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for a past academic year. Please see the current academic year for up to date information.
| Unit name |
Film Criticism |
| Unit code |
DRAM33128 |
| Credit points |
20 |
| Level of study |
H/6
|
| Teaching block(s) |
Teaching Block 1 (weeks 1 - 12)
|
| Unit director |
Dr. Pete Falconer |
| Open unit status |
Not open |
| Pre-requisites |
None
|
| Co-requisites |
None
|
| School/department |
Department of Film and Television |
| Faculty |
Faculty of Arts |
Description including Unit Aims
Film criticism is a form of communication that addresses films as potential achievements and wishes to convey their distinctiveness and quality (or lack of it). What makes this film the film it is? How might we elucidate its qualities or assess whether and why we think it works? In this unit students will study key essays in the history of English-language film criticism, considering the nature and purpose of their undertaking, and the ways in which they may deepen our experience and understanding of particular films (hence of film as a medium). Alongside the study of criticism itself, the unit will also develop students’ critical faculties and abilities to account for experience. Each week students will grapple as a group with a film chosen precisely because it poses special challenges for viewer and/or critic. As a group students will carry out practical criticism of sequences and try to find words to account for the film’s qualities. The unit culminates with the production of a work of film criticism.
Aims
- To develop an advanced understanding of the purposes, principles and potential of film criticism.
- To develop students’ critical faculties and ability to account for their experience.
- To enable students to make fine distinctions and defensible judgements.
- To enable students to develop writing skills and strengthen their confidence in articulating their own views.
- To explore critically and perceptively a range of film practices.
- To develop highly appropriate critical and theoretical approaches to the chosen practices.
- To investigate in a chosen practical and creative manner one or more alternative languages of cinematic expression.
- To develop highly competent self-reflective analytical methods.
- To develop higher-level group-work project skills.
- To be able to reflect on individual work within a collaborative production context.
Intended Learning Outcomes
- Students will demonstrate an advanced understanding of the purposes, principles and potential of film criticism.
- Students will articulate advanced critical skills and the ability to account for experience
- To demonstrate knowledge of, and use creatively, a wider range of secondary literature than at Level I
- To apply with consistent competence a range of established critical and theoretical ideas
- To present a clear and well-structured argument, supported by relevant critical and theoretical literature, that additionally develops independent lines of inquiry
- To present work that is highly assured in its use of English and referencing
- To be able to communicate verbally key ideas based on secondary reading and relevant primary texts and independent research/lines of enquiry
- To demonstrate advanced skills of time management
- To plan and execute a research project
Plus as appropriate to the mode of teaching, that is, the combination of seminar and practice-based workshop and/or presentations:
- To be able to write a highly reflective account of practical work, making connections with an appropriate range of critical ideas
- To be able to work effectively, constructively and creatively in a group-based workshop
- To be able to work within the disciplines of production and project processes, working to deadlines and within production budgets
- To work independently and reach individual/personal judgements within a collaborative context
- To be able to reflect on individual work within a collaborative production context and with reference to an appropriate range of critical ideas
Teaching Information
Seminars, workshops, screenings, as appropriate
Optional units may be taught according one of three models, depending on student numbers choosing the option and resource matters. Unit convenors will decide on teaching mode in consultation with HoE and with students in advance of advertising option year-on-year. Contact hours and assessment details will be mapped to teaching mode, as detailed below.
Model A is a seminar-based unit
Model B combines seminars with workshops encompassing an average 30-hour production period
Model C is taught through workshops encompassing an intensive 60-hour production period
Assessment Information
Teachers will assign assessments according to the teaching mode employed.
Model A:
4,000-word essay (50%) + student presentation (25%) + 2,000-word write-up (25%), or equivalent.
OR
Model B:
Essay [3,000 words] (33%) +
Workfile (22%): containing evidence to demonstrate student contribution to workshops / practical exercises; contribution to seminars Presentation/performance (22%) Critical analysis [1,500 words] (22%)
OR
Model C:
Workfile (33%): containing evidence to demonstrate student contribution to workshops / practical exercises; contribution to seminars, preparation & execution of technical production role Presentation/performance (33%) Critical analysis [2,500 words] (33%)
Reading and References
- Carroll, N. (2009) On Criticism (New York and London: Routledge)
- Clayton, A. & Klevan, A. (2011) The Language and Style of Film Criticism (New York and London: Routledge)
- Crowther, P. (2007), Defining Art, Creating the Canon: Artistic Value in an Era of Doubt (Oxford University Press)
- Durgnat, R. (1976) Durgnat on Film (London: Faber)
- Farber, M. (1998) Negative Space: Manny Farber on the Movies (New York: Da Capo Press)
- Martin, A. (1992) ‘Mise-en-Scène is Dead, or The Expressive, The Excessive, The Technical and The Stylish’, Continuum 5, 2: 87-140.
- Perkins, V.F. (1990) ‘Must We Say What They Mean? Film Criticism and Interpretation’, Movie, 34.
