Catalog

The Film Experience

Literature MIT CC BY-NC-SA 4.0 23 lectures

This course concentrates on close analysis and criticism of a wide range of films, from the early silent period, classic Hollywood genres including musicals, thrillers and westerns, and European and Japanese art cinema. It explores the work of Griffith, Chaplin, Keaton, Capra, Hawks, Hitchcock, Altman, Renoir, DeSica, and Kurosawa. Through comparative reading of films from different eras and countries, students develop the skills to turn their in-depth analyses into interpretations and explore theoretical issues related to spectatorship.

Syllabus

  1. 1 Lecture 1: Introduction (2007)
  2. 2 Lecture 2: Keaton (2007)
  3. 3 Lecture 3: Chaplin, Part I (2007)
  4. 4 Lecture 4: Chaplin, Part II (2007)
  5. 5 Lecture 5: Film as Global & Cultural Form; Montage, Mise en Scène
  6. 6 Lecture 6: German Film, Murnau
  7. 7 Lecture 7: The Studio Era
  8. 8 Lecture 8: The Work of Movies; Capra & Hawks
  9. 9 Lecture 9: Alfred Hitchcock
  10. 10 Lecture 10: Shadow of a Doubt, Rear Window
  11. 11 Lecture 11: The Musical
  12. 12 Lecture 12: The Musical (continued)
  13. 13 Lecture 13: The Western
  14. 14 Lecture 14: The Western (continued)
  15. 15 Lecture 15: American Film in the 1970s, Part I (2007)
  16. 16 Lecture 16: American Film in the 1970s, Part II (2007)
  17. 17 Lecture 17: Jean Renoir and Poetic Realism
  18. 18 Lecture 18: Renoir's Grand Illusion (1937)
  19. 19 Lecture 19: Italian Neorealism, Part I (2007)
  20. 20 Lecture 20: Italian Neorealism, Part II (2007)
  21. 21 Lecture 21: Truffaut, the Nouvelle Vague, The 400 Blows
  22. 22 Lecture 22: Kurosawa and Rashomon
  23. 23 Lecture 23: Summary Perspectives - Film as Art and Artifact

Course materials