COM 261 UCF World Cinema Through Global Genres Wedding Films Presentation

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COM 261

University of Central Florida

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Book: 1.William V. Costanzo, World Cinema through Global Genres. Hoboken, NJ: Wiley Blackwell, 2014.

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wedding films 

Mira Nair + Debate

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COM 261: PRESENTATION PROJECTS Unit 1: Warrior Hero Unit 2: Wedding Films Unit 3: Horror To complete this assignment, pick one of the topics listed above (only one per member of the group to avoid redundancy) that corresponds to your chosen unit, then prepare to present 1) a relevant scene analysis (show a clip and walk us through it with full consideration of the five aspects listed below) and 2) develop and present a thorough and thoughtful response to one of the project options listed below (again, only one per group member). You should plan for your presentation to last no longer than then 10minutes. You will deliver it live over Zoom on the last day of class. I will meet with each of you individually to review a draft the week before. 1) Select one scene from a film (either assigned or a relevant alternative) that exemplifies the genre of your unit. Show it as part of your project presentation and answer these questions about the scene: a) Plot and Theme. What does the scene contribute to the ongoing story? What important information do we learn from it, how does it drive the plot forward, and which of the film’s central ideas or messages does it support? What patterns do you notice? b) Point of View. Does the scene present an objective view of events or does it represent someone’s subjective account? How is the camera used to emphasize this point of view? c) Character. What does the scene tell you about the major character or characters? Refer to the actors’ movements, words, and dress as revealed by the camera. d) Tone. Describe the overall mood of this scene. Is it mysterious, funny, sad? How do the lighting, camera work, sound, and editing help to create this mood? e) Technique. What kind of editing is involved? Transitions (cut, dissolve, fade)? Camera movements (pan, tilt, dolly, boom) and angles (high, low, aerial)? Framing (close-up, long shot)? Lighting (notable use of high-key, low-key, backlighting)? Sound (important dialogue, music, sound effects, voice-over)? For a good model of scene analysis applied to kung fu films, see David Bordwell’s Planet Hong Kong: Popular cinema and the art of entertainment (Harvard University Press, 2000) or “Aesthetics in Action: Kungfu, Gunplay, and Cinematic Expressivity” (in At Full Speed: Hong Kong Cinema in a Borderless World, ed. Esther Yau, University of Minnesota Press, 2001, 73– 93). 2) Pick one of the options listed below. Each person in the group should choose a different option. Debate The field of transnational cinema is animated by lively disagreements. For example, some critics belittle Hong Kong kung fu films or Indian wedding movies as crass commercialism while others champion them as vibrant instances of popular culture. Some film historians point to concepts like mono no aware and Daoism in Asian movies as instances of cultural diversity worthy of our close attention. Others dismiss such concepts as exoticism, arguing that Western viewers should not impose their own views on foreign films. Then there are those who worry that globalism threatens the uniqueness of national cinemas, turning the world’s movies into one homogeneous product. Choose a controversy related to world cinema that interests you and stage a debate that makes an informed case both for and against the central argument. Film Proposal Imagine your group is a production company working in another country with the job of producing a genre film. What kind of movie would you propose? Given what you know about the genre’s popularity in the United States and abroad along with the challenges of filmmaking abroad, include key decisions about location, casting, audience, and marketing, write a synopsis (brief description of the plot) for your proposed film, and develop a realistic plan to take it through the stages of preproduction (securing funding, cast, crew, and equipment), postproduction (editing, sound track), and distribution (in theatres, on the Internet, or on DVD). How do considerations of genre figure into your proposal? Give the film a working title and imagine what might be included in the trailer. Pitch your proposal to the class. International Film Festival Plan a retrospective on one global film genre (or subgenre) for UT. What films would you choose to show and why? What filmmakers would you invite to speak and why? How would you deal with co-productions and diasporic casts and viewers? Be prepared to justify your choices to an audience of peers. Then design your own website to advertise your festival. Genre and Myth Have movies taken on the role of telling our most important stories? Are they replacing written literature and oral narratives as the chief bearers of our cultural values? Explore the notion that today’s film genres constitute a national or global mythology. Read what Joseph Campbell (The Hero with a Thousand Faces, 1949; The Power of Myth, 1988), Christopher Vogler (The Writer’s Journey, 1998), and Stuart Voytilla (Myth and the Movies, 1999) have to say about the hero with a thousand cinematic faces. Consider the warrior heroes in Westerns, samurai, wuxia, and kung fu movies as archetypal figures. Or apply these concepts to the characters in wedding films, road movies, or horror films. What deep-seated fears, desires, and ideals do they represent? To what extent do these figures reflect local or universal concerns? Genres and Their Origins Where do the stories in these movies come from? Investigate some of the literary sources, high and low, for your favorite genre or subgenre: The Leatherstocking Tales and nineteenth-century dime novels for the Western; The Tale of Genji, samurai ballads, and Kabuki theatre for the samurai tradition; Journey to the West, Chinese opera, and graphic novels of magic and swordplay for the wuxia genre; gothic novels for horror films; romance novels for wedding films; epics and picaresque tales for road movies. What features of these narrative traditions do the movies draw from? What seems to be left out? Grouping Genre Films If you’ve seen a lot of genre films, you may have noticed that some films don’t seem to fit neatly into one genre or another. Tarantino’s Kill Bill series, for example, contains elements of samurai, wuxia, kung fu, and Western traditions, among others. How should it be classified? Furthermore, a genre can split into subgenres, as David Desser pointed out in his 1983 essay “Toward a Structural Analysis of the Postwar Samurai Film,” Quarterly Review of Film Studies 8, no. 1 (Winter 1983): 25–41. Try your hand at classifying action, wedding, or horror films. Make a list of those you know and divide them into subgenres. Explain your basis for these secondary categories. Why do you think they developed as they did? Genre Stars Some actors become renowned – some typecast – through their association with a particular kind of film. Think of John Wayne and Gary Cooper, Toshiro Mifune and Hiroyuki Sanada, Jet Li and Maggie Cheung, Bruce Lee and Jackie Chan in their defining performances. Who are the actors you think of in relation to wedding films, horror, or road movies? How can you account for their celebrity? What aspects of the genre do they embody best on screen? And how does their stardom help establish and manage audience expectations? COM 261 • WORLD CINEMA COURSE DESCRIPTION This course provides an introduction to the discipline of feature film analysis through global film genres. Through readings, screenings, and discussions, students use critical distance in order to better understand the economic, political, and cultural contexts of film production, audience reception, and audiovisual aesthetics. The course pays particular attention to the intersecting roles of technology, identity, geography, language, transnationalism, and globalization while reading and comparing a diverse array of films. 1. COURSE OBJECTIVES By the end of this course, you should be able to: a. understand and apply the basic technical and theoretical vocabulary of film analysis. b. question your own roles as spectators and increase your ability to watch films critically. c. appreciate how popular genres address the needs and desires of worldwide audiences. d. recognize how national cinemas are shaped by local events and transnational trends. e. write critically and creatively about film aesthetics within cultural/economic/technical contexts. REQUIRED TEXTBOOK 1. William V. Costanzo, World Cinema through Global Genres. Hoboken, NJ: Wiley Blackwell, 2014. FRIDAY JUNE 5: THE WARRIOR HERO READ Preface ix-xii / How to Use This Book xv-xviii / Introduction 1-41 Chapter 1: The Warrior Hero 45-72 Close-up: The Magnificent Seven 100-105 Close-up: Seven Samurai 106-112 WATCH 1. Seven Samurai (Japan, 1954) https://tampa.kanopy.com/video/seven-samurai-1 2. The Magnificent Seven (USA, 1960) https://digitalcampus.swankmp.net/ut370896/watch?token=12FA8CD6D3B6FE90 3. Iron Fists and Kung-Fu Kicks (USA, 2019) https://www.netflix.com/title/80188823 4. Enter the Dragon (USA, 1973) https://digitalcampus.swankmp.net/ut370896/watch?token=73AA0DFD7A4FA8C6 COMPARATIVE ESSAY OPTIONS a. "Girl power" READ: Deep Focus on Chinese Cinemas 79-98 COMPARE: Come Drink with Me (Hong Kong, 1966) https://www.amazon.com/Come-Drink-Me-ChengPei-pei/dp/B01F7OXV1S and Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon (USA, 2000) https://www.amazon.com/Crouching-Tiger-Hidden-Dragon-Michelle/dp/B000R3BMM0 b. "Save us!" READ: Close-up: Sholay 113-117 / Close-up: Way of the Dragon 118-123 COMPARE: Sholay (India, 1975) YouTube https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_Vk6PtNMhYk Amazon Prime https://www.amazon.com/gp/video/detail/amzn1.dv.gti.6eb65e03-09d2-411e-5754e5ebc349d3eb? and Way of the Dragon (Hong Kong, 1972) https://www.dailymotion.com/video/x6c1kzd FRIDAY JUNE 12: THE WEDDING FILM READ Comparative Weddings 150-153 Towards a Definition of the Genre 153-155 Deep Focus on Indian Cinemas 159-180 Close-up: Monsoon Wedding 187-191 WATCH 1. Monsoon Wedding (USA, 2001) https://digitalcampus.swankmp.net/ut370896/watch?token=0B9EFFB47E8C358E 2. Sembene! (Senegal, 2015) https://tampa.kanopy.com/node/5276463 3. This is Nollywood (USA, 2007) https://tampa.kanopy.com/node/139774 4. The Narrow Path (Nigeria, 2006) https://tampa.kanopy.com/node/120739 COMPARATIVE ESSAY OPTIONS a. "Big Bollywood" READ: Close-up: My Big Fat Greek Wedding 181 2 WATCH: Shalom Bollywood (Australia, 2013) https://tampa.kanopy.com/node/5638388) COMPARE: Hum Aapke Hain Koum! (India, 1994) https://www.netflix.com/watch/60035870 and My Big, Fat, Greek Wedding (USA, 2002) https://www.amazon.com/My-Big-Fat-GreekWedding/dp/B003KGIOY0 b. "Middle East Marriages" READ: Arab Brides on the Border 142-144 / Close-up: Wedding in Galilee 197-201 COMPARE: Syrian Bride (Israel, 2004) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QN8gYDrkNB4 and Wedding in Galilee (Palestine, 1987) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ggyOqY1mBbk FRIDAY JUNE 19: THE HORROR FILM READ Chapter 3: The Horror Film 205 - 247 WATCH 1. Nosferatu (Germany, 1922) https://tampa.kanopy.com/video/nosferatu-0 2. A Girl Walks Home Alone at Night (Iran, 2014) https://tampa.kanopy.com/video/girl-walks-home-alone-night COMPARATIVE ESSAY OPTIONS a. “Ring Cycle” READ: Deep Focus on Japanese Cinemas 254-268 / Close-up: Ring 287-291 COMPARE: Ring/Ringu (Japan, 1998) https://tampa.kanopy.com/video/ring-1 and The Ring (USA, 2002) https://www.amazon.com/Ring-Naomi-Watts/dp/B00B1L8YJG b. “Witches Brew-ha-ha” READ: Close-up: Suspiria 276-281 COMPARE: Suspiria (Italy, 1977) https://tampa.kanopy.com/video/suspiria-0 and Suspiria (Italy, 2018) https://www.netflix.com/title/60037424 FRIDAY JUNE 26: COMPARATIVE ESSAY – INDIVIDUAL MEETINGS Due: Comparative Essay Draft Due: Presentation Draft FRIDAY JULY 3: WRAP UP Due: Final Presentation Due: Comparative Essay 3
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