History Of Film – Cleo 5-7.
History Of Film – Cleo 5-7
Paper details Write an essay on a single scene, shot, or aspect of mise-en-scène from a movie we have watched for class so far this semester, up to and including Varda’s Cleo From 5 to 7. • Essays should be 3-5 pages (750-1250 words) long, typed, and double-spaced. • Your essay should relate the scene, shot, or element of your choosing to the film as a whole (technically or thematically) and analyze how or what it contributes to the movie. This could include its relationship to the film movement or historical period of which the film is a part, but it does not need to do so. Make sure that your essay and your choice of topic let you engage with specific detail from the film itself. • We have discussed a number of ways to think about historical context in class; the reading questions ask you to consider specific approaches to film history; your final paper will give you an opportunity to put forward or synthesize an historical argument of your own. This first paper asks you to be particularly attentive to a specific film, and to ground your discussion in detail from it. • What might that mean? Some examples (but note that your paper need not address each of the questions listed below—they are meant to start your thinking if you are stuck, not define its scope): o You could discuss the final scene of Bicycle Thieves (or even just the sequence of shots in which Bruno takes his father’s hand) in light of the film as a whole. How does it resolve, or fail to resolve, the plot? Is it in keeping with what came before? How does it relate to Zavattini’s assertion that in his work he “leave[s] the solutions to the audience” (56)? How to the “moral responsibility” of film as a medium (53)? o You could write about camera movement or placement in Rashomon, using a particular sequence or scene as your focus. How does the camera’s position, or the composition of a particular shot contribute to our sense of the story, or to the “verdict” of the film as a whole? How might a particular composition relate both to the film as a whole and to an assertion laid out in the reading? o How does a scene, sequence, or shot from Cleo From 5 to 7 relate to an aspect of New Wave style? Does it illustrate the movement of which it may or may not be a part? o How does either framing or lighting, or color change our relationship to what we see in a scene from All That Heaven Allows? Is there a contradiction between the movie’s explicit values and what it shows us? Is this contradiction real? o Don’t forget Double Indemnity. In film noir, according to Paul Schrader, “the theme is hidden in the style” (241-242). How does a formal aspect we see it in a specific scene or shot (the lighting, the composition, the camera angle) work to transmit its mood or tone, or add to our sense of character or of a specific relationship, and why does that matter to the film as a whole? What is the relationship of a particular line of dialogue to the themes of the film? How does, say, the voiceover alter our experience of a particular scene? • These are possibilities. Answers to any one of the questions above would need both focus and organization to make a paper. More than that, they are merely examples of the kind of topics you might consider (though you should feel free to use any one of them). Part of this assignment is developing a topic that works. • No matter what you choose, make sure that your discussion is more than a recounting of the story of the film. Your readers (real and hypothetical) have seen the movie you are writing about. While you should situate your readers in the film and scene you discuss, your goal is to contribute to their understanding. • While this is a film history class, and while any of the films we will see this semester could be thoughtfully considered in relation both to their historical period and their participation in a particular style or movement, you should allow your topic and your thesis to determine the role these contexts play in your discussion. No need, in other words, to rehash the history of the American occupation of Japan in order to talk about long shots, unless it has specific relevance to your discussion. Use your space wisely. Be especially careful not to rely on unsupported generalizations about a particular historical period, nation, or group. • Your essay should have a specific and well-developed thesis generated from, and supported by detail and close analysis from the scene or element you choose to discuss. You will have an easier time doing this if you start your thinking, and perhaps center your paper on just a few elements that illustrate your point particularly well. (This does not, of course, mean that you shouldn’t consider the film as a whole in your discussion, just that your analysis will be more precise, more rewarding, and more satisfying to your detail-obsessed teacher if you work from the specific to the general.)