Summer 2017 Undergraduate Courses

May 22-July 6
Tuesdays & Thursdays
6:00-9:00pm

Marie Lascu & Rufus DeRham

CINE-UT 1809 / c#4357

In a world where individuals are constantly generating digital content for personal and professional use, learning how to organize and save this material is essential for ensuring its long-term accessibility. This introductory course will impart practical skills from the world of archiving to help students take control of the media they store at home, in the studio, or online. Students will learn to identify legacy analog and digital formats, assess a filmmaker's collection for a digitization project, and plan for the ongoing care of their media.  Designed for anyone who wants to save their digital content, this course is especially well-suited for students, scholars, artists, filmmakers, musicians, activists, bloggers, and journalists. Emphasis will be placed on preserving audiovisual and photographic materials, with additional consideration of documents and social media.

NOTE: In addition to tuition, there are Media & Production fees totaling $80 for this course.

May 22-June 8
Mondays-Thursdays
12:30-4:30pm

Chris Straayer

CINE-UT 220 / c#5479

Please note this class runs: 5/22 to 5/25, 5/30 to 6/01, and 6/5 to 6/8.

Pedro Almodóvar is the most notorious Spanish filmmaker since Luis Buñuel, and, like Buñuel, he rapidly gained international acclaim. This course will attend to Almodóvar’s appealing body of work (What Have I Done to Deserve This, Matador, Law of Desire, Tie Me Up Tie Me Down, All About My Mother, Talk to Her, Bad Education, Volver, Women on the Verge of a Nervous Breakdown, The Skin I Live In, among others) in relation to: national political history; international film exhibition; intertextual popular culture; comedy-thriller-melodrama genre mixing; convoluted narrative structures; theatrical uses of color, music, acting, and scale; interrelated themes of family, desire, and identity; and an aesthetics of excess. Finally we will consider the “outstanding” Almodóvar within a context of “influence.”

This course is open to graduate and undergraduate students.  Please use appropriate course number (UT for Undergraduate and GT for Graduate). NOTE: In addition to tuition, there are Media & Production fees totaling $80 for this course.

June 12-June 29
Mondays-Thursdays
12:30-4:30pm

William Simon

CINE-UT 206 / c#5486

The films of Stanley Kubrick constitute one of the most innovative bodies of work in the commercial cinema. This course investigates Kubrick’s films in detail with emphasis on their narrative conceptions and structures. The course will explore the uses of irony and voiceover, the representation of the relationship between humans and technology, the centrality of the topic of war, and the relationship of his films to issues of genre.

This course is open to graduate and undergraduate students.  Please use appropriate course number (UT for Undergraduate and GT for Graduate).   NOTE: In addition to tuition, there are Media & Production fees totaling $80 for this course.

July 3-August 13
Tuesdays & Thursdays
6:00-10:00pm

Michael Bowen

CINE-UT 320 / c#6565

This course will examine the history and significance of the maternal horror film, focusing especially on the early work of director Roman Polanski (Rosemary’s Baby, Repulsion) and its diverse progeny. Topics covered will include the history and development of horror as a genre; late-Twentieth century anxieties about reproduction, spirituality, and the family; and the politics and aesthetics of adaption and remakes. In addition to a focused engagement with Rosemary’s Baby (1968) and some of its more recent offspring, screenings will include other “evil offspring” classics such as The Omen (1976), Carrie (1976) and Alien (1979). Screenings will be buttressed with a limited amount of fiction reading and film theoretical writing.

This course is open to graduate and undergraduate students.  Please use appropriate course number (UT for Undergraduate and GT for Graduate). NOTE: In addition to tuition, there are Media & Production fees totaling $80 for this course.

July 3-August 13
Mondays & Wednesdays
6:00-10:00pm

Tanya Goldman

CINE-UT 217 / c#5491

Summer filmgoing has become synonymous with “the blockbuster,” a category of films defined by big expectations—big budgets, big special effects, big stars, and big marketing campaigns. This course will examine the origins and evolution of this ubiquitous mode of contemporary film production by historicizing the term as a formal and narrative style, industrial strategy, and cultural phenomenon. Through this lens, we will consider cinema’s roots in spectacle, as well as high concept narratives, special effects, the rise of sequels and remakes, and staples of the blockbuster form such as action thrillers, superheroes, and outsized epic adventures. In addition to viewing key films in the development of the blockbuster tradition, media paratexts such as trailers, print advertisements, merchandising, and viral content campaigns that position and surround these film products in the market place will also be considered. In charting the evolution of the blockbuster, this summer course will examine the multivalent qualities that have informed and continue to inform commercial filmmaking on a global scale.

NOTE: In addition to tuition, there are Media & Production fees totaling $80 for this course.

July 3-August 13
Tuesdays & Thursdays
12:30-4:30pm

Rochelle Miller

CINE-UT 100 / c#6491

When Industrial Light and Magic’s VFX team experienced difficulties articulating the Rathtar creature’s multiple limbs for Star Wars: The Force Awakens (2015), they consulted with Pixar’s animators who had struck upon an innovative rigging system to animate Hank the octopus’s tentacles for Finding Dory (2016). This curious case of convergent evolution, ultimately executed through a collaboration across studios, occurred because both Lucasfilm and Pixar Animation share a common parent: The Walt Disney Company. Somewhat embodying an octopus, Disney’s far reach extends across a vast empire of entertainment and multi-media interests that influence American culture. The company’s deeply entrenched, self-cultivated, and legally regulated image of a benevolent conglomerate means its business model and practices often evade severe scrutiny. Similarly, Disney’s seductively alluring, seemingly innocent movies and the representations they proffer resist critical analysis from adoring audiences.

In this course we will break the spell of Disney’s image and products to address critically both the Corporation, and the narratives it projects. We will also have occasion to examine the changing output and company cultures of Disney’s recent acquisitions, which include: Marvel, Pixar, and Lucasfilm. Screenings and clips will draw from Disney’s and its subsidiaries’ most beloved movies, lesser-seen works, and externally produced films that present critiques of Disney’s global empire.

NOTE: In addition to tuition, there are Media & Production fees totaling $80 for this course.