Spring 20 Courses

Any course on this list (except for the First Year Seminars) may count as an elective for the Global Cinema Minor or the Film Studies concentration in English. Some of these courses, however, will not automatically count, and in those cases you will need to request a Tar Heel Tracker adjustment. Also keep in mind that some restrictions may apply to production courses. Be sure to check Connect Carolina for specifications by the department offering the course.

If you are following the Film Studies Major Concentration, here are Spring courses that will meet certain requirements:

Foundations

ENGL 142 Film Analysis (Dr. Johnson)

Survey II

ENGL 381 Literature and Cinema (Dr. Watson)

CMPL 255 The Feast in Film, Fiction, & Philosophy (Dr. Brodey)

Writing Intensive

ENGL 381 Literature and Cinema (Dr. Watson)

Research Intensive

CMPL 494 The Essay Film (Dr. Warner)

ENGL 410 Documentary Film (Dr. Johnson)

Depth

CMPL 254 Horror and the Global Gothic (Dr. Rodriguez)

CMPL 494 The Essay Film (Dr. Warner)

ENGL 410 Documentary Film (Dr. Johnson)

Methods

ENGL 680 Film Theory (Dr. Warner)

If you wish to plan ahead, here are ENGL and CMPL film courses currently planned for Fall 21: TBA

FIRST-YEAR SEMINARS

AAAD 51 – First-Year Seminar: Masquerades of Blackness

TuTh 12:30-1:45

Dey Hall – Rm 0410

Charlene Regester

This seminar is designed to investigate how the concept of race has been represented in cinema historically, with a particular focus on representations of race when blackness is masqueraded. Its intent is to launch an investigative inquiry into how African Americans are represented on screen in various time periods, how we as spectators are manipulated by these cinematic constructions of race, and how race is marked or coded other than through visual representation. Students will view films that deal with ¿passing¿ from the various historical periods and will utilize theoretical concepts introduced in class to read these visual representations. Films selected for viewing include the pre-World War II Era, the Civil Rights Era, and the ¿Post-Racial¿ era. Students will be required to write three papers that reflect their ability to apply theoretical concepts to reading racialized representations on screen in these three historical periods to demonstrate their understanding of how racial masquerades have evolved over time and continue to persist in contemporary culture.

ENGL 57H – First-Year Seminar: Future Perfect: Science Fictions and Social Form

TuTh 3:30-4:45

Greenlaw – Rm 0317

Matthew Taylor

This class will investigate the forms and cultural functions of science fiction using films, books, and computer-based fictional spaces (Internet, video games, etc).

GSLL 60 – First-Year Seminar: Avant-Garde Cinema: History, Themes, Textures

TuTh 9:30-10:45AM

Dey Hall – Rm 0410

Richard Langston

Students explore the international history, filmic techniques and cultural meanings of non-narrative cinema of the 20th century. Students also transform in-class discussions and individual essays into video projects. Previously offered as GERM 60.

MUSC 63 – First-Year Seminar: Music on Stage and Screen

MoWe 3:35-4:50

Hill – Rm 0103

Anne Macneil

Offers tools and techniques for understanding multimedia, staged musical works like opera, musical theater, and film. The goal of the seminar is to develop students’ analytical skills in verbal and nonverbal media and to encourage their visualization of the potential and implications of artistic forms and structures.

GENERAL COURSE LIST

AAAD 250 – The African American in Motion Pictures: 1900 to the Present

Tu 3:30-6:20

Phillips – Rm 0328

Charlene Regester

This course will analyze the role of the African American in motion pictures, explore the development of stereotypical portrayals, and investigate the efforts of African American actors and actresses to overcome these portrayals.

ASIA 231 – Bollywood Cinema

TuTh 5:00-6:15

F Brooks – Sitterson – Rm F009

Afroz Taj

This course explores the development of the Indian cinema, with particular emphasis on the Hindi-Urdu films produced in Mumbai (Bollywood).

ASIA 252 – Popular Culture in Modern Southeast Asia

MoWeFr 10:10-11:00AM

Gardner – Rm 0209

Lorraine Aragon

This course examines popular culture in Southeast Asia as a response to colonialism, nationalism, modernization, the state, and globalization. Topics include theater, film, pop songs, television, rituals, and the Internet.

ASIA 357 // PWAD 362 // JWST 357 – The Arab-Jews: Culture, Community, and Coexistence

TuTh 11:00-12:15PM

Wilson – Rm 0217

Yaron Shemer

This course is designed to examine Jewish life in Arab lands in the last century by examining culture, language, and the communal life that the Arab-Jews shared with their neighbors.

ASIA 358 – Religion and Tradition in Israeli Cinema, TV, and Literature

TuTh 2:00-3:15

Kenan Laboratories – Rm B125

Yaron Shemer

This research-intensive course focuses on the ways religion and religious practices are represented in Israeli literature and media. The greater part of the semester will explore the variety of religious traditions in Israel within the framework of Zionist thought, gender and sexuality issues, and ethnic differences.

CMPL // KOR 232– Imagining the City in Modern Korea: Text, Image, Space

TuTh 11-12:15

New West – Rm 0219

Jonathan Kief

This course introduces students to modern Korea through the lens of the city. It explores the changing shape of urban space on the Korean peninsula as well as the central role that visions of the city and of city life have played in the development of modern Korean literature, television, and film.

CMPL 254 – Horror and the Global Gothic: Film, Literature, and Theory

MoWeFr 12:20-1:10

Greenlaw – Rm 0304

Guillermo Rodriguez

This course traces the development of horror in film and writing from the 18th-century European novel to contemporary Asian film. Theoretical readings will embrace a range of disciplines, from literary and film theory to anthropology, feminism and gender studies, and psychoanalysis.

CMPL // ASUA 255H – The Feast, Fiction, and Philosophy

MoWeFr 9:05-9:55AM

YMCA Building – Rm 0207

Inger Brodey

While its individual form and content may differ greatly, the feast or banquet functions as a strong symbol in most global communities. Food and feasting often defines community by establishing a connection between those who eat, what they eat and how they eat: as such it shapes national and cultural identities. As it is portrayed in Western philosophy from the seminal banquet in the pages of Plato’s Symposium, the feast is simultaneously erotic and philosophical. It has the potential to descend into gluttony or to rise to the level of the sublime. Feasting can represent communion or transgression, just as eating “the flesh” may symbolize one of Christianity’s most central rites or one of Western society’s central taboos. In Asia, the influence of Buddhist reincarnation has instilled additional meanings and taboos upon the consumption of food. The multiple purposes and nuances of food make it a rich theme in literature, film, and the visual arts. The food and banquet film has recently become a genre unto itself, and the outpouring of films are helpful in understanding cross-cultural differences in the social and philosophical understandings of what it is to be human. In addition to readings in philosophy, theology, and literature, we will study food films, work in the digital humanities, invite guest speakers, and create our own final feast.

CMPL 494 – The Essay Film: Adventures in Modern Cinema since 1945

TuTh 11-12:15

Dey Hall – Rm 0203

Rick Warner

This course examines the international evolution of the “essay film” after World War II. The essay film is a highly self-conscious genre that combines fiction and documentary, incorporates the subjectivity of the filmmaker, relies crucially on montage, and addresses the viewer as a participant in the ongoing reflection. An “essay” in this context is less an argument than an investigation that proceeds in an exploratory fashion. The filmmaker’s perspective is not just asserted but is self-critically questioned through meditations on perception, memory, and identity. We will consider how this peculiar tradition of cinema deviates from conventional documentary. We will repeatedly examine the ways in which essay filmmakers have confronted horrors of history (in particular the Holocaust), urgent political matters, and the workings of audiovisual media themselves. We will study this wide-ranging genre through several approaches, including affect theory, phenomenology, critical race theory, feminism, and more.

Films likely to be shown:

Sunless (Chris Marker)
Histories of Cinema (Jean-Luc Godard)
Cameraperson (Kirsten Johnson)
Night and Fog (Alain Resnais)
I’m Not There (Todd Haynes)
The Thin Blue Line (Errol Morris)
I Am Not Your Negro (Raoul Peck)
The Tree of Life (Terrence Malick)
F is for Fake (Orson Welles)
The Beaches of Agnes (Agnes Varda)
Hour of the Furnaces (Solanas and Getino)
Nostalgia for the Light (Patricio Guzman)
Images of the World and the Inscription of War (Harun Farocki)
Encounters at the End of the World (Werner Herzog)
Waltz with Bashir (Ari Folman)
News from Home (Chantal Akerman)

Graduate students will devise research projects related to their interests.

Counts for the Global Cinema Minor and Film Studies Concentration.

Prior knowledge of film history and film studies is recommended.

COMM 130 – Introduction to Media Production

Tu 11-12:50

Fr 9:05-10:55AM

Fr 11:15-1:05

Swain Hall – Rm 001A

Kristin Hondros

Permission of the instructor for nonmajors. Prerequisite for all production courses. Introduces students to basic tools, techniques, and conventions of production in audio, video, and film.

COMM 230 – Audio/Video/Film Production and Writing

TuTh 12:30-2:20

Swain Hall – Rm 200A

Julia Haslett

This course has major restrictions.

Prerequisite: COMM 130 (C or better)

Permission of instructor for non-majors and those who are lacking the prerequisite.

Course Description:
This course will explore the material, processes, and procedures of audio, video, and film production. Our emphasis will be on the control of those elements of convention that define the form in the appropriate medium. The creative development of narrative and documentary storytelling forms through the stages of pre-production through production and post-production will be explored through lectures, workshops, lab exercises and most importantly hands on practice.
This course has prerequisite requirements.

COMM 330 – Introduction to Writing for Film and Television

TuTh 12:30-1:45

TuTh 11-12:15

Greenlaw – Rm 526A

Stephen Neigher

An introduction to screenwriting for film and television.

COMM 331 – Writing the Short Film

MoWe 11:15-12:30

Graham Memorial – Rm 0212

Richard Coen

COMM 334 – Writing the One-Hour TV Drama

TuTh 5-6:15

Murphey – Rm 0221

Stephen Neigher

Prerequisite, COMM 330. Students in this class will live the life of a writing staff on a just-picked-up, fictional, one-hour television series. As if on a real series, they will individually and cooperatively create story ideas, treatments, and outlines, as well as write scenes, acts, and entire scripts.

COMM 390 – Special Topics in Communication Study (Writing the Full Length Play)

Mo 7-10PM

Bingham – Rm 0002

Howard Craft

This course expands upon the students basic knowledge of character, plot, dialogue, and structure. The importance of editing and revision are explored in great detail. Students will write a full length, polished script and receive instruction on submitting work to theaters. The prerequisites for this course are COMM 131, DRAM 231, or ENG 130 or 132. Students who do not have these requirements can contact the instructor for approval to take the course.

COMM 450 – Media and Popular Culture

MoWeFr 9:05-9:55AM

Bingham – Rm 0108

TuTh 12:30-1:45

Wilson – Rm 0202

Prerequisite, COMM 140. Permission of the instructor for nonmajors. Examination of communication processes and cultural significance of film, television, and other electronic media.

COMM 535 – Introduction to Screen Adaptation

Mo 5-7:45

Caldwell – Rm 0208

Michael Acosta

Prerequisite, COMM 131, 330, ENGL 130, or 132H. Students practice the craft of screen adaptation by conceptualizing, outlining, and writing scenes based on material from another medium (both fiction and nonfiction). Work is presented, discussed, and performed in a workshop environment.

COMM 635 – Documentary Production

Th 9:30-12:15

Swain Hall – Rm 106A

Julia Haslett

Prerequisite, COMM 230. A workshop in the production of video and/or film nonfiction or documentary projects. The course will focus on narrative, representational, and aesthetic strategies of documentary production.

COMM 647 – Advanced projects in Media Production

Tu 9:30-12:15

Swain Hall – Rm 108A

Julia Haslett

Instructor Consent Required

Prerequisite, COMM 230 and one of COMM 534, 635, 646, 653, or 654.

COMM 653 – Experimental Video

MoWe 12:20-2:15

Swain Hall – Rm 106A

Mo 5:45-7:45

Swain Haal – Rm 106A

Edward Rankus

Prerequisite, COMM 230; permission of the instructor for students lacking the prerequisite. This course allows students to create video productions that play with forms that lie outside of mainstream media.

COMM 654 – Motion Graphics, Special Effects, and Compositing

MoWe 9:05-11

Swain Hall – Rm 108A

Edward Rankus

In this course students will learn a wide range of post-production techniques for video projects, using primarily After Effects (and Photoshop, to a lesser extent). Topics explored include: Compositing, that is to say the integration and collage-ing of multiple video/film/still/text layers. Motion Graphics deals with the movement through 2D and 3D screen space of these layers, and Visual Effects will consider the myriad ways one can distort, color manipulate, and modify these layers, or create such phenomena as smoke, rain, etc. Besides creating projects using these techniques, we will also screen and analyze how this form of image manipulation is used in television and motion pictures.

COMM 656 – Sound for Film and Video: Theory and Practice for Motion Picture Sound Design

MoWe 12:20-2:15

Swain Hall – Rm 200A

William Brown

The aim of this course is to provide students who have an interest in film and video production with an understanding of the technical, conceptual, and aesthetic implications of the motion picture soundtrack, with a special emphasis on sound-image relationships. Students who have already developed a basic proficiency in the use of video cameras, audio recorders, and editing software will be asked to cultivate an understanding of and appreciation for the expressive and artistic possibilities.

COMM 690 – Advanced Topics in Communication Studies (Movie Making Machines: Learning About Cinema in the Maker Space)

MoWe 9:05-10:45AM

Swain Hall – Rm 200A

William Brown

Though we generally think of movies as the result of the work of screenwriters, cinematographers, actors, and directors, movies are also the product of a range of scientific and technological concepts and innovations. The magic of the movies begins with the technologies that make moving images possible. This projects-based seminar will introduce students to the fundamental optical and technological principles of motion pictures. By using the Maker Space to design and fabricate cameras, lenses, film strips, and movie projectors, students will gain a deep understanding of the material and technological foundations of the cinema, and the operating principles that are behind not only the classic films of Hollywood¿s past, but the high-definition digital imaging technologies of the present.

ENGL 142 – Film Analysis

Now in its second century, the cinema remains one of the most popular global art forms. Storytelling techniques first used a century ago, from close-ups to parallel editing, continue to be vital today. At the same time, audiences are often unaware of the work that goes into creating motion pictures, and lack a language to describe, precisely, how movies work. In this class, we will develop skills as interpreters and analysts of the cinema by focusing on the work of some of the most exciting contemporary directors working today. We will consider how they utilize long established film techniques and develop new ones in service of realizing the full potential of the moving image. Through a series of short assignments, we will become more astute viewers of the movies, and of the many images that populate our daily lives and our imaginations. Each week, we will focus on a set of cinematic techniques, and a director whose work exemplifies those techniques. Directors to be discussed include Ryan Coogler, Ava DuVernay, Taika Waititi, Edgar Wright, Alfonso Cuaron, Asghar Farhadi, Xavier Dolan, Kelly Reichardt, Steve McQueen, Yorgos Lanthimos, Celine Sciamma, Marielle Heller, and Bong Joon-ho. Assignments include short writing responses, a midterm, and a final.

MoWe 1:25-2:15

Bingham – Rm 0103

Martin Johnson

Fr 1:25-2:15

Hamilton Hall – Rm 0570

Jordan Schroeder

Fr 1:25-2:15

Fr 2:30-3:20

Hamilton Hall – Rm 0517

Sejal Mahendru

This course offers an introduction to the technical, formal, and narrative elements of the cinema.

ENGL 143 – Film and Culture

Examines the ways culture shapes and is shaped by film. This course uses comparative methods to contrast films as historic or contemporary, mainstream or cutting-edge, in English or a foreign language, etc.

MoWeFr 1:25-2:15

Greenlaw – Rm 0305

Bradley Hammer

TuTh 11-12:15

Greenlaw – Rm 0222

Jennifer Larson

ENGL 381 – Literature and Cinema

TuTh 2-3:15

Murphey – Rm 0302

Jacob Watson

The course introduces students to the complex narrative, aesthetic, and rhetorical relationship between literature and cinema.

ENGL 410 – Documentary Film

MoWeFr 9:05-9:55AM

Global Center – Rm 1009

Martin Johnson

When John Grierson defined the documentary as the creative treatment of actuality in 1926, he was thinking only of film. But the documentary mode has long been utilized across media, from the late 19th century advocacy journalism of Jacob Riis to Craig Gilbert’s 1973 reality television series An American Family to the selfies that circulate on social media. In this class, we will consider the persistence and pervasiveness of the documentary mode in the past century and a half. By surveying key developments in documentary film, and its historical, theoretical, and ethical implications, we will lay the groundwork for thinking critically about non-fiction media in its current, past, and future forms. Assignments include a series of short writing assignments, a take-home midterm, and a research-based final project.

ENGL 680 – Film Theory

TuTh 2-3:15

Dey Hall – Rm. 0313

Rick Warner

This course offers a rigorous examination of developments in film theory from the 1920s to the present. We will begin by considering the obsession with medium specificity that defines classical film theory and its efforts to establish the legitimacy of cinema relative to the other arts. We will question the degree to which classical film theories from the first half of the twentieth century remain relevant to more recent films. After comparing constructivist and realist approaches, we will focus on more contemporary trends that emphasize the embodied role of the spectator, such as affect theory and phenomenology. Mood, rhythm, music, and the multisensory impact of cinema will be our focus in the middle stretch of the course. We will also take up the politics of representation where gender, sexuality, and race are concerned. We will explore feminist theories beyond familiar psychoanalytic approaches to the gaze, and we will discuss queer theory approaches as they intersect with critical race approaches. We will devote one week to theories of animation (in particular Japanese anime) as they have challenged traditional film theories. From there, we will explore two recent avenues of inquiry: 1) arguments for the philosophical power of cinema, the claim being that films can think in their own right; and 2) the transformation of “film” after the arrival of digital technology. Our discussion of the digital afterlife of cinema will consider the significance of videogames.

Some of our group screenings will be part of an Ackland Film Forum series to be held at the Varsity theater.

We also have a world-renown visiting speaker who will share their innovative theories of animation with our class.

Films we will likely watch include:

Moonlight (Jenkins)
Syndromes and a Century (Apichatpong)
Parasite (Bong)
Wavelength (Snow)
Grandmaster (Wong)
Stalker (Tarkovsky)
Jeanne Dielman, 23 Commerce Quay, 1080 Brussels (Akerman)
I, Daniel Blake (Loach)
Transit (Petzold)
Portrait of a Lady on Fire (Sciamma)
Paprika (Satoshi Kon)
Code Unknown (Haneke)
Inside Llewyn Davis (Coen brothers)
A Most Violent Year (Chandor)
Twin Peaks: The Return (Lynch)
The Thin Red Line (Malick)
Night Moves (Reichardt)
Three Colors: Blue (Kieslowski)

Videogames: Firewatch, What Remains of Edith Finch, and possibly other walking simulator games.

Graduate students in the course will devise research projects related to their interests.

This course counts for the Global Cinema Minor and for the Film Studies Concentration.

Prior knowledge of film studies is recommended but not required.

FREN 389 – History of French Cinema II: 1950 to the Present

TuTh 3:30-4:45

Dey Hall – Rm 0301

Hassan Melehy

Study of French cinema from 1950 to the present, including postwar cinema, the New Wave, and the French film industry in the age of globalization. Concepts and vocabulary for film criticism. Conducted in English; students may do written work in French for major or minor credit. For French majors and minors, recommended preparation is FREN 300 and one of the following: FREN 255, 260, or 262; for all other students, recommended preparation is CMPL 143.

GERM 268 – Auteur Cinema: The Life and Films of Rainer Werner Fassbinder

TuTh 2-3

Dey Hall – Rm 0404

Priscilla Layne

Fassbinder has been called everything from a genius to a narcissist. But what is undebatable is the impact he left on German film. Students will learn about his work from his early students films to his melodramas and television series. Class discussion in English. All films in German with English subtitles.

HIST 124 – United States History through Film

TuTh 9:30-10:45AM

Murphey – Rm 0116

Fr 11:15-12:05

Stone Center – Rm 0210

We 9:05-9:55AM

Dey Hall – Rm 0403

Th 3:30-4:20

Genome Sciences Bldg – Rm 1373

Th 5-5:50

Hamilton Hall – Rm 0150

Fr 12:20-1:10

Dey Hall – Rm 0401

Fr 1:25-2:15

Genome Sciences Bldg – Rm 1378

Fr 3:35-4:25

Dey Hall – Rm 0209

William Brundage

Explores the history of the United States through films made about various historical eras. For each film, the instructor will lecture on the time period(s), the class will read relevant primary and secondary sources, and then the class will watch and discuss the film.

ITAL 337 – Cinema for Italian Conversation

MoWeFr 12:20-1:10

Dey Hall – Rm 0203

Prerequisite, ITAL 300. Expansion of speaking, writing, vocabulary, and grammar in Italian through the study of a variety of films. Topics relating to global issues, transnational connections between different countries, and diversity in Italy will be explored.

JAPN 417 – Japanese Culture through Film and Literature

TuTh 5-6:15

New West – Rm 0103

Yuko Kato

Prerequisite, JAPN 306. This course helps students to improve their Japanese language skills while developing an understanding of Japanese culture through films and literature. Exercises include reading novels in Japanese, close observation of Japanese films, analysis of cultural context, writing summaries, and frequent discussion.

PORT 388 – Portuguese, Brazilian, and African Identity in Film

TuTh 9:30-10:45AM

Dey Hall – Rm 0208

Kristine Taylor

Study of the literary and cultural film production of the Portuguese-speaking world on three continents. Films in Portuguese with English subtitles.

ROML 665 – Reading Latin American Film and Photography

Tu 3:30-6:00

Dey Hall – Rm 0210

Carolina Sa Carvalho Pereira

Required preparation, one Spanish or Portuguese major-level literature course or permission of the instructor. Critical readings of photography through the lens of Brazilian and Spanish-American written, photographic, and film archives. This course is designed for graduate and advanced undergraduate students and considers current theoretical movements in photography alongside the historical, political, and aesthetic debates shaping the field of Latin American visual culture.

RUSS // JWST 480H – Russian-Soviet Jewish Culture: Lofty Dreams and Stark Realities

TuTh 2:00-3:15

Venable – Rm G311

Stanislav Shvabrin

This course delves into the scintillating literary, visual, musical, and cinematic culture created by Jewish universalists seeking to build their new secular identity under the aegis of the Soviet Communist experiment in the aftermath of the 1917 Bolshevik coup. Surveys the works of Isaac Babel, Eduard Bagritsky, Marc Chagall, Sergey Eisenstein, Ilya Ehrenburg, Masha Gessen, Vasily Grossman, Osip Mandelshtam, and others. Taught in English; some readings in Russian for qualified students; films with English subtitles.