The course meets three times a week: Mondays, Wednesdays, and Fridays from 8:45am until 12:20pm in VCB 182.  Attendance is required at all class meetings; it will be taken at the beginning of each class session for purposes of determining the final grade.

• Dr. Walter Metz, Associate Professor

• Office Location: VCB 224

• Office Phone: (406) 994-6403 [with voice mail]

• E-mail address: metz@montana.edu

• Office Hours: Mondays, Wednesdays, and Fridays from 12:20 until 1:20pm in VCB 224

This course serves as an introduction to the history of international cinema.  The course will proceed historically, by chronologically visiting with the major movements in film industries from around the world: France, Germany, the Soviet Union, and the Third World. The course will ask questions about how a national cinema is constituted, defined, developed, and properly analyzed. The course will also interrogate traditional theories for investigating these art cinemas.

During many class meetings, a film will be screened in its entirety. It is important to attend carefully to these films, taking copious notes on them: the films play a similar role in a film studies class that novels do in a literature class. That is, you must study the films to understand most of the other material of the course. The exams will require you to possess a significant amount of knowledge about these films.

I have ordered five books for this course, all available at the MSU Bookstore (located in the Strand Union Building) and on reserve at the Renne Library.

• Nowell-Smith, Geoffrey (Ed.). The Oxford History of World Cinema. Oxford and NY: Oxford UP, 1997. ISBN 0198742428

• Elsaesser, Thomas. Metropolis. London: British Film Institute, 2000. ISBN 0851707777.

• Forbes, Jill. Les Enfants du paradis. London: British Film Institute, 1997. ISBN 0851703658.

• Keiko McDonald (Ed.). Ugestu (Rutgers Films in Print). New Brunswick: Rutgers UP, 1994. ISBN 0813518628.

• Lloyd Michaels (Ed.). Ingmar Bergman’s Persona. Cambridge and NY: Cambridge UP, 2000. ISBN 0521656982.

To do well, you must take notes in this class, on lecture material, the readings, and the screenings. In lecture, I'll be throwing a lot of complicated information at you, so you'll need to write it down, reflect on it, and work to understand its relevance to the "Big Picture." This is not the sort of class where if you just come and pay attention, you are guaranteed a good grade. There is a great deal of reading material, and in order to learn what is contained therein, you need to take notes on it and study it. People learn by processing material repeatedly. Reading something once without going back over it a few times (taking notes facilitates this) does not encourage remembering it later.

Sometimes, students enter a film studies class expecting it to be a "gut" class (we're watching movies--how hard can it be?!!). This is not an easy class. The readings are heavy and the information I'll be presenting and we'll be discussing is often theoretical, and thus difficult and challenging. That said, however, I want to re-assure you that I'll keep this in mind while determining grades. Don't be afraid if you're confused early on. Use our discussions and office hours to work through this new material. That confusion is invigorating and is the fuel that will drive your education. I've attempted to structure the course so that it will be challenging, yet accessible, to students of varying levels and abilities.  No one who masters the material of this course will receive a grade of less than C.  If you receive a D or F on either exam, I will be glad to work with you on study strategies so that you will do better on a re-take exam.  I will use the + and - system when assigning grades.

• Exam #1 (Monday, June 6) is worth 50%

• Exam #2 (Friday, June 24) is worth 50%

• Attendance (see below)

My exams are rather challenging. However, I grade on a curve, and most students who study hard throughout the semester will do well on them. You'll be given short format yet open-ended questions (identifications, identify and analyze a quotation, and short essay) about the material presented in class and in the readings, and its applicability to the screenings. The material for these questions will be culled from lectures (including clips shown in class), the reading, and the films themselves. Please write down immediately the date of the exams. If you do not take an exam, you will receive a grade of F for the course (except in cases of extreme personal emergency).  Make-up exams for reasons of extreme personal emergency must be arranged in advance.

If you don't come to lecture regularly, there's no way you'll pass the course. I'll be presenting complicated information in class, and be showing clips from films that won't be available later on. Since so much of the learning will be going on during lecture, you won't be able to fully understand the lecture by looking at someone else's notes later on. Also, there are no professional course notes available for this course. I will keep track of attendance, as a criteria for borderline students caught between one grade and another. Since the course is difficult, I always give a break to students who have demonstrated their interest by coming to class diligently (and also coming to office hours, etc.). However, students who miss a great number of classes do not help their cause any. At the instructor's discretion, if you miss 2 or more lectures (as un-excused absences, according to university definitions), expect to receive no better than a C in the course; 4 or more un-excused absences without explanation will probably result in a grade of F for the course.

Come to class prepared (having done the reading, having thought about the films, being prepared with questions, etc.). Take good notes on every facet of the class (screenings, lectures, readings). This will prove invaluable in preparing for the exams. Do the reading. Many students fall behind, and then complain that they're having trouble in the class. The reading is vital because it frames issues of the class in different words than mine in lecture. This gives you a second voice to help you understand difficult ideas. If you don't understand a particular essay or don't find it useful, come to talk with me about it--the discussion we have will benefit us both. Keep up with the reading. Set aside a few hours on Sunday, Tuesday, and Thursday nights (the nights before the class periods) to read, take notes, and ponder the significance of the readings for the class.

• Lecture            “Six Theses” (cont’d)

• Reading            Oxford History: Chapter 1 (“National Cinemas ,”  pages 112-182)

• Lecture             “Six Theses” (cont’d)

• Reading            Oxford History : Chapter 2 (“National Cinemas,”  pages 344-435)

• Discussion        Metropolis

• Reading            Thomas Elsaesser, Metropolis

• No Class: Memorial Day Holiday

• Topic               World War II

• Screening         Les Enfants du Paradis (France, Marcel Carne, 1943, 190 min)

• Discussion        Les Enfants du Paradis

• Reading            Jill Forbes, Les Enfants du Paradis

• Discussion        Ugetsu

• Reading            Keiko McDonald, Ugetsu

• Discussion        Persona

• Reading            Lloyd Michaels, Persona

• Catch-up

• Course Evaluations