May 6 - Jun 12: Bruce Marchfelder, History Of Cinema

Bruce Marchfelder is a film maker who teaches directing at Vancouver Film School, and a number of film courses at Regent College and Corpus Christi, the newish Catholic college at UBC. The first time one of his courses is offered and I can attend all the lectures, I'm there, no exaggeration: this guy is an inspired teacher. I've heard him two or three times show film clips and talk about what's going on onscreen, and I'm not hyping when I say he's a master teacher. But I'll be in rehearsal for YOU CAN'T TAKE IT WITH YOU the first couple weeks of this one, so it's no go for me. Hey, you can go in my place...

Course: HISTORY OF CINEMA 1930's - 1960's
Dates: MAY 6 - JUNE 12, Tuesday and Thursday evenings 6:15-9:15PM.
Cost: Full credit: $462.00 + ($50.00 registration) = $512.00
or
To audit: $276.00 + ($50.00 registration) = $326.00

If interested, please contact: Margaret Trim or Marjorie Budnikas at 604-822-6862.

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Course Description
An introduction to film history from the release of sound motion pictures in the late 20’s to the 1960’s. Emphasis will be placed on the achievements of directors who are representative of significant developments in the medium.

Course Objectives
The objectives of the class are three fold:
(i) to provide an overview of film history focusing on its key contributors;
(ii) to foster an appreciation for the language of film, and;
(iii) to equip students with the critical tools to engage and comment on film intelligently and responsibly;

Course Format
Two 3 hr. classes per week. Lecture with in-class screenings.

Required Reading
Kawin, Bruce F. and Mast, Gerald. A Short History of the Movies (Abridged). 9th ed.

Selections from the Following Texts:
Cousins, Mark. The Story of Film: A Worldwide History, 1st ed. New York, Thunder’s
Mouth Press, 2006

Sklar, Robert. Movie-Made America: A Cultural History of American Movies, 2nd ed.
Vintage, 1994

Course Outline

Class 1 Fritz Lang: The Darkened Screen
Screenings: M, Metropolis, Scarlet Street

Class 2 John Ford: The Cinema of Remembrance
Screenings: How Green Was My Valley, Stagecoach, My Darling Clementine, The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance

Class 3 Orson Welles: Genius and the Fractured Image
Screening: Cabinet of Dr. Caligari, Citizen Kane, Lady from Shanghai

Class 4 Howard Hawks: The Aesthetics of Omission
Screening: Red River, Scarface To Have and Have Not

Class 5 Frank Capra, Gregory La Cava, Preston Sturges: Cinema of Conscience
Screenings: Sullivan’s Travels, My Man Godfrey, Meet John Doe, It’s a Wonderful Life

Class 6 Alfred Hitchcock: The Banality of Evil
Screenings: The 39 Steps, Notorious, Vertigo, Psycho

Class 7 Billy Wilder: The Master Ironist
Screenings: Double Indemnity, Sunset Boulevard, The Apartment

Class 8 Vincent Minnelli: The Choreographer
Screenings: Cabin in the Sky, Bad and the Beautiful, The Band Wagon

Class 10 Roberto Rossellini, Vittorio De Sica: The Neo-Realists
Screenings: The Bicycle Thief, Open City

Class 11 Carl Th. Dreyer, Ingmar Bergman: Nordic Cinema
Screenings: The Seventh Seal, Ordet

Class 12 Akira Kurosawa and Kenji Mizoguchi: Post War Japan
Screenings: Ikiru, Rashomon, Shichinin No Samurai, Ugetsu