107-421 Contemporary Film Theory

Formerly available as 107-096. Students who have completed 107-096 are not eligible to enrol in this subject.

Admission to the postgraduate diploma or fourth-year honours in cinema studies, see Honours entry.

This subject will examine the development of contemporary film theory post-1968. Students will be expected to critically evaluate the significance and applicability of some of the following theoretical approaches: formalism and structuralism; apparatus theory; feminist film theory and spectatorship; Lacanian psychoanalytic theory; postmodernism; and queer and postcolonial theory. Students will attend seminars that involve a variety of topics: close analysis, close readings, research, thesis writing, paper presentation. Finally, students will be required to present a paper based on a close reading of a specific film text with reference to its use of film language. Students will also conduct research into this film in relation to its production history, distribution and reception and relate their findings as to the place of the film within the history of film theory.