Stanford University Explore Courses

FILMSTUD 315: Documentary Issues and Traditions (FILMSTUD 115)

Issues include objectivity/subjectivity, ethics, censorship, representation, reflexivity, responsibility to the audience, and authorial voice. Parallel focus on form and content.

Last offered: Autumn 2015

FILMSTUD 316: International Documentary (FILMSTUD 116)

Historical, aesthetic, and formal developments of documentary through nonfiction films in Europe, Asia, Latin America, and Africa.

Terms: Aut | Units: 4

Instructors: Keca, S. (PI)

FILMSTUD 329: Animation and the Animated Film (AMSTUD 129, FILMSTUD 129)

The fantasy of an image coming to life is ancient, but not until the cinema was this fantasy actualized. The history of the movies begins with optical toys, and contemporary cinema is dominated by films that rely on computer animation. This course considers the underlying fantasies of animation in art and lit, its phenomenologies, its relation to the uncanny, its status as a pure cinema, and its place in film theory. Different modes of production and style to be explored include realist animation, abstract animation; animistic animation; animated drawings, objects, and puppets; CGI, motion capture, and live/animation hybrids.

Terms: Spr | Units: 4

Instructors: Bukatman, S. (PI)

FILMSTUD 331: Cinemato-graph (FILMSTUD 131, SLAVIC 185, SLAVIC 285)

The term cinematography, which literally means "inscribing motion," tends to lose the "graphic" part in modern use. However, several influential film-makers not only practiced the art of "inscribing motion" but also wrote texts discussing the aesthetic premises of cinematographic art. This course explores theories of cinema as propagated by the following film-makers: Vertov, Eisenstein, Godard, Bresson, Antonioni, Pasolini, Tarkovsky, Greenaway, and Lynch. Selected key texts will be supplemented by screenings of classic films, indicative of each director's work.

Last offered: Winter 2016

FILMSTUD 332: East Asian Cinema

Social, historical, and aesthetic dimensions of the cinemas of Japan, Hong Kong, Taiwan, mainland China, and Korea. Topics such as nation and gender, form and genre, and local and transnational conditions of practice and reception. Screenings include popular and art films from the silent to contemporary eras, including, Zhang Yimou, Wong Kar-wai, Hou Hsiao-hsien, Ozu Yasujiro, Kurosawa Akira, and Im Kwon-taek.

Last offered: Spring 2007

FILMSTUD 333: Contemporary Chinese Auteurs (FILMSTUD 133)

New film cultures and movements in Taiwan, Hong Kong, and mainland China in the 80s. Key directors including Jia Zhangke, Wu Wenguang, Tsai Ming-liang, Hou Hsiao-hsien, Wong Kar-wai, Ann Hui. Topics include national cinema in the age of globalization, the evolving parameters of art cinema, and authorship.

Last offered: Spring 2013

FILMSTUD 336: Gender and Sexuality in Chinese Cinema (FILMSTUD 136)

Representations of gender and sexuality in the cinemas of China, Taiwan, and Hong Kong, covering key periods and genres such as the golden age of Shanghai film, Hong Kong action pictures, opera films, post-socialist art films, and new queer cinema. Historical and contemporary perspectives on cinematic constructions of femininity, masculinity, and sexuality as they relate to issues of nationalism, modernity, globalization, and feminist and queer politics. Weekly screening required.

Last offered: Spring 2012

FILMSTUD 340: Film Aesthetics: Editing (FILMSTUD 140)

Practical and theoretical approaches to editing and montage. The role of editing in film meaning, and cognitive and emotional impact on the viewer. Developments in the history and theory of cinema including continuity system, Soviet montage, French new wave, postwar and American avant garde. Aesthetic functions, spectatorial effects, and ideological implications of montage. Film makers include Eisenstein, Godard, and Conner.

FILMSTUD 341: Music Across Media: Music Video to Postclassical Cinema (FILMSTUD 141, MUSIC 185, MUSIC 385)

What makes music videos, YouTube clips and musical numbers in today's films engaging? What makes them tick? Emphasis is on aesthetics and close reading. How music videos and its related forms work. Uses of the body, how visual iconography operates, what lyrics and dialogue can do, how and what music can say, and how it can work with other media. Questions of representation such as how class, ethnicity, gender, race, and nationality function. Viewership and industry practices.

Last offered: Autumn 2013

FILMSTUD 345: Politics and Aesthetics in East European Cinema (FILMSTUD 145)

From 1945 to the mid-80s, emphasizing Polish, Hungarian, Czech, Slovak, and Yugoslav contexts. The relationship between art and politics; postwar establishment of film industries; and emergence of national film movements such as the Polish school, Czech new wave, and new Yugoslav film. Thematic and aesthetic preoccupations of filmmakers such as Wajda, Jancso, Forman, and Kusturica.