- Theory of Cinema

Catalog description

This course examines major concepts and important writings in film theory from the 1920s to the present. Students engage with a wide variety of theories: on the nature of cinema as an art form, its relationship to the other arts, its meaning-making capacities, its aesthetic and psychological powers, and its potential social and political effects. Theories are critically examined for their argumentative structures and use of evidence, and assessed in comparison to other theories. The scope of the course typically includes Modernist and realist film theories of the “classical” period, and more recent approaches to film theory informed by structuralism and post-structuralism, semiotics, Marxism, feminism, psychoanalytic and cognitive psychology, and queer theory. Required weekly film screenings. Required for all Cinema majors.