INTRO TO FILM & MEDIA STUDIES
This course serves as an introduction to the study of film and related visual media, examining fundamental issues of aesthetics (mise-en-scene, editing, sound), history (interaction of industrial, economic, and technological factors), theory (spectatorship, realism, and indexicality), and criticism (auteurist, feminist, and genre-based approaches). The course also investigates how digital media change has been productive of new frameworks for moving image culture in the present. Discussion section FILM UN1001 is a required corequisite.
- R 1:10 p.m.-3:55 p.m.
-
Instructor:
Racquel Gates
Info - 3 points
INTRO-FILM & MEDIA STUDIES-DIS
Co-requisite discussion section for FILM UN 1000 INTRO TO FILM & MEDIA STUDIES.
- F 1:10 p.m.-2 p.m.
- F 12:10 p.m.-1 p.m.
- F 9:10 a.m.-10 a.m.
- F 2:10 p.m.-3 p.m.
- F 9 a.m.-9:50 a.m.
-
Instructor:
Anqi Chen
Info -
Instructor:
Azia White
Info -
Instructor:
Yunxia Wang
Info -
Instructor:
Anna Dunn
Info -
Instructor:
Elizabeth P Wills
Info - 0 points
CINEMA HIST II: 1930-1960
This course examines major developments and debates in the history of cinema between 1930 and 1960, from the consolidation of the classic Hollywood studio system in the early sound era to the articulation of emergent ;new waves; and new critical discourses in the late 1950s. Our approach will be interdisciplinary in scope, albeit with an emphasis on social and cultural history - concerned not only with how movies have developed as a form of art and medium of entertainment, but also with cinemas changing function as a social institution. Discussion section FILM UN 2021 is a required co-requisite.
- W 2:10 p.m.-3:25 p.m.
-
Instructor:
Richard A Pena
CULPA: 16
Info
- 3 points
CINEMA HIST II-1930-1960-DIS
Co-requisite for FILM UN 2020 Cinema History II.
- R 9 a.m.-9:50 a.m.
- F 1:10 p.m.-2 p.m.
- R 1:10 p.m.-2 p.m.
-
Instructor:
Sherif A Ibrahim
Info -
Instructor:
Leon Ristov
Info -
Instructor:
Pierre Ho Ieong
Info - 0 points
CINEMA HIST III:1960-1990
By closely watching representative classics from countries including Italy, Poland, Russia and Argentina, we will study the distinctive trends and masters of this vibrant era. Special attention will be paid to the French New Wave (60s); the New German Cinema (70s); the reformulation of Hollywood studio filmmaking in the 70s (Altman, Cassavetes, Coppola), and the rise of the independent American cinema (80s). Discussion section FILM UN 2031 is a required co-requisite.
- R 2:10 p.m.-6 p.m.
-
Instructor:
Annette Insdorf
CULPA: 10 Wikipedia Info - 3 points
CINEMA HIST III:1960-1990-DISC
Co-requisite discussion section for FILM UN 2030 Cinema History III: 1960-90.
- F 10:10 a.m.-11 a.m.
- F 1:10 p.m.-2 p.m.
- F 2:10 p.m.-3 p.m.
-
Instructor:
Alexander J Abate
Info -
Instructor:
Fernando Reinaldos
Info -
Instructor:
Nana F Duffuor
Info - 0 points
American Film: Cult & Exploitation
Amer Film: Cult & Exploit
Once associated with images of fishnet-costumed fans of
The Rocky Horror Picture Show
, the concept of the “cult film” has gone increasingly mainstream in recent years. This course seeks to assess the popularization of the phenomenon, asking: what exactly
is
a cult film? And what does the mainstreaming of the concept suggest about our changing relation to today’s media environment?
Whereas most types of film can be defined through widely recognized elements of story and setting (tumbleweed, deserts, gunfights: it’s a western), this is far from being the case with cult. Some have defined the cult film as “created” by audiences (again,
Rocky Horror
); others in terms of nonclassical or aberrant modes of textuality (e.g., various forms of “bad taste” cinema). This course, however, seeks to go beyond audience- and text-based definitions, instead placing cult within a series of historical contexts:
as an outgrowth of film industry practices that sustained the
low cultural status
of certain movie types during the classical Hollywood cinema (e.g., B movies, exploitation, etc.);
as the product of
audience reception
practices, shaped by the politics of cultural taste and “camp” viewing practices that first coalesced during the “midnight movie” phenomenon of the late 1960s/1970s;
as sustained by the
transnational flow
of media content, offering new frameworks for understanding “national” cinemas.
In offering such an approach, this course seeks to isolate the different uses to which “cult” has been put, in order to indicate how pervasive and adaptable the idea has recently become. As we will see, the cult phenomenon implies both a perspective on the past, hence inseparable from the experience of nostalgia, as well as an engagement with our media-driven present.
- R 10:10 a.m.-12:55 p.m.
-
Instructor:
Robert King
CULPA: 7
Info
- 3 points
American Film: Cult & Exploitation DISC
Per syllabus- required discussion section for Film UN2132 American Film: Cult & Exploitation
- F 9:10 a.m.-10 a.m.
- F 11:10 a.m.-noon
- F 10:10 a.m.-11 a.m.
- F 12:10 p.m.-1 p.m.
-
Instructor:
Miranda D Disick
Info -
Instructor:
Sara Boutorabi
Info -
Instructor:
Alexandra Van Den Sigtenhorst
Info -
Instructor:
Deborah Chuang
Info - 0 points
American Film: Film Noir
This course surveys the American film genre known as
film noir
, focusing primarily on the genre’s heyday in the 1940s and early 1950s, taking into account some of its antecedents in the hard-boiled detective novel, German Expressionism, and the gangster film, among other sources. We will consider a wide variety of critical and theoretical approaches to the genre, and will also study a number of film noir adaptations and their literary sources.
- M 10:10 a.m.-1:55 p.m.
-
Instructor:
James A Schamus
CULPA: 8
Wikipedia
Info
- 3 points
American Film: Film Noir DISC
Per syllabus- required discussion section for Film UN2136: American Film: Film Noir
- F 11:10 a.m.-noon
- F 9:10 a.m.-10 a.m.
- F 1:10 p.m.-2 p.m.
-
Instructor:
Cece A Wheeler
Info -
Instructor:
Katherine Burns
Info -
Instructor:
Nora G Marris
Info - 0 points
WORLD CINEMA: LATIN AMERICA
An overview of the major developments in the art and industry of cinema in Latin America, ranging from its earliest days to the most recent works of the digital era. The interaction of Latin American filmmakers with international movements such as neorealism, modernism, cinema vérité, and postmodernism will be addressed. Among the filmmakers to be studied are Luis Buñuel, Glauber Rocha, Raúl Ruiz and Lucrecia Martel. Students will discover the major industrial tends as well as artistic currents that have defined Latin American cinema, as well as have the chance to analyze a number of key works both in terms of their varying approaches to filmmaking as well as their resonance with political/social/historical issues.
- T 6:10 p.m.-9:45 p.m.
-
Instructor:
Richard A Pena
CULPA: 16
Info
- 3 points
WORLD CIN: LAT AM DISCUSSION
The global success of film directors Alejandro González Iñárritu, Alfonso Cuarón, and Guillermo del Toro has attracted much attention to the New Mexican Cinema. Yet this «Nuevo cine mexicano» cannot be understood without knowing the traditions of Mexico’s intricate film history. This course explores the numerous tendencies of Mexican cinema through the analysis of its most representative genres, features, and directors since the so called Golden Age (1938-1957). An in-depth analysis of films such as Emilio Fernández’s
La perla
(1947), Luis Buñuel’s
Los olvidados
(1950), Jomi García Ascot’s and María Luisa Elío's
En el balcón vacío
(1962), Alejandro Jodorowsky’s
La montaña sagrada
(1973), and Arturo Ripstein's
Profundo carmesí
(1996) will contribute to define the characteristics of the most relevant «national» genres – from 1940s melodramas to 1970s psychedelic movies and 1990s crime films. The study of the New Mexican Cinema of Iñárritu (
Amores perros
, 2000), Cuarón (
Y tu mamá también
, 2001), and del Toro (
El laberinto del fauno
, 2006) will comprise an examination of the complex relationship between the US and Mexican film industries, as well as a critique of the very notion of «national identity» in today’s globalized world. We will also analyze new tendencies in commercial, experimental, and documentary Mexican films – including Carlos Reygadas'
Luz silenciosa
(2007) and Pedro González
Rubio's Alamar
(2009).
- F 1:10 p.m.-2 p.m.
- F 2:10 p.m.-3 p.m.
-
Instructor:
Jean Chapiro
Info -
Instructor:
Miruna C Straut
Info - 0 points
LAB IN WRITING FILM CRITICISM
Lab in Writing Film Criticism
This course will focus on writing fresh, original criticism, on developing an individual voice, and on creating strong arguments supporting your ideas (qualities that translate to many areas, from reviewing to pitching a film project). Screenings in and outside class will be followed by discussion and in-class writing exercises, as well as regular writing assignments. How do you choose an effective critical approach? How do you make your opinions vivid and convincing on the page? We will also analyze recent criticism and consider the changing landscape of film criticism today.
Prerequisite:
Instructor’s permission. Submit a short, film-related sample to cj2374@columbia.edu
Note: Because permission is required, on-line registration may say the course is full when it is not. Priority given to film majors.
- M 1:10 p.m.-3:40 p.m.
-
Instructor:
Caryn James
Wikipedia Info - 3 points
LABORATORY IN SCREENWRITING
This lab is limited to declared Film and Media Studies majors. Exercises in the writing of film scripts.
- M 6 p.m.-9 p.m.
- W 6 p.m.-9 p.m.
- F 2 p.m.-5 p.m.
-
Instructor:
Shan Jiang
Info -
Instructor:
Hazel C McKibbin
Info -
Instructor:
Javier Cibils Madero
Info - 3 points
LAB IN FICTION FILMMAKING
This lab course is limited to declared Film & Media Studies majors. Exercises in the use of video for fiction shorts.
- F 2 p.m.-5 p.m.
-
Instructor:
Hector Prats I Castro
Info -
Instructor:
Kunao Yan
Info - 3 points
Auteur Studies: John Cassavetes
Auteur Study: John Cassav
This course is devoted to an in-depth analysis of maverick American auteur John Cassavetes work. A central figure in the New American Cinema scene in the late fifties in New York and in Independent Cinema Cassavetes was influenced by the New York School of Filmmaking—writers and actors who worked on television and acting prior to moving to Hollywood.
Shadows
(1958-59) his first feature is crucial in understanding the budding currents of experimental and indie work in early sixties in New York. His eccentricity to Hollywood, exacerbated by his acting work within the film industry, are exemplary of the struggles for an independent authorial vision.
Cassavetes narratives of individual autonomy emerge through a thematic constant: the friction between social scripts--notions of proper behavior-- and the alternate corporeal inventiveness of characters/actors. During the course we will discuss how Cassavetes aesthetics is propped on notions of individual expressivity –both his own as filmmaker and that of his characters and actors. We will discusss notions of improvisation and acting, his camera work, editing and sound. We will place his work in the context of independent cinema from the late fifties to the early eighties analyzing his eccentric relation to Hollywood.
This course will encourage modes of comparative analysis as well as further discussion on Cassavetes reception. With a focus on Cassavetes student will learn to identify auteurs according to their themes, their visual and aural style as well as manner of production; understand the relation of films to their historical and socio-cultural moment; consider the notion of American independent cinema historically with a special focus on New American cinema from the late fifties up to the 1980s.
- R 10:10 a.m.-12:40 p.m.
-
Instructor:
Ivone Margulies
Info - 3 points
SENIOR SEMINAR IN FILM STUDIES
A seminar for senior film majors planning to write a research paper in film history/theory/culture. Course content changes yearly.
- W 2:10 p.m.-5:40 p.m.
-
Instructor:
Annette Insdorf
CULPA: 10 Wikipedia Info - 3 points
ADVANCED FILM PRODUCTION PRACTICE
Advanced Film Production Practice is an advanced production and lecture course for students who wish to obtain a deeper understanding of the skills involved in screenwriting, directing and producing. Building on the fundamentals established in the Labs for Fiction and Non-Fiction Filmmaking, this seminar further develops each student’s grasp of the concepts involved in filmmaking through advanced analytical and practical work to prepare Thesis film materials.
- W 9:30 a.m.-12:30 p.m.
-
Instructor:
Benjamin C Leonberg
Info - 3 points
SENIOR SEM IN SCREENWRITING
A seminar for senior film majors. Students will complete a step outline and minimum of 30 pages of their project, including revisions. Through reading/viewing and analyzing selected scripts/films, as well as lectures, exercises and weekly critiques, students will expand their understanding of dramatic writing and narrative-making for film and TV, including adaptations. They will learn appropriate structure for each specific screen-writing form, and endeavor to apply their understanding of drama, character, theme, and structure to their chosen narrative project.
- F 2:10 p.m.-4:40 p.m.
-
Instructor:
Loren-Paul Caplin
CULPA: 2 Info - 3 points
FILM AND MEDIA THEORY
This course offers a historical and critical overview of film and media theory from its origins up to the present.
- T 1:10 p.m.-4:55 p.m.
-
Instructor:
Jason R Lariviere
Info - 3 points
FILM & MEDIA THEORY-DISC
Co-requisite undergraduate discussion section for FILM GU 4000 Film & Media Theory.
- F 9:10 a.m.-10 a.m.
- F 1:10 p.m.-2 p.m.
- F 3:10 p.m.-4 p.m.
- F 1 p.m.-1:50 p.m.
-
Instructor:
Emily S Ko
Info -
Instructor:
Christopher P Wang
Info -
Instructor:
Yingda Wang
Info -
Instructor:
Majorca H Bateman-Coe
Info - 0 points
Seeing Narrative
An advanced film theory "workshop" in which we shall avoid reading film theory in favor of a selection of other texts, taken mainly from the domains of art history, philosophy, and literature. Our central question will be: What can we, who have grown up in the age of cinema and digital media, learn from discourses about vision and its relation to narrative that pre-date the cinema, or that consider the cinema only marginally? In this course, we shall begin to approach some of the major topics of contemporary film theory -- narrativity, subject-construction, the relation of words to images -- through the lens of texts that have remained largely outside the network of citations and references we normally associate with the work of professional media theory. We might begin the groundwork for an "opening up" or critique of some of the blind spots of current theory; at the very least, we shall be reading works that challenge our usual ways of theorizing.
- M 6:10 p.m.-8:40 p.m.
-
Instructor:
James A Schamus
CULPA: 8
Wikipedia
Info
- 3 points
NEW MEDIA ART
The rapid democratization of technology has led to a new wave of immersive storytelling that spills off screens into the real world and back again. These works defy traditional constraints as they shift away from a one-to-many to a many-to-many paradigm, transforming those formerly known as the audience from passive viewers into storytellers in their own right. New opportunities and limitations offered by emergent technologies are augmenting the grammar of storytelling, as creators wrestle with an ever-shifting digital landscape. New Media Art pulls back the curtain on transmedial works of fiction, non-fiction, and emergent forms that defy definition. Throughout the semester well explore projects that utilize Artificial Intelligence, Virtual Reality, Augmented Reality and the Internet of Things, alongside a heavy-hitting selection of new media thinkers, theorists, and critics. The course will be co-taught as a dialogue between artistic practice and new media theory. Lance Weiler, a new media artist and founder of Columbia’s Digital Storytelling Lab, selected the media artworks; Rob King, a film and media historian, selected the scholarly readings. It is in the interaction between these two perspectives that the course will explore the parameters of emerging frontiers in media art and the challenges these pose for existing critical vocabularies.
- M 11 a.m.-1:30 p.m.
- 3 points
When American Television Became American
When Amer TV Became Amer
In a 2015 interview with David Simon (creator of
The Wire
) President Barak Obama offered that
The Wire
is, "one of the greatest -- not just television shows, but pieces of American art in the last couple of decades."
The Wire
combines hyperrealism with the reinvention of fundamental American themes (from picaresque individualisms, to coming to terms with the illusory “American dream”, to a fundamental loss of faith in American institutions), and engages in a scathing expose of the shared dysfunction among the bureaucracies (police, courts, public schools etc.) that manage a troubled American inner city. On a more macro level
The Wire
humanizes (and therefore vastly problematizes) assumptions about the individual Americans’ who inhabit America’s most dangerous urban environments from gang members to police officers to teachers and even ordinary citizens.
The Wire
, of course, did not single-handedly reshape American television. Scholars like Martin Shuster refer to this period of television history as “new television.” That is, the product of new imaginations that felt television had exhausted its normative points of reference, subject matter and narrative technique. Many of the shows from this period sought to reinvent television for interaction with an evolving zeitgeist shaped by shared dissolution with 21st century American life: “I’d been thinking: it’s good to be in a thing from the ground floor, I came too late for that, I know. But lately I’m getting the feeling I might be in at the end. That the best is over,” Tony Soprano confides to Dr. Malfi in S1.E1 of the Sopranos. Series that fall within this rubric include (in chronological order):
The Sopranos
;
The Wire
;
Deadwood
;
Madmen
; and
Breaking Bad.
We need to consider carefully that these shows emerged during a particular moment on American history. This was a period shaped by an increasingly relativist conceptualizations of truth (and, at times, outright fraud) and a resultant loss of faith in American institutions. Resistance movements (MeeToo, and Black Lives Mater) began to shape. No wonder that so many of the series under discussion take place amid American cultures defined by a liminal faith in law and order, within the contexts of vague moral authorities and hold American institutions with a shared, deep, suspicion.
These show
- W 2 p.m.-5 p.m.
-
Instructor:
Ben Alexander
Info - 3 points
CINEMA HIST II: 1930-1960
- W 2:10 p.m.-3:25 p.m.
-
Instructor:
Richard A Pena
CULPA: 16
Info
- 3 points
CINEMA HIST III:1960-1990
- R 2:10 p.m.-6 p.m.
-
Instructor:
Annette Insdorf
CULPA: 10 Wikipedia Info - 3 points
World Cinema: Latin America
An overview of the major developments in the art and industry of cinema in Latin America, ranging from its earliest days to the most recent works of the digital era. The interaction of Latin American filmmakers with international movements such as neorealism, modernism, cinema vérité, and postmodernism will be addressed. Among the filmmakers to be studied are Luis Buñuel, Glauber Rocha, Raúl Ruiz and Lucrecia Martel. Students will discover the major industrial tends as well as artistic currents that have defined Latin American cinema, as well as have the chance to analyze a number of key works both in terms of their varying approaches to filmmaking as well as their resonance with political/social/historical issues.
- T 6:10 p.m.-9:45 p.m.
-
Instructor:
Richard A Pena
CULPA: 16
Info
- 3 points
ELEMENTS OF DRAMATIC NARRATIVE
A lecture and discussion course on the basics of feature-length screenwriting. Using written texts and films screened for class, the course explores the nature of storytelling in the feature-length film and the ways in which it is an extension and an evolution of other dramatic and narrative forms. A basic part of Film’s first year program, the course guides students in developing the plot, characters, conflict and theme of a feature-length story that they will write, as a treatment, by the end of the semester.
- M 10 a.m.-1 p.m.
-
Instructor:
Andrew S Bienen
Info - 3 points
SCREENWRITING I
In this introductory workshop, students write several short screenplays over the course of the semester and learn the basics of the craft. Character, action, conflict, story construction, the importance of showing instead of telling, and other essential components are explored.
- M 6 p.m.-9 p.m.
- W 6 p.m.-9 p.m.
-
Instructor:
Aslihan Unaldi
Info -
Instructor:
Joshua R Troxler
Info -
Instructor:
Rafael L Pedreira
Info -
Instructor:
Michael H Castelaz
Info -
Instructor:
Daniel Kleinman
Info -
Instructor:
Jeanne Donohoe
Info - 3 points
American Film: Cult & Exploitation
Amer Film: Cult & Exploit
Once associated with images of fishnet-costumed fans of
The Rocky Horror Picture Show
, the concept of the “cult film” has gone increasingly mainstream in recent years. This course seeks to assess the popularization of the phenomenon, asking: what exactly
is
a cult film? And what does the mainstreaming of the concept suggest about our changing relation to today’s media environment?
Whereas most types of film can be defined through widely recognized elements of story and setting (tumbleweed, deserts, gunfights: it’s a western), this is far from being the case with cult. Some have defined the cult film as “created” by audiences (again,
Rocky Horror
); others in terms of nonclassical or aberrant modes of textuality (e.g., various forms of “bad taste” cinema). This course, however, seeks to go beyond audience- and text-based definitions, instead placing cult within a series of historical contexts:
as an outgrowth of film industry practices that sustained the
low cultural status
of certain movie types during the classical Hollywood cinema (e.g., B movies, exploitation, etc.);
as the product of
audience reception
practices, shaped by the politics of cultural taste and “camp” viewing practices that first coalesced during the “midnight movie” phenomenon of the late 1960s/1970s;
as sustained by the
transnational flow
of media content, offering new frameworks for understanding “national” cinemas.
In offering such an approach, this course seeks to isolate the different uses to which “cult” has been put, in order to indicate how pervasive and adaptable the idea has recently become. As we will see, the cult phenomenon implies both a perspective on the past, hence inseparable from the experience of nostalgia, as well as an engagement with our media-driven present.
- R 10:10 a.m.-12:55 p.m.
-
Instructor:
Robert King
CULPA: 7
Info
- 3 points
American Film: Film Noir
This course surveys the American film genre known as
film noir
, focusing primarily on the genre’s heyday in the 1940s and early 1950s, taking into account some of its antecedents in the hard-boiled detective novel, German Expressionism, and the gangster film, among other sources. We will consider a wide variety of critical and theoretical approaches to the genre, and will also study a number of film noir adaptations and their literary sources.
- M 10:10 a.m.-1:55 p.m.
-
Instructor:
James A Schamus
CULPA: 8
Wikipedia
Info
- 3 points
FUNDAMENTALS OF DIRECTING
Weekly lectures will introduce film grammar, textual analysis, staging, the camera as narrator, pre-visualization, shot progression, directorial style, working with actors and editing. Lectures by all members of the full time directing faculty anchor the class, highlighting a range of directorial approaches with additional lectures on the techniques and aesthetics of editing. Each lecture will be supported by visual material from master film directors as well as the examples of the short films students will be required to produce in their first two semesters. For the final 7 weeks of the term, a student fellow will be available to mentor students through the planning of their 3-5 films.
- W 9:30 a.m.-12:30 p.m.
-
Instructor:
Bogdan G Apetri
Info - 3 points
DIRECTING I
Students explore the grammatical rules and narrative elements of cinematic storytelling by completing a minimum of three short, nondialogue exercises and two sound exercises, all shot and edited in video. Emphasizes using the camera as an articulate narrator to tell a coherent, grammatically correct, engaging, and cinematic story. Technical workshops on camera, lighting, sound, and editing accompany the workshops, as well as lectures that provide a methodology for the director.
- R 2 p.m.-5 p.m.
- M 2 p.m.-5 p.m.
- W 2 p.m.-5 p.m.
- T 2 p.m.-5 p.m.
- R 2 p.m.-5 p.m.
- T 6 p.m.-9 p.m.
-
Instructor:
Hilary Brougher
Wikipedia Info -
Instructor:
Rania Attieh
Info -
Instructor:
Ramin Bahrani
Wikipedia Info -
Instructor:
Diana Peralta
Info -
Instructor:
Bette Gordon
Wikipedia Info -
Instructor:
Ian W Olds
Info - 3 points
DIRECTING ACTORS I
A workshop in which the student explores the craft and vocabulary of the actor through exercises and scene study as actors and the incorporation of the actor's vocabulary in directed scenes. Exploration of script analysis, casting, and the rehearsal process.
- M 2 p.m.-5 p.m.
- W 2 p.m.-5 p.m.
- T 2 p.m.-5 p.m.
- M 2 p.m.-5 p.m.
- T 6 p.m.-9 p.m.
-
Instructor:
Benjamin K Martin
CULPA: 2 Info -
Instructor:
Anna Maria Cianciulli
Info -
Instructor:
Jodie Markell
Wikipedia Info -
Instructor:
Adrienne Weiss
Info -
Instructor:
John Rubin
Info -
Instructor:
Abigail Zealey Bess
Info - 3 points
FUNDAMENTALS OF EDITING
This online class explores the creative and narrative principals of editing through the editing of students' 8-12 minute films and / or other footage. Instructors are professional editors who will provide lecture and individual based instruction.
- R 6 p.m.-9 p.m.
- M 6 p.m.-9 p.m.
- F 10 a.m.-1 p.m.
- W 9:30 a.m.-12:30 p.m.
- W 2 p.m.-5 p.m.
-
Instructor:
John D Allen
Info -
Instructor:
Katherine McQuerrey
Info -
Instructor:
Elizabeth Kling
Info -
Instructor:
Susan Korda
Info -
Instructor:
Elizabeth Kling
Info - 1.5 points
PRACTICAL PRODUCTION I
Practical Production 1 teaches students best practices regarding film production and technology in the integrated first year of the MFA Film Program through lectures, discussions, pre-production meetings, multi-hour shoots on set and an end-of-the-semester screening. This class is required for all first-year students. Throughout the Fall, students will work in small production groups to prep and shoot a short script in the Prentis studio. Each week one group will organize a pre-production meeting and then produce a four-hour shoot. The professor will be in attendance and two de-briefing sessions will occur throughout the production to reiterate best film production practices. Additional assignments will include the creation of various pre-production, production and wrap paperwork and tech deliverables. Additional mandatory production and risk management workshops will be given. The last class will be a screening of all group films and prep/discussion for the 3-5 exercise shot over Winter Break. Required for all first-year students.
- F 10 a.m.-1 p.m.
-
Instructor:
Maureen A Ryan
Info - 1.5 points
TECH ARTS:POST PRODUCTION
Tech Arts: Post Production delivers a practical introduction to modern post production workflows. The course will cover the process of moving efficiently from production to post production, the techniques of non-linear editing and ultimately the process of professionally finishing a film for modern distribution. Students will learn foundational post terminology, how to create the best workflow for your film, how to manage data/footage in the edit room, and offline and online editing. Additionally, the class will explore other key steps in the post production process including audio syncing, transcoding, exporting and mastering. The hands-on lessons and exercises will be conducted using the industry-standard non-linear editing system (NLE), Avid Media Composer, and will serve as a primer for other professional systems, including Adobe Premiere and Davinci Resolve. Students will also learn about Columbia Film’s shared storage system and cloud editing systems, Avid Nexis and Avid Media Central. The course is necessary and required for Columbia Film MFA students as it prepares them for post production, an unavoidable component of the most essential part of the Film MFA, filmmaking.
- R 10 a.m.-1 p.m.
-
Instructor:
Michael J Cacioppo Belantara
Info - 0 points
TECH ARTS
TECH ARTS: CAMERA & LENSES
The Tech Arts curriculum is a hands-on, experiential way for our students to learn best practices regarding film production and post production technology in the integrated first year of the MFA Film Program. The curriculum will be taught in 3 different disciplines/sections with up to 12. Instructors: Matthew Farrell, Michael O’Brien, Gregg Conde
The disciplines/sections are: Cameras and Lenses, Grip and Electric, and Cinema Audio. Students will all be required to take one discipline for registration in their first year.
Cameras and Lenses, Grip and Electric, and Cinema Audio will educate students on this topics utilizing the cameras and lens equipment offered by Film’s Production Center in Nash. In addition to the practicum workshops students will be required to do specific readings and assignments to maximize their learning of the weekly subject matter and participate in class discussion.
Practical Production 1: Lab-Tech Arts Curriculum takes students through the principles of cinematography, lighting, framing, and audio production by working directly with the equipment and technology through small group sections. Technological competency is required to maximize what they are learning through their other classes in directing, screenwriting and producing classes.
- R 6 p.m.-9 p.m.
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Instructor:
Gregg L Conde
Info - 0 points
TECH ARTS
TECH ARTS: GRIP & ELECTRIC
The Tech Arts curriculum is a hands-on, experiential way for our students to learn best practices regarding film production and post production technology in the integrated first year of the MFA Film Program. The curriculum will be taught in 3 different disciplines/sections with up to 12. Instructors: Matthew Farrell, Michael O’Brien, Gregg Conde
The disciplines/sections are: Cameras and Lenses, Grip and Electric, and Cinema Audio. Students will all be required to take one discipline for registration in their first year.
Cameras and Lenses, Grip and Electric, and Cinema Audio will educate students on this topics utilizing the cameras and lens equipment offered by Film’s Production Center in Nash. In addition to the practicum workshops students will be required to do specific readings and assignments to maximize their learning of the weekly subject matter and participate in class discussion.
Practical Production 1: Lab-Tech Arts Curriculum takes students through the principles of cinematography, lighting, framing, and audio production by working directly with the equipment and technology through small group sections. Technological competency is required to maximize what they are learning through their other classes in directing, screenwriting and producing classes.
- M 6 p.m.-9 p.m.
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Instructor:
Matthew D Farrell
Info - 0 points
TECH ARTS
TECH ARTS: CINEMA AUDIO
The Tech Arts curriculum is a hands-on, experiential way for our students to learn best practices regarding film production and post production technology in the integrated first year of the MFA Film Program. The curriculum will be taught in 3 different disciplines/sections with up to 12. Instructors: Matthew Farrell, Michael O’Brien, Gregg Conde
The disciplines/sections are: Cameras and Lenses, Grip and Electric, and Cinema Audio. Students will all be required to take one discipline for registration in their first year.
Cameras and Lenses, Grip and Electric, and Cinema Audio will educate students on this topics utilizing the cameras and lens equipment offered by Film’s Production Center in Nash. In addition to the practicum workshops students will be required to do specific readings and assignments to maximize their learning of the weekly subject matter and participate in class discussion.
Practical Production 1: Lab-Tech Arts Curriculum takes students through the principles of cinematography, lighting, framing, and audio production by working directly with the equipment and technology through small group sections. Technological competency is required to maximize what they are learning through their other classes in directing, screenwriting and producing classes.
- T 6 p.m.-9 p.m.
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Instructor:
Michael O'Brien
Info - 0 points
TECH ARTS
TECH ARTS: CAMERA & LENSES
The Tech Arts curriculum is a hands-on, experiential way for our students to learn best practices regarding film production and post production technology in the integrated first year of the MFA Film Program. The curriculum will be taught in 3 different disciplines/sections with up to 12. Instructors: Matthew Farrell, Michael O’Brien, Gregg Conde
The disciplines/sections are: Cameras and Lenses, Grip and Electric, and Cinema Audio. Students will all be required to take one discipline for registration in their first year.
Cameras and Lenses, Grip and Electric, and Cinema Audio will educate students on this topics utilizing the cameras and lens equipment offered by Film’s Production Center in Nash. In addition to the practicum workshops students will be required to do specific readings and assignments to maximize their learning of the weekly subject matter and participate in class discussion.
Practical Production 1: Lab-Tech Arts Curriculum takes students through the principles of cinematography, lighting, framing, and audio production by working directly with the equipment and technology through small group sections. Technological competency is required to maximize what they are learning through their other classes in directing, screenwriting and producing classes.
- R 6 p.m.-9 p.m.
-
Instructor:
Gregg L Conde
Info - 0 points
TECH ARTS
TECH ARTS: GRIP & ELECTRIC
The Tech Arts curriculum is a hands-on, experiential way for our students to learn best practices regarding film production and post production technology in the integrated first year of the MFA Film Program. The curriculum will be taught in 3 different disciplines/sections with up to 12. Instructors: Matthew Farrell, Michael O’Brien, Gregg Conde
The disciplines/sections are: Cameras and Lenses, Grip and Electric, and Cinema Audio. Students will all be required to take one discipline for registration in their first year.
Cameras and Lenses, Grip and Electric, and Cinema Audio will educate students on this topics utilizing the cameras and lens equipment offered by Film’s Production Center in Nash. In addition to the practicum workshops students will be required to do specific readings and assignments to maximize their learning of the weekly subject matter and participate in class discussion.
Practical Production 1: Lab-Tech Arts Curriculum takes students through the principles of cinematography, lighting, framing, and audio production by working directly with the equipment and technology through small group sections. Technological competency is required to maximize what they are learning through their other classes in directing, screenwriting and producing classes.
- M 6 p.m.-9 p.m.
-
Instructor:
Matthew D Farrell
Info - 0 points
TECH ARTS
TECH ARTS: CINEMA AUDIO
The Tech Arts curriculum is a hands-on, experiential way for our students to learn best practices regarding film production and post production technology in the integrated first year of the MFA Film Program. The curriculum will be taught in 3 different disciplines/sections with up to 12. Instructors: Matthew Farrell, Michael O’Brien, Gregg Conde
The disciplines/sections are: Cameras and Lenses, Grip and Electric, and Cinema Audio. Students will all be required to take one discipline for registration in their first year.
Cameras and Lenses, Grip and Electric, and Cinema Audio will educate students on this topics utilizing the cameras and lens equipment offered by Film’s Production Center in Nash. In addition to the practicum workshops students will be required to do specific readings and assignments to maximize their learning of the weekly subject matter and participate in class discussion.
Practical Production 1: Lab-Tech Arts Curriculum takes students through the principles of cinematography, lighting, framing, and audio production by working directly with the equipment and technology through small group sections. Technological competency is required to maximize what they are learning through their other classes in directing, screenwriting and producing classes.
- T 6 p.m.-9 p.m.
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Instructor:
Michael O'Brien
Info - 0 points
CINEMA/MEDIA HISTORIOGRAPHY
An introduction to issues and cases in the study of cinema century technologies. This class takes up the definition of the historiographic problem and the differences between theoretical empirical solutions. Specific units on the history of film style, genre as opposed to authorship, silent and sound cinemas, the American avant-garde, national cinemas (Russia and China), the political economy of world cinema, and archival poetics. The question of artificial intelligence approached as a question of the “intelligence of the machine.” A unit on research methods is taught in conjunction with Butler and C.V. Starr East Asian Libraries. Writing exercises on a weekly basis culminate in a digital historiography research map which becomes the basis of final written “paper” posted in Courseworks in video essay format. Students present this work at a final conference. Topics in the past include:
Cultural Transactions: Across Media and Continents, Genre: Repetition and Difference, and Bang, Bang, Crash, Crash: Canon-Busting and Paradigm-Smashing
- R 2:10 p.m.-4:40 p.m.
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Instructor:
Jane Gaines
CULPA: 4 Info - 3 points
Minstrelsy and Popular Culture
Minstrelsy is one of America’s original forms of popular entertainment, and its formal, thematic, and narrative elements continue to reverberate throughout popular culture to this day. Indeed, given the close relationship between stage performance and the development of screen cultures, it should come as little surprise that many of the tropes and representational strategies that film and media adopted to portray blackness bore, and continue to bear, close relation to minstrelsy and blackface. This seminar will examine the ways that minstrelsy has played a crucial role in the evolution of American popular culture, especially in film and media. The course will focus on the complex function and legacy of minstrelsy, whether from the perspective of Jewish artists trying to establish their racial identities in early Hollywood, or African American artists attempting to subvert dominant representational modes.
- T 9:10 a.m.-11:40 a.m.
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Instructor:
Racquel Gates
Info - 3 points
SCREENWRITING THREE
A two-semester intensive screenwriting workshop with one instructor. The Screenwriting 3 and Screenwriting 4 class sequence allows for the careful and more sustained development of a feature-length script. In the fall semester, students further develop an idea for a screenplay and write the first act (approximately 30 pages). In the spring semester, students finish writing the script and, time permitting, begin a first revision.
- R 10 a.m.-1 p.m.
- T 2 p.m.-5 p.m.
- M 10 a.m.-1 p.m.
- T 10 a.m.-1 p.m.
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Instructor:
Christina Lazaridi
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Instructor:
Katherine Dieckmann
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Instructor:
Richard Dresser
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Instructor:
Trey Ellis
Wikipedia Info - 3 points
DIRECTING III
Students explore more deeply the range of skills and techniques necessary to direct both short and feature films including script breakdown of sequences, scenes, turning points and beats as well as advanced study of actor and camera staging. Students will hone their directing skills by preparing, shooting, and editing, in video, a minimum of three significant scenes from published or original work, depending on priority of the instructor. When taken concurrently, at least one of these scenes will be presented in Directing the Actor workshops. Students should also be working on a first draft of a short screenplay for their second-year project if they intend to take Directing 4.
- R 9:30 a.m.-12:30 p.m.
- R 2 p.m.-5 p.m.
- T 10 a.m.-1 p.m.
- W 2 p.m.-5 p.m.
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Instructor:
Tom Kalin
Wikipedia Info - 3 points
DIRECTING ACTORS III
More sophisticated principles are applied and more challenging scenes are presented. Collaboration with a writer is a requirement. Required for Screenwriting and Directing concentrates.
- W 2 p.m.-5 p.m.
- R 2 p.m.-5 p.m.
- W 9:30 a.m.-12:30 p.m.
- T 2 p.m.-5 p.m.
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Instructor:
Jon Shear
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Instructor:
Lisa Milinazzo
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Instructor:
Mikael Sodersten
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Instructor:
Shira-Lee Shalit
Info - 3 points
THE BUSINESS OF FILM
An overview of the business side of theatrical motion pictures, from the Hollywood major studios to small independents and self-distribution. Covers all the ancillary markets (cable, home video) and their relationship both to the theatrical success of the film and to its bottom line. Required for all second-year Creative Producing students. Available as an elective for Directing/Screenwriting students.
- R 10 a.m.-1 p.m.
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Instructor:
Ira Deutchman
Wikipedia Info - 3 points
FEATURE FILM DEVELOPMENT
An exploration of the process and the various options for developing feature film scripts and ideas. The course covers option deals, copyrights, dealing with agents, lawyers and managers, working with writers, guild requirements and the selling process. There is a particular emphasis on learning pitching skills in order to effectively communicate the essence of a project to potential collaborators, financiers and end users. Required for all second-year Creative Producing students and only open to students in that concentration.
- M 10 a.m.-1 p.m.
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Instructor:
Mynette Louie
Wikipedia Info -
Instructor:
Mary Jane Skalski
Info - 3 points
WRIT/SCRIPT ANALYSIS-PRODUCERS
This is a specialized course designed to provide prospective producers with a nuanced framework for understanding the screenwriting process. The course will explore all the ways a producer might interact with screenwriters and screenplays, including coverage, script analysis, notes, treatments, and rewrites. Each student will complete a series of writing and rewriting assignments over the course of the semester. Required for all second-year Creative Producing students and only open to students in that concentration.
- W 6 p.m.-9 p.m.
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Instructor:
Jack Lechner
Info - 3 points