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FILM AND AMERICAN CULTURE 

Fall 2008

“You can take Hollywood for granted like I did, or you can dismiss it with the contempt we reserve for what we don’t understand.  It can be understood too, but only dimly and in flashes.  Not half a dozen men have ever been able to keep the whole equation of pictures in their heads.”  F. Scott Fitzgerald, The Last Tycoon

“Suspense, laughter, violence, hope, heart, nudity, sex, happy endings.  Mainly happy endings.”   Griffin Mill (in Robert Altman’s The Player), on what a movie needs to get produced.

“Each genre represents a distinct problem-solving strategy that repeatedly addresses basic cultural contradictions. . . . If genres develop and survive because they repeatedly flesh out and re-examine cultural conflicts, then we must consider the possibility that genres function as much to challenge and criticize as to reinforce the values that inform them.”  Thomas Schatz, Hollywood Genres

 American movies, which celebrated their 110th anniversary in April 2006, have a special relationship with American culture, for they both shape and are shaped by our national attitudes, values, and ways of living.  Richard Maltby has written that “however well acquainted we are with Hollywood’s stars and movies, few of us actually spend much time thinking seriously about what they mean, or about how they mean what they mean.”  We plan to do that this semester.  Film and American Culture is based on three assumptions.  First, it assumes that narrative films can communicate meanings and evoke emotions in powerful and effective ways. Second, it assumes that there is a close yet complex relationship between feature films and the society in which they are produced. Finally, it proposes that movies, if examined carefully and thoughtfully, are rich sources for cultural analysis, enabling us to explore cultural values, attitudes, and beliefs.  Proceeding from these assumptions, we will consider films both as works of art and as cultural documents.  By the end of the course you should be able to do several things:

1.    To understand the formalist framework of analysis and recognize narrative and stylistic conventions of (as well as variations of and deviations from) the "Classical Hollywood Cinema."  As part of this, you should be able to identify various elements of narrative and style when you see or hear them in a film.

2.    To carry out convincing analysis of individual film narratives, showing how character interaction and development of conflict lead to affirmation and/ or criticism of particular cultural values, attitudes, and ways of living.

3.    To trace the evolution of American movies from the beginnings to the present, and to discuss the historical context of the films we see during the term.

4.     To discuss with some sophistication the ways in which American society and American movies relate, drawing especially from the formalist, genre, ideological, and auteur approaches to films.  (Ask, and be able to discuss, questions like these:   How do we recognize a film auteur?   What are the cultural functions of genres like westerns or screwball comedies?  How do movies relate to broad cultural myths and to more specific socio-historical contexts?  What is the relationship between movies and dominant cultural values?  How do different kinds of movies—blockbusters, independent films—relate to society in different ways?)

To reach these objectives, everyone will need to participate actively by reading assignments before class time of the day they're assigned, watching films (most in class, some outside of the class), discussing and writing about the readings and films.  Above all, we will need to think more actively and seriously about movies than we may be accustomed to doing.

REQUIRED BOOKS AND OTHER COURSE MATERIALS:

John Belton, American Cinema/American Culture

Robert Ray, A Certain Tendency in the Hollywood Cinema, 1930‑1980

SelecteSelected Essays—these required readings are available on-line on Blackboard: click the “Selected Essays” button.

CLASS FORMAT:

    The class is designed as a lecture/discussion course.   We will all meet together on most Tuesdays for lectures and Wednesdays for screenings (and, as time permits, introductory comments).  Starting on the second Thursday of the term, we will divide into two discussion groups: Maland’s meets in Hodges 252 and Larsen’s in Hodges 253. In these sessions we will discuss the film screened the previous meeting, as well as issues raised by the readings and lectures that week.  Locations for all meetings are listed at the start of the syllabus.

BLACKBOARD:

We encourage you to use our Blackboard on-line site regularly.   If you are officially enrolled, it should show up as “Film and American Culture Fall 2008”  when you log in at “online.utk.edu.”  If you have problems accessing the site, please email Dr. Maland. Use the site in several ways: 1) check our announcement at the start of each week; 2) access the Selected Essays, which are part of the required readings of the course; 3) download study questions for the Thursday discussion sections each week by Tuesday or Wednesday, then bring them to class on Thursday; 4) make use of  the Assignments section for paper assignments and study sheets;  5) review Powerpoint lectures and/or lecture notes each week, which will be available after we give them; and 6) access the Exercises as you learn the formalist system and prepare for the first exam.  As a bonus, we have some fun and useful inks to film sites.  Let us stress, too, that we consider Blackboard not a substitute for attending class but a supplement to the course to enhance and enrich your learning.  (See the next section.)

ATTENDANCE AND READING POLICY:

            We’ll be in class, and we expect you to be in class.  Our attendance policy: you are allowed THREE absences during the term.  There will be NO distinction between “excused” and “unexcused” absences.  After the THIRD absence, your OVERALL COURSE GRADE will be docked ONE letter grade for each subsequent absence.  We’ll try to make class interesting, informative, and even fun.  If, however, you do miss a class session, YOU are responsible for any work we will have accomplished that day.  Finally, coming into class more than ten minutes late or leaving more than ten minutes early will be considered an absence.

            Read the assigned readings by class time on the day they’re assigned.  We won’t “lecture from the book,” although we will sometime refer to readings, and they will be linked to the topics we’ll be considering the week they are assigned. 

CELLULAR PHONES:

As a courtesy to everyone in class, do not bring active cellular phones (or other beeping devices) into classrooms.  Get in the habit of turning off your cell phone before you go into class.

QUIZZES:

At the beginning of each day that your discussion group meets, we will have a quiz.  These quizzes may NOT be made up, and your cumulative score of the ten highest grades (there will be twelve quizzes) will count 16.67% of your grade.  Be sure to arrive promptly, because we will collect the quizzes quickly.  N.B.: If you do not stay for the entire discussion session, then your quiz grade will NOT count as a grade.

FILM WORKSHEETS:

In order to provide you an incentive NOT to miss a big-screen viewing of a film that will become a touchstone of sorts in the course, as well as the two films we will screen during weeks without a Thursday discussion session, you MUST screen AND complete and turn in the worksheets for Casablanca and Matewan to be eligible to pass the course.  In addition, you also may complete and turn in the worksheet for the screening of It’s A Wonderful Life.  The best score of these worksheets then will be counted as a thirteenth quiz grade.

PAPERS:

Every student must write two analytical papers of around 1200 words each, due on September 23 and November 4.  Around ten days before each paper is due, we will provide a handout sheet with the specific assignment and the films to write on.  Papers will be evaluated on the basis of three criteria: 1) quality and clarity of the thesis, or main idea; 2) quality and clarity of the presentation of that main idea in the body of the essay; and 3) general correctness and effectiveness of mechanics, grammar, and style.  Strive to make the writing your most effective. These should be your own analyses, based on your own viewing and reviewing of the film, not a research paper.  (Our lectures and discussions, as well as Selected Essays #1-3, will help you plan and structure your essays.) 

PAPER DUE DATES:

      September 30:                         First paper due (typed, about 1200 words)

      November 4:                           Second paper due (typed, about 1200 words) 

EXAMS:

      September 9:                           Exam on film form and our first three films

      October 14:                              Exam on American film to WW II

      December 4:                            Final exam in Lib Aud, 10:15-12:15 p.m. (Monday)

GRADING:

Each paper, exam, and your cumulative quiz rersults will count 1/6 of your grade.   The quality of your participation in class discussions will be taken into account when deciding borderline final grades.

HODGES  CIRCULATION DEPARTMENT AND THE MEDIA COLLECTION:

The library’s collection of DVDs and VHS tapes has been split.  The DVDs are now accessed through the Circulation Department.  Many can be checked out in the library only and watched on library computers.  Some of the collection, mostly VHS tapes, will now be circulating, available to check out of the library.  Check with Circulation, second floor Hodges, about using titles from the collection

OUTSIDE READING:

Hodges Library has extensive holdings in Film Studies.  We would also be happy to recommend readings for anyone interested in doing more reading on specific topics in American film.  If you are interested in reading a general history of American movies, a good recommendation is Robert Sklar's Movie-Made America (2nd ed.).

DISABILITY SERVICES:

If you need course adaptations or accommodations because of a DOCUMENTED disability or if you have emergency information to share, please contact the Office of Disability Services at 974-6087 to discuss your specific needs. Such contact with the Office of Disability Services is the ONLY way to ensure that you are properly registered for such services and therefore can receive any such course adaptations or accommodations.

KNOXVILLE FILM/DVD/VIDEO RESOURCES

Knoxville Museum of Art occasionally holds film screenings.  For those interested in renting DVDs or videotapes, we’d recommend the downtown Knoxville Public Library AV Department, which now offers free checkout of DVDs and VHS tapes.  The collection contains recent films, as well as some good classics and foreign films.  For current independent American and foreign films, check out Downtown West Theater, near Target.  And, of course, there’s always Netflix.

READING AND VIEWING ASSIGNMENTS

B = Belton, American Cinema, American Culture

R = Ray, A Certain Tendency in the Hollywood Cinema

SE = Selected Essays   

(Unless otherwise indicated below, our Wednesday screenings will be in Hodges 101, the Library Auditorium.)

I. CLASSICAL HOLLYWOOD CINEMA AND FILM FORM

AUGUST

20    Introduction to the course; introduction to Textual Analysis and the Neo-Formalist Approach to Film--Screen It (Clarence Badger, 1927)

21:   Today everyone meets in Lib Aud at  9:40.  The Formalist Approach, I: Narrative and Cinematic Style I (Mise-en-scene)‑‑SE, 1; B, Ch. 2.  NOTE: Bring Selected Essays # 1 and 2 to class every Tuesday and Thursday through September 2.  We'll be studying the formalist mode of analysis and learning the conventions of Classical Hollywood Cinema (CHC); hand out optional study sheet on It’s a Wonderful Life

 SEPTEMBER

 2:    Variations on Classical Hollywood: Orson Welles Goes to Hollywood; review SE, 2; continue the practice exercises in Blackboard. (They can be taken more than once.)

 3:    Screen Citizen Kane (Orson Welles, 1941)

 4:    Discuss film form of Kane (Refer to SE, 1 & 2 on the Formalist Approach and Classical Hollywood Cinema); Quiz 2

9:     OBJECTIVE EXAM on Film Form, our readings, and our first three films.

II. FILM AND AMERICAN CULTURE TO WORLD WAR II          

10:   Introduction to Cultural Analysis, and The Birth of American Movies Prehistory of Movies; Cinema of Attractions, and Cinema of Narrative Integration, Part 1: Early Edison films; The Great Train Robbery (Porter, 1903); A Corner in Wheat (Griffith, 1909); A Girl and Her Trust --B, Ch. 1; SE, 3 (“Model of Cultural Analysis” and  “American History, American Film”)

11:   Cinema of Narrative Integration, Part II: The Immigrant (Charles Chaplin, 1917) and One Week (Keaton, 1920); Quiz 3

16:   American Cultural Values, Film Genre, and the “American Foundation Myth,” the Western: B, 127-30 and Ch. 11; R: Introduction (3-21) and Ch. 11 (175-79 and 215-243).

17:   Screen The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance (John Ford, 1962)

18:   Discussion of Liberty Valance, the Western, and American Cultural Values; distribute Paper #1 Assignment; Quiz 4

23:   The Studio System and American Movies in the Great Depression, I: the Golden Age of Turbulence (1930-1934)--SE, 4 (Sklar, "The Golden Age of Turbulence and the Golden Age of Order"), B, pp. 66-84

24:   I Am a Fugitive From a Chain Gang (Mervyn LeRoy, 1932)

25:   Discuss Chain Gang and the "Golden Age of Turbulence"; Quiz 5

30:   American Movies in the Depression, II: The Production Code, Screwball Comedy, Frank Capra, and The Golden Age of Order--B, Ch. 8; SE, 5 (the Motion Picture Production Code) FIRST PAPER DUE

OCTOBER

 1:    Mr. Deeds Goes to Town (Frank Capra, 1936)

 2:    Discuss Deeds, Screwball Comedy, and the Effect of the Code, Quiz 6

 7:    Movies, Stars, and World War II‑‑B, Chs. 5 & 9; R, Skim introduction and read  pp. 48‑69 (think about the hero types described in 55‑69 and relate to heroes in the films we've seen thus far).

 8:    Screen Casablanca (Michael Curtiz, 1942)--R, ch. 3

 9:    NO CLASS: FALL BREAK

13:   BONUS MEETING: Study Session for Exam: Hodges 253, 10:10-11 (we’ll spend some time discussing Casablanca)

14:   SECOND EXAM on American Film to World War II (Turn in Casablanca study sheet)

III. FILM AND AMERICAN CULTURE SINCE WORLD WAR II

15:   Cracks in the Wall: Introduction to the American Consensus, and Hollywood Meets Film Noir; Screen Double Indemnity (Billy Wilder, 1944)—SE 6, (Chandler, “The Simple Art of Murder”); B, Ch. 10 (225-46, 277-78) and Ch. 12 (279-85); R, Ch. 5 (129-52)  and  Ch. 6 (153-59)

16:   Discuss Cracks in the Wall, End of WWII, Film Noir, Billy Wilder, and Double Indemnity; Quiz 7

21:   The Red Scare, Hollywood, Elia Kazan, and the Movies--B, Ch.  12; review R, Ch. 5 (esp. 145-47); SE, 7--Maland, "On the Waterfront: Film and The Dilemmas of American Liberalism in the McCarthy Era"

22:   Screen On the Waterfront (Elia Kazan, 1954)

23:   Discuss On the Waterfront, Kazan, and the Red Scare; Quiz 8

28:   Crumbling: The Studio System. . . and The American Consensus in the 1960s‑‑B, Ch. 14; R, 8

29:  Screen  Bonnie and Clyde (Arthur Penn, 1967)

30:   Political Polarization, Authority, and Movies in the Late 1960s: discuss Bonnie and Clyde; Quiz 9

NOVEMBER

 4:  The American Film Renaissance--R, 9; B, pp. 348-362; second paper due.  .  (Note: The Godfather, scheduled for Wednesday, runs 173 minutes; hence our early start tomorrow.)

 5:    Meet at 8:10 today.  Screen The Godfather, Part I (Francis Ford Coppola, 1972)--R, 326-349.   If you will not be able to be there for the whole film, it will also be shown in Hodges 251 at 2:30.)

 6:    Discuss The Godfather--what are its central appeals and what cultural values does it affirm and challenge? Quiz 10

11:   The New Hollywood, I: the Blockbuster--B, pp. 362-373; SE, 8--Thomas Schatz, "The New Hollywood "12:   Screen Raiders of the Lost Ark (Stephen Spielberg, 1981)

13:   Discuss Raiders, Spielberg, Lucas, and the Blockbuster; Quiz 11

18:   New Hollywood, II: Gender Politics and Contemporary American Film in the Moderately-Priced Star Vehicle‑‑B, pp. 375-388, SE, 9 (Ryan and Kellner on sexuality and politics)

19:   Screen Kramer vs. Kramer (Robert Benton, 1979)    

20:   Discuss the Moderately Priced Star Vehicle, Gender, and Kramer vs. Kramer; Quiz 12

25:   New Hollywood, III: Countercurrents in Independent Film: John Sayles and Matewan—B, pp. 389-410, SE, 11 (from Thinking in Pictures, by John Sayles). 

26:   Meet at 8:35 a.m.  Screen Matewan (John Sayles, 1989)

27:   NO CLASS—THANKSGIVING BREAK

DECEMBER

Dec    2:   Discuss Sayles, Matewan, and American Independent Cinema; Class Summary (turn in Matewan study sheet)

  3:   Study Day--Review Session, 9:30-11 in Hodges 253

  4:   FINAL EXAM‑‑10:15-12:15 LIB AUD (Thursday).