FI208-15 Silent Cinema
Introductory description
This module introduces students to a vitally important period in film history, beginning in the mid-1890s and extending to the late 1920s and (in some parts of the world) the mid-1930s, in which the technology to create and present photographic moving pictures was first created, industrial modes of production, distribution and exhibition facilitated its transformation into a mass entertainment medium, and a narrative grammar of film language was gradually developed, refined and frequently challenged.
Module aims
- Introduce some of the most important films, filmmakers and filmmaking trends from Europe, America and beyond in the period between 1895 and the mid-1930s.
- Investigate social and cultural contexts with a defining influence on the early evolution of the cinema.
- Familiarise students with theoretical concepts and models which will help them to discuss and analyse the products of early cinema as complex rather than ‘primitive’ texts and to formulate hypotheses concerning the uneven development of early representational techniques and stylistic practices.
- Examine filmic representations of class, race, gender, sexuality and national identity within particular moments of social upheaval and cultural crisis in the first three-and-half decades of the 20th century.
- Familiarise students with the developing industrial structure of the international film industry in this period, and enable them to gain a complex historical understanding of the battle for commercial hegemony between different national and regional film industries.
Outline syllabus
This is an indicative module outline only to give an indication of the sort of topics that may be covered. Actual sessions held may differ.
This is an indicative module outline only to give an indication of the sort of topics that may be covered. Actual sessions held may differ.
Week 1: The cinema of attractions.
Week 2: Early forms of narrative integration.
Week 3: Film serials of the 1910s.
Week 4: The emergence of the feature film format.
Week 5: The prominence of women filmmakers in the silent era.
Week 7: Slapstick comedy in the silent era.
Week 8: German expressionism.
Week 9: Soviet montage cinema.
Week 10: Japanese silent cinema.
Learning outcomes
By the end of the module, students should be able to:
- Demonstrate knowledge of early film history and relevant scholarly debates in this field.
- Show familiarity with a range of methodologies necessary to analyse silent films.
- Demonstrate understanding of the social, technological and cultural conditions that underpinned the rise of cinema.
- Communicate ideas effectively, using appropriate academic conventions.
Indicative reading list
Richard Abel, The Cine Goes to Town: French Cinema 1896-1914 (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1994). Jennifer M. Bean and Diane Negra (ed.), A Feminist Reader in Early Cinema (Durham, NC: Duke University Press, 2002). Noël Burch, Life to those Shadows (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1990). Vicki Callahan, Zones of Anxiety: Movement, Musidora, and the Crime Serials of Louis Feuillade (Detroit: Wayne University Press, 2005). Thomas Elsaesser (ed), Early Cinema: Space, Frame, Narrative (London: BFI, 1990). Steve Neale (ed.), Silent Features: The Development of Silent Feature Films, 1914-1934 (Exeter: University of Exeter Press, 2018). Patrice Petro, Joyless Streets: Women and Melodramatic Representation in Weimar Germany (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1989). Deac Rossell, Living Pictures: The Origins of the Movies (New York: State University of New York Press, 1998).
Subject specific skills
This module develops skills of audio-visual literacy, through close textual and/or contextual analysis in relation to the moving image and sound. It also develops skills required to interpret historical documents pertaining to the film industry and understandings of historical, theoretical and conceptual frameworks relevant to screen arts and cultures.
Transferable skills
Critical and analytical thinking; independent research skills; team work; clarity and effectiveness of communication, oral and written; accurate, concise and persuasive writing; audio-visual literacy
Study time
| Type | Required |
|---|---|
| Lectures | 9 sessions of 1 hour (6%) |
| Seminars | 9 sessions of 1 hour (6%) |
| Other activity | 18 hours (12%) |
| Private study | 114 hours (76%) |
| Total | 150 hours |
Private study description
Preparation for seminars; researching and writing assessed coursework.
Other activity description
Compulsory film screenings
Costs
No further costs have been identified for this module.
You do not need to pass all assessment components to pass the module.
Assessment group A
| Weighting | Study time | Eligible for self-certification | |
|---|---|---|---|
Assessment component |
|||
| Film Analysis | 30% | Yes (extension) | |
|
Students will submit a 1,000-word film analysis, written in relation to an early film to be chosen from a selection of examples made available by the module tutor. |
|||
Reassessment component is the same |
|||
Assessment component |
|||
| Essay | 70% | Yes (extension) | |
|
Students will submit a 3,000-word independently researched essay. Questions can be chosen from a selection made available by the module tutor. |
|||
Reassessment component is the same |
|||
Feedback on assessment
Published written feedback on film analysis and essay assignments.
Pre-requisites
To take this module, you must have passed:
Courses
This module is Optional for:
- Year 2 of UFIA-W620 Undergraduate Film Studies
- Year 2 of UFIA-QW25 Undergraduate Film and Literature