Film

Course Structure

1. Conceptualising Film
2. Advanced Film Theory
3. Film History
4. Film and Modernity
5. Dissertation:GPMS
6. develop your understanding and skills to a notably higher level of sophistication and achievement (appropriate to an Master’s level award) than would be expected at degree level, such that you leave the programme with a substantial analytic and critical understanding of film and film studies
7. develop your understanding and skills to the level necessary for entry into a research programme in Film Studies
8. develop your ability to think independently, argue with clarity and force, to discern areas of research interest within the field and be able to frame viable research questions
9. provoke reflection on areas of critical and theoretical approaches to cinema and its context
10. nurture the intellectual skills cited above in the context of written work (essays and dissertations) as well as in the context of interpersonal interaction (seminars, research papers, supervision)
11. attract outstanding students irrespective of race, background, gender, and physical disability, from both within the UK and from overseas
12. develop existing and new areas of teaching in response to the advance of research and scholarship within the subject, as well as new developments in filmmaking practice.
13. the techniques which comprise film and related, moving audio-visual media, and the ways in which they are used to create meaning and experience
14. concepts and practices integral to the production and reception of films, including authorship, genre, industry, stardom, style, modernity, national and transnational cinemas
15. conceptualisations of our engagement with film, including the cultural, aesthetic, industrial and economic contexts in which viewing and exhibition occurs
16. critical approaches to film, including an understanding of the historical and contemporary debates within film theory
17. film histories and historiography, particularly as it informs the concepts and practices cited in the second point above.
18. constructing arguments and produce evidence appropriate for research at Master’s level
19. the ability to reflect critically on debates within the conceptual practices of the discipline
20. designing and implementing research projects informed by interdisciplinary approaches in the humanities.
21. articulating, in written and oral contexts, an understanding of film commensurate with the first four programme aims noted above
22. analysing narrative and other forms and structures shaping films
23. the ability to draw on interdisciplinary intellectual knowledge, methods and techniques drawn from other disciplines (such as psychoanalysis, philosophy, and literary theory) in the study of film
24. mastery of the vocabularies developed to enhance the analysis and understanding of film and related media
25. analysing, with precision, the images and sounds which comprise films.
26. the ability to communicate effectively in both oral and written contexts, at a level appropriate for the conduct of original research
27. the ability to create, manage and self-direct essays and research projects, with the advice and supervision of teaching staff
28. the ability to integrate skills of argument and reasoning with those of empirical observation
29. the ability to contribute effectively to the exploration of a question or problem in the context of group discussion and analysis, through a combination of intervention, leading of discussion, and focussed attention to others
30. the ability to deploy the subject-specific understanding of the nature of film and related media – in relation to, for example, social and ethical questions – in the context of participation in society as workers and citizens
31. the ability to use various IT skills, ranging from word-processing and audio-visual presentation to research through web-based sources, at a level of sophistication commensurate with the production of original research.
32. national cinemas – form and history: North American, European, Latin American
33. the moving image in a digital context
34. documentary film
35. film aesthetics
36. avant-garde and experimental cinema.