What is an auteur? What is auteur theory?
How do Mast and Kawin describe the first filmmakers?
What role did Thomas Edison play in early cinema?
What was the Kinetoscope?
How did the Kinetoscope’s design influence the films shot for it? What were the subjects of early films?
What was Black Maria? Were there disadvantages to Black Maria?
January 27
Who are the Lumiere Brothers? What innovations did they bring to cinema?
Who was Georges Melies? What innovations did he bring to cinema?
February 1
What are the major characteristics, themes, and influences of Westerns? How do you know you are watching a Western? (Please make a very detailed list)
February10
What are Griffith’s innovations regarding narrative, editing, acting, etc.?
What is the context and historical background for Griffith’s
production of Birth of a Nation?
Considering the racist context of Birth of a Nation, how do Mast
and Kawin claim that the film remains a masterpiece of cinema?
February 12
February 15
February 12
What lessons did Mack Sennett learn from D.W. Griffith and
how did he apply them to his comedies?
How do Sennett and Chaplin’s principles of comedy differ in
their films? (Make a detailed list and compare)
What innovations does Chaplin bring to the film industry?
February 15
What is the “star system”? Provide examples from the
second-third major period in motion picture history.
What is the “studio system”? Provide examples from the
second-third major period in motion picture history.
What were the precursors to documentary film?
How is documentary film defined? (Make a detailed list)
February 17
How were the German nation and characters being portrayed on screen around the world? What did the Germans do as an attempt to “antidote “this issue? Was this a successful “antidote”? Explain your analysis.
What are the major elements and characteristics of Surrealism?(Make
a detailed list)
February 22
February 17
How were the German nation and characters being portrayed on screen around the world? What did the Germans do as an attempt to “antidote “this issue? Was this a successful “antidote”? Explain your analysis.
How do Mast and Kawin describe the major differences between
American (Griffith), Soviet and German filmmaking? What major innovations in film
did German filmmakers contribute both on screen and in the production and
studio processes? How did German studios work? German sets? German actors?
What are the major elements and characteristics of Expressionism?
(Make a detailed list)
What makes The Cabinet
of Dr. Caligari major film innovation in both its content and production?
What were the major cultural and social atmospheres that
facilitated the growth and maturity of
French films in the 1920s-1930s? What were the three types of experimental
French films in the 1920s? How did these films “look?”
February 22
What was the political climate when Soviet film was born?
How are Soviet film compared to Hollywood? Soviet
compared to German?
What is the Kuleshov Workshop and what factors
influenced the reasons for Soviet film experiments?
Describe the three primary purposes Kuleshov
students learned in building a film?
Who is Segei M. Eisenstein? Describe Dialectical
Montage. Provide an example.
What is the background for Battleship Potemkin? What makes this film influential in cinema
history through its content, editing, and form?
February 24
What are the major elements and characteristics of Film Noir (Make a detailed list)
February 26
What role did The Jazz
Singer play in the introduction to sound to audiences?
March 2
What major cycles, conventions, and styles became prominent
in Hollywood?
February 24
What are the major elements and characteristics of Film Noir (Make a detailed list)
February 26
What were some of the problems film makers encountered when
they began producing “talkies?” How did it effect the camera and film
production? How did it effect the jobs in the film industry?
March 2
What facilitated the survival of the studio system between
1930-1945? How do those years compare to more recent years of filmmaking?
What brought about the Hollywood Production Code? How did
the code effect the content of the film?
What is a film cycle? What purposes did they serve to the
film industry?
What types of roles did women have during the Studio Era in Hollywood?
March 7
March 7
What two “forces” ended the era of old Hollywood?
What decisions were made about how Hollywood could
“sell” its films?
How did Americans feel about the motion picture
industry following World War II? How did the motion picture industry respond to
HUAC’s investigations?
How did the two most familiar genres of Hollywood
between the years 1946-1965, interplay on the screen?
March 21
How did European films contrast with the American films being produced?
May 2
March 21
How did European films contrast with the American films being produced?
What social and cultural factors influenced the
beginning of Italian Neorealism? How is Italian Neorealism described?
March 23
How did “la nouvelle vague” or the New Wave begin? How is New Wave film described?
March 30
How does the reemergence of mythology in U.S. cinema
differ from the era of the Hollywood Renaissance?
March 23
How did “la nouvelle vague” or the New Wave begin? How is New Wave film described?
March 30
Who were the Pythons? What influence did they have
on British cinema?
April 1
How do Mast and Kawin describe “J-Horror?”
April 11
April 11
What reasons do Mast and Kawin list for the
evolution of the new American cinema?
How does the new American cinema style differ from
the old Hollywood style?
How do Mast and Kawin define Third Cinema?
April 22
April 29
April 20
April 22
What major reasons do Mast and Kawin list for
international productions?
What are the
differences between international cinema and transnational cinema?April 29
What types of films are being made during the Return
of Myths era?
What technological advancements are integrated into
cinema during the Return of Myths era?May 2
What Jung's major archetypes and what do they
represent? (Make a detailed list)
May 4
What effect did conglomerates have on film making?
May 9
What are the advantages and disadvantages of digital film making? (Make a detailed list)
How did the studio change? What types of films were
being made?
How did the VHS and DVD effect film making and
viewing? What was cinema like before and after VHS and DVD?
May 9
What are the advantages and disadvantages of digital film making? (Make a detailed list)
