and aesthetics of films from such regions as Europe, Middle East, and East Asia among others will complicate our understanding of the interconnectedness and discontents between the cultural political and socio-economic contexts of various cinematic traditions. More importantly, the course will provide us with a forum to rethink the artistic and political functions of world cinemas in addressing contemporary global issues and policymaking. Some of the topics to be covered include social justice, climate change, radicalism, and global pandemic.

Pre-requisite: 1.0 credit from 100- and/or 200-level FS courses.

Exclusion: FS343f

A study of gothic/horror films as part of a genre or cultural narrative that both supports and subverts various political, economic, social and sexual hierarchies. Texts may be approached from a number of critical perspectives, including psychoanalytic, feminist and cultural theories.

In addition to the lecture, students are required to attend weekly screenings.

Pre-requisite: 1.0 credit from 100- and/or 200-level FS courses.

Exclusion: FS343g

An advanced study of the principles and techniques of video pre-production, production, and post-production, specifically digital non-linear video editing.

Pre-requisites: FS370 or FS309b

Exclusion: FS309c

This course examines the work of women directors from the silent to the contemporary era, from a variety of film production contexts around the world, in the light of feminist approaches to questions about gender, representation, and authorship. Along the way, we will consider the extent to which formal and stylistic features may be said to characterize films directed by women; the ways in which films by women directors are shaped by historical, cultural, and industrial factors; different approaches to filmmaking within and outside the mainstream film industry; and the role of feminist film theory in critical studies of films by women. Assigned films may include work by Alice Guy Blaché, Dorothy Arzner, Jane Campion, Claire Denis, Sophie Deraspe, Maya Deren, Ava DuVernay, Joanna Hogg, Ida Lupino, Lucrecia Martel, Léa Pool, Solly Potter, Céline Sciamma, Agnes Varda, Lois Weber, and Chloé Zhao.

In addition to the lecture, students are required to attend weekly screenings.

Since the silent era, the representation of sex has been both a taboo and a selling point in Hollywood films. These days, sex has become normalized in many Hollywood films. Our course traces “sex” in movies from the pre-code Hollywood scandals to the institutionalization of the Hays Code and beyond. As argued by Linda Williams in Screening Sex – which is one of the key texts of our course – the word “screening” is a double entendre (“a revealing projection onto and as a concealing screening off”). This course follows this double entendre to explore the contentious and revelatory history of the representation of sex, sexuality, and sensuality in film in the US, Europe and Asia. Through intensive in-class discussion and debate, seminar presentations, and a final paper, we will explore the meanings of “sex” within the context of art, censorship, and technology.

This course examines the representation of the Holocaust in film and literature, both fiction and non-fiction, from the immediate postwar period to the present. The aim is to gain a solid understanding of the cultural-historical significance of the Holocaust while acknowledging the freedom of the author or filmmaker to approach this subject from a variety of different perspectives, set alongside ongoing debates (since Adorno) about the Holocaust’s relative ‘representability.’ At the same time, we will balance the moral-ethical status of the Holocaust’s artistic mediation against the costs of historical amnesia or collective forgetting. The student should come away from the course with an enhanced understanding of this event, alongside a recognition of the transformations in its representation over the passing decades, as the Holocaust moves from the embrace of living memory, ostensibly grounded in authentic recollection, into the larger realm of collective cultural memory. In the 21st century, cultural producers with no direct or lived connection to the Holocaust continue to attend to the genocide of Europe’s Jews that began with the Nazi’s seizure of power in Germany in 1933, became official policy with the conception of the ‘Final Solution’ in 1942, and ended (in principle) with the war in 1945. The latter part of the course will consider the lingering aftereffects of the Holocaust and renewed antisemitism in Europe and elsewhere, as filtered through the artistic sensibilities of the 2nd and now 3rd post-Holocaust generations. Topics of focus include: collective memory, traumatic memory, collective trauma, the relative (un-) representability of atrocity, the role of humour and irony, different media forms and the representation of the Holocaust (trans-/intermediality), the Holocaust and other histories of persecution.