Five College Film & Video Course Guide
FALL 2009 (updated 10/29/09)
Note: Course info may be subject to change and will
be updated as more information becomes available. All courses are 4 credits each unless
otherwise noted.
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HACU 0205-1 INTRO TO AFRICAN
CINEMA
Jean Marie Teno
300220 09:00AM-11:50AM T;07:00PM-09:00PM
TH Jerome
Liebling Center 120;Jerome Liebling
Center 131
This course introduces and explores issues related to the
genesis, evolution and various challenges in African cinema. Most especially it
will consider prominent themes, aesthetic paradigms, funding, production,
distribution as well as the reception of African films from the perspectives of
both practitioners and critics of African cinema. It will also actively engage
students in the art and practice of viewing and analyzing films made by
selected generations of African filmmakers, namely, Sembene
Ousmane, Djibril Diop Manbety, Souleymane
Cisse, Idrissa Ouedraogo, Safi Faye, Sarah Maldoror,
Haile Gerima, Balufu Bakupa Kanyinda,
Abdherramane Sissako, Zeka Laplaine, Newton
Aduaka among others. In all, students will be
encouraged to think critically, about the writings in and on African cinema,
and contextualize them within
Undergraduate UMass Film Studies Certificate category: IIB
Five College Film Studies Major category: 5
HACU 0209-1 VIDEO
I: QUEER LOOKS
Kara Lynch
299575 07:00PM-10:00PM T;07:00PM-09:00PM M Jerome Liebling Center 131; Jerome Liebling Center 131
Video I is an introductory video
production course. Over the course of the semester students will gain
experience in pre-production, production and post-production techniques as well
as learn to think and look critically about the making of the moving image. We
will engage with video as a specific visual medium for expression, and we will
apply queer theory and practice as a lens and sounding board in relation to
issues of representation, spectatorship, identification, practice and
distribution. Projects are designed to develop basic technical proficiency in
the video medium as well as the necessary working skills and mental discipline
so important to a successful working process. Final production projects will
experiment with established media genres.
This course has unspecified prerequisite(s) - please see the instructor.
Undergraduate UMass Film Studies Certificate category: V
Five College Film Studies Major category: 8
HACU 0210-1 FILM WORKSHOP I
Jean Marie Teno
299576 09:00AM-11:50AM W;07:00PM-09:00PM T Jerome Liebling Center 120; Jerome Liebling Center 120
This course teaches the basic skills of film production, including camera work, editing, sound recording, and preparation and completion of a finished work in film and video. Students will submit weekly written responses to theoretical and historical readings and to screenings of films and videotapes, which represent a variety of aesthetic approaches to the moving image. There will be a series of filmmaking assignments culminating in an individual final project for the class. The development of personal vision will be stressed. The bulk of the work in the class will be produced in 16mm format. Video formats plus digital image processing and non-linear editing will also be introduced. A $50 lab fee provides access to equipment and editing facilities. Students are responsible for providing their own film, tape, processing and supplies. There are weekly evening screenings or workshops. Prerequisite courses include a 100 level course in media arts (Introduction to Media Arts, Introduction to Media Production, Introduction to Digital Photography & New Media, or equivalent and must be completed and not concurrent with this course.) NOTE: Enrolled or top 5 waitlist students who DO NOT attend the first class session risk losing their place on the class roster.
This course has unspecified prerequisite(s) - please see the instructor.
Undergraduate UMass Film Studies Certificate category: V
Five College Film Studies Major category: 8
HACU 0253-1 WRITING FOR FILM
Baba Hillman
299590 01:00PM-03:50PM M;07:00PM-09:00PM M Jerome Liebling Center 120; Jerome Liebling Center 120
This production/theory course combines studies in writing,
film and videomaking with an emphasis on the theme of
migration in contemporary film through a study of the role of memory, language,
performance and visual structure. The course will engage students across
disciplines who are working with issues of displacement and exile, as well as
students who are working with languages other than English or across multiple
languages. We will study filmmakers and writers who are working in hybrid
combinations of poetic, fictional and non-fictional forms and in a context of
transnational histories. The course emphasizes Maghrebi
film with a range of approaches by filmmakers who are questioning what it means
to work in a transnational context and to negotiate conflicts between notions
of the local and the global, notions of national identity and the postnational. The course includes a study of writers Sophie
Ponchalet, Faiza Guene, Leila Sebbar, and Leila Houari and critical writings by James Clifford, Reda
A $50 Lab Fee is required. Instructor permission required.
Undergraduate UMass Film Studies Certificate category: V
Five College Film Studies Major category: 8
HACU 0255-1 MEDIA PRODUCTION
II: HD & FILM
William Brand
299592 12:30PM-03:30PM T;07:00PM-09:00PM T Jerome Liebling Center 120;Jerome Liebling Center 120
High definition digital video offers image resolution and color rendition comparable to yet different than analogue film. Filmmaking is no longer either chemical or electronic but often a hybrid of the two where images migrate from celluloid to computer chip and computer to film. Likewise, cinema is no longer primarily experienced merely in the movie theater or on television but also in the art gallery, on the computer screen, the iPod and the cell phone. This course will teach advanced skills in cinematography as well as evolving contemporary techniques of post-production and exhibition. The course will equally emphasize the development of technical skills and esthetic sensibilities including composition in the frame, camera placement and movement, color, use of light and lighting, production planning and design, choice of film stock or digital camera set ups for control of contrast, color rendition, frame rate, sharpness and saturation. Students will be expected to develop high levels of practical skill yet be willing to explore and invent unconventional approaches and uses of the medium across digital and analogue platforms. Students will work in 16mm film and HD video on group and individual exercises and projects. Students will be expected to attend screenings of works in documentary, narrative and experimental genres, as well as absorb critical and technical readings, and to complete one analytical essay. This course is open by instructor permission to advanced film and video students who have completed either Video I, Film I or the equivalent. A $50 lab fee provides access to equipment and editing facilities. Students are responsible for providing their own supplies including film, processing, tape or data storage. NOTE: Enrolled or top 5 waitlist students who DO NOT attend the first class session risk losing their place on the class roster.
Undergraduate UMass Film Studies Certificate category: V
Five College Film Studies Major category: 8
HACU 0258-1 MEDIA PROD. II:
WOMEN DIRECTOR
Joan Braderman
299595 06:00PM-09:00PM W;06:00PM-09:00PM TH Jerome Liebling Center 120; Jerome Liebling Center 120
A course in reading films and videos as well as considering
how they are produced historically, we will take gender as our point of
departure. Engaging actively with making visual images will be part of our
work. We explore the reasons for the historical absence of women filmmakers and
study the works they produced when they won the right to do so. International
cinemas, both dominant medias and films and videos made to oppose that system
will be examined. We will analyze diverse works: from avant-garde director,
Germaine Dulac, in
Instructor Permission required.
Undergraduate UMass Film Studies Certificate category: IIB, V
Five College Film Studies Major category: 6, 8