Film 114a: Genre, Gender and Women’s Filmmaking
Instructor: Dr. Mary Harrod
Office Hours: Tues/Fri 11.30-12 and Tues 2-3, Olin Sang 219.
Class hours/location: Tues/Fri 9.30-10.50, Mandel G03 (except Friday week 3, February 3, Shapiro Campus Multipurpose Room, second floor)
E-mail:
Course Description
This course will consider women’s recently expanding contribution to popular filmmaking across a range of genres and production contexts, including the USA (for the first half of the course), then France, Spain, India and the UK. It will explore how women draw on both national and transnational paradigms to express concerns that have particular resonance for them: what creative strategies emerge from such an encounter and how these might be understood as feminist, as well as how racial, sexual and other identity categories inflect issues of gender.
Requirements
This is a four-credit course (with three hours of class-time per week). Students are expected to spend a minimum of nine hours of study time each week in preparation for the course (readings, papers, films, discussion, and so on). In addition to weekly assignments and regular attendance, class requirements include participation in discussion (10% of grade), an oral presentation (20%), a midterm paper (25%, due 28 February) and a final project (45%; due 10 May except seniors due 2 May)
Set readings will be posted on LATTE (marked L on syllabus) or are available online through the library or elsewhere. For general readings on women’s filmmaking and related topics see the additional bibliography at the end of this syllabus; for an introduction to analysing film see Bordwell and Thompson, Film Art (McGraw-Hill, various editions). All required films will be digitized on LATTE, but students can also consult the Goldfarb Library, which now holds a rich collection of relevant movies on DVD.
Students need to come to class and complete all assignments in a timely fashion in order to pass the course. No work will be accepted by facsimile or by electronic mail. Essays must be delivered in person and in hard copy. Students should comply with University policy on academic integrity as set forth in the Rights and Responsibilities Handbook distributed by the Office of Campus Life. Those with a documented disability on record at the University ought to see the instructor immediately.
Goals and Outcomes
In addition to improving expository writing skills, students will learn to analyse film from aesthetic, industrial and ideological perspectives. They will also gain knowledge about the relationship between film and gender studies, theories of genre and authorship in cinema, and the history of women filmmakers in various contexts.
Provisional Schedule
1. Week commencing 16 January
Introduction: Genre, Gender and Authorship
Film: Annie Hall (Woody Allen, USA 1977)
Reading:
- Steve Neale, ‘Questions of Genre,’ Screen 31 (1): 45-66 (1990). https://genrefilm.wikispaces.com/file/view/Neale+on+Genre.pdf
- Frank Krutnik, ‘The Faint Aroma of Performing Seals: the “Nervous” Romance and the Comedy of the Sexes.’ The Velvet Light Trap no. 26 (Fall 1990): 57-72. L
Further viewing: Dance, Girl, Dance (Dorothy Arzner, USA 1940); The Hitch-Hiker (Ida Lupino, USA 1953)
Further reading:
- Timothy Corrigan, ‘The Commerce of Auteurism,’ inA Cinema Without Walls: Movies and Culture After Vietnam (New Brunswick, NJ: Rutgers UP, 1991), 101–36. L
- ------, ‘Auteurs and the New Hollywood,’ in J. Lewis (ed.), The New American Cinema (Durham, Duke University Press, 1998), 38-63.
- Christine Gledhill, ‘Rethinking genre,’ in C. Gledhill and L. Williams (eds.), Reinventing Film Studies Edward Arnold, 2000), 221-43. http://academic.uprm.edu/mleonard/theorydocs/readings/Gledhill.pdf
- David Shumway, ‘Relationship Stories.’ InModern Love: Romance, Intimacy and the Marriage Crisis (New York: New York University Press, 2003), 157-87.
- Peter William Evans and Celestino Deleyto, ‘Introduction: Surviving Love,’ in P. W. Evans and C. Deleyto (eds) Terms of Endearment: Hollywood Romantic Comedies of the 1980s and 1990s (Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press,1998), 1-14.
2. W/c 23 January
‘Chick-flicks’ 1: romantic comedy
Film: What Women Want (Nancy Meyers, USA 2000)
Reading:
- Jane Gaines, ‘The Genius of Genre and the Ingenuity of Women,’ (extract) in C. Gledhill (ed.), Gender Meets Genre in Postwar Cinemas (Illinois: Urbana, Chicago & Springfield: University of Illinois Press, 2012), 15-23. L
- Deborah Jermyn, ‘The Contemptible Realm of the Queen of Romcom: Nancy Meyers, Cultural Value and Romantic Comedy,’ in M. Harrod and K. Paszkiewicz (eds), Women’s Authorship and Genre in Film and Television (forthcoming Routledge, 2017). L
Further viewing: Sleepless in Seattle (Nora Ephron, USA 1993), Something’s Gotta Give (Meyers, 2003), The Holiday (Meyers, USA 2006), It’s Complicated (Meyers, USA 2009)
Further reading:
- Celestino Deleyto, ‘Introduction,’ in The Secret Life of Romantic Comedy. Manchester and New York: Manchester University Press 2009, pp. 1-17.
- Frank Krutnik, ‘Love Lies: Romantic Fabrication in Contemporary Romantic Comedy,’ in P. W. Evans and C. Deleyto (eds) Terms of Endearment: Hollywood Romantic Comedies of the 1980s and 1990s (Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press,1998), 1-14.
- Tamar Jeffers-Macdonald, ‘Introduction,’ in Romantic Comedy: Boy Meets Girl Meets Genre (New York: Columbia UP, 2012) (on Sleepless in Seattle).
3. W/c 30 January
‘Chick-flicks’ 2: period drama
** Friday 3=open DEIS session in Shapiro Campus Multipurpose Room, second floor***
Film: Marie Antoinette (Sofia Coppola, USA/France/Japan, 2006)
Reading:
- Belén Vidal, ‘Narrative Aesthetics and Gendered Histories: Renewing the Heritage Film,’ in Heritage Film: Nation, Genre and Representation (NY: Columbia University Press, 2012), 91-121. L
- Christina Lane and Nicole Richter, ‘The Feminist Poetics of Sofia Coppola: Spectacle and Self-Consciousness in Marie Antoinette (2006),’ in H. Radner and R. Stringer (eds) Feminism at the Movies: Understanding Gender in Contemporary Popular Cinema (New York and Abingdon: Routledge 2011). L
Further viewing: The Notorious Bettie Page (Mary Harron, USA 2005); Suffragette (Sarah Gavron, UK 2015);
Further reading:
- Belén Vidal, ‘Introduction: the Biopic and its Critical Contexts,’ in B. Vidal and T. Brown (eds), The Biopic in Contemporary Film Culture London and New York: Routledge, 2014).
- Pam Cook, ‘History in the Making: Sofia Coppola’sMarie Antoinetteand the New Auteurism,’ in B. Vidal and T. Brown (eds), The Biopic in Contemporary Film Culture London and New York: Routledge, 2014).
- Fiona Handyside,’ Girlhood, Postfeminism and Contemporary Female Art-House Authorship: The “Nameless Trilogies” of Sofia Coppola and Mia Hansen-Løve’http://www.alphavillejournal.com/Issue10/HTML/ArticleHandyside.html
4. W/c 6 February
Teenpics
Film: Clueless (Amy Heckerling, USA 1995)
Reading:
- Wood, Robin. ‘Party Time or Can’t Hardly Wait for that American Pie: Hollywood High School Movies of the 90s.’ CineAction! 58 (2002): 4-10.
- Lynch, Deirdre. ‘Clueless: About History.’ In Jane Austen and Co.: Remaking the Past in Contemporary Culture, ed. by Suzanne R. Pucci and James Thompson, 71-92. New York: SUNY Press 2003. L
Further viewing: Fast Times at Ridgemont High (Amy Heckerling, USA 1982), Lords of
Dogtown (Catherine Hardwicke, USA/Germany, 2005), The Bling Ring (Coppola, USA 2012)
Further reading:
- Tim Shary, Teen Movies: American Youth on Screen (Wallflower Press, 2005)
- Maureen Turim, ‘Popular Culture and the Comedy of Manners: Clueless and Fashion Clues,’ in Jane Austen and Co.: Remaking the Past in Contemporary Culture, Suzanne R. Pucci and James Thompson (eds), 33-52. New York: SUNY Press 2003.
- Tim Shary and Frances Smith, Refocus on the Films of Amy Heckerling (Edinburgh University Press, 2016), especially chapters 3 and 12.
5. W/c 13 February
(Teen?) fantasy plus discussion of midterm project
Film: Twilight (Catherine Hardwicke, USA 2008)
- Mark Adams, ‘“Venus in Fangs”: Negotiating Masochism in Twilight,’ in W. Clayton and S. Harman (eds), Screening Twilight: Critical Approaches to a Cinematic Phenomenon (London: I. B. Tauris, 2014). L
- Bethan Jones, ‘Normal Female Interest in Vampires and Werewolves Bonking: Slash and the Reconstruction of Meaning,’ in W. Clayton and S. Harman (eds), Screening Twilight: Critical Approaches to a Cinematic Phenomenon (London: I. B. Tauris, 2014). L
Further viewing: Red Riding Hood (Hardwicke, USA 2011); Vamps (Heckerling, USA 2012)
Further reading:
- Anne Morey (ed.), Genre, Reception and Adaptation in the Twilight Series (Cambridge, Mass.: Ashgate, 2012)
W/c 20 February
WINTER RECESS
6. W/c 27 February
*Midterms due Tuesday 28 February*
The Horror Movie
Film: Carrie (Kimberly Peirce, USA 2013)
Reading:
- Barbara Creed, ‘Horror and the Monstrous-Feminine: An Imaginary Abjection,’ Screen 27, 1 (1986), 44-71. L
- Katarzyna Paskiewicz, ‘When the Woman Directs (A Horror Film),’ in M. Harrod and K. Paszkiewicz (eds), Women’s Authorship and Genre in Film and Television (forthcoming Routledge, 2017). L
Further viewing: The Slumber Party Massacre (Amy Jones, USA, 1982), Near Dark (Bigelow, USA 1986), Jennifer’s Body (Karyn Kusama, USA 2009)
See also Will Ashton’s 9-Minute video essay comparing De Palma’s and Kimberly Peirce’s versions of Carrie, http://www.indiewire.com/2016/03/watch-9-minute-video-essay-compares-brian-de-palmas-kimberly-peirces-versions-of-carrie-263707/
Further reading:
- Cynthia A. Freeland, ‘Feminist Frameworks for Horror Films,’ in Noël Carroll and David Bordwell, eds. Post-Theory:Reconstructing Film Studies, (University of Wisconsin Press, 1996), pp. 195-218.
http://uffilmanalysis.pbworks.com/f/Freeland742-763.pdf
- Carol Clover, ‘Her Body, Himself: Gender in the Salsher Film,’ in B. K. Grant (ed.), The Dread of Difference: Gender and the Horror Film (Austin, University of Texas Press, 1996).
7. W/c 6 March
Action cinema
Film: Point Break (Kathryn Bigelow, 1991)
Reading:
- Sean Redmond, ‘All That is Male Melts Into Air: Bigelow on the Edge of Point Break,’ in D. Jermyn and S. Redmond (eds), The Cinema of Kathryn Bigelow: Hollywood Transgressor (London: Wallflower, 2003), pp. 106-124.L
- Luke Collins, ‘100% Pure Adrenaline: Gender and Generic Surface in Point Break,’ in C. Gledhill (ed.), Gender Meets Genre in Postwar Cinemas (Illinois: Urbana, Chicago & Springfield: University of Illinois Press, 2012), 54-67.L
Further viewing: The Hurt Locker (Bigelow, USA 2010), Meek’s Cutoff (Kelly Reichardt, USA 2010), Girlfight (Karyn Kusama, USA 2000)
Further reading:
- Steve Neale, ‘Action-Adventure as Hollywood Genre,’ in Y. Tasker (ed.), The Hollywood Action and Adventure Film (Wiley-Blackwell, 2015).
- Yvonne Tasker, Spectacular Bodies: Genre, Gender and the Action Cinema (London and New York, Routledge, ‘Introduction’ and Chapters 3 (on masculinities) & 8 (on Bigelow).
- Yvonne Tasker and Eylem Atakav, ‘The Hurt Locker: Male Intimacy, Violence, and the Iraq War Movie,’ in Sinecine 1(2), 57-70. http://www.sinecine.org/wp-content/uploads/2014/11/Tasker_Hurt-Locker.pdf
- Dawn Hall, ‘Gender Politics in Kelly Reichardt’s Feminist Western Meek’s Cutoff,’ in M. Harrod and K. Paszkiewicz (eds), Women’s Authorship and Genre in Film and Television (forthcoming Routledge, 2017). Email me for a copy.
- Yvonne Tasker, ‘Bodies and Genres in Transition: Girlfight and Real Women Have curves,’ in C. Gledhill (ed.), Gender Meets Genre in Postwar Cinemas (Illinois: Urbana, Chicago & Springfield: University of Illinois Press, 2012).
8. W/c 13 March
French Cinema 1. The ‘Banlieue’ Film
Film: Ain’t Scared/Regarde-Moi (Audrey Estrougo, France 2007)
Instead of a reading, please watch La Haine (Kassovitz, 1995, FOR TUESDAY) and compare it closely with this film (FOR FRIDAY). Similarities and differences can form a basis for some discussion points. Vincendeau’s book on La Haine (see below) is also excellent for those wishing to flesh out thoughts on the ‘banlieue film’ genre.
Further viewing: Girlhood/Bande de filles (Céline Sciamma, France 2014); Leila/Toi, moi, les autres (Estrougo, France 2010).
Further reading:
- Ginette Vincendeau, La Haine (London: I. B. Tauris, 2005).
- Will Higbee, ‘The return of the political, or designer visions of exclusion? The case for Mathieu Kassovitz's ‘fracture sociale’ trilogy, Studies in French Cinema 5, 2 (2005).
- Carrie Tarr, Reframing Difference: Beur and banlieue filmmaking in France (2005), especially Chapter 3 on Métisse and La Haine.
- Ginette Vincendeau, ‘Minority Report’, Sight & Sound: French Cinema Special, 25: 6 (2015): 22 – 27. On Bande de filles.
9. W/c 20 March
French Cinema 2: Romcom à la française
Film: French Twist/Gazon maudit (Josiane Balasko, France 1995)
Reading:
- FOR TUESDAY: Kathleen Rowe,The Unruly Woman (Austin: University of Texas Press, 1995), 1-12. L
- FOR FRIDAY: Ince, ‘Queering the family: fantasy and the performance of sexuality andgay relations in French cinema 1995-2000’,Studies in French Cinema2, no.2 (2002), 90-97. L
Further viewing: Jet-Lag/Décalage horaire (Daniéle Thompson, France/USA 1999); Venus Beauty Institute/Vénus Beauté Institut (Tonie Marshall, France 1999); 2 Days in Paris (Julie Delpy, France/Germany, 2007); 2 Days in New York (Julie Delpy, France/Germany/Belgium 2012).
Further reading:
- Brigitte Rollet, ‘Transatlantic Exchanges and Influences: Décalage horaire (Jet
Lag), Gender and the Romantic Comedy à la française,’ in S. Abbott and D. Jermyn (eds), Falling in Love Again: Romantic Comedy in Contemporary Cinema (London: I.B. Tauris), 92-104. L
- ------, ‘Unruly Woman? Josiane Balasko, French Comedy, andGazon maudit,’ in P. Powrie (ed.),French Cinema in the 1990s: Continuity and Difference (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1999), 127-36.
- Mary Harrod, ‘The Réalisatrice and the Rom-Com in the 2000s,’ Studies in French Cinema, Special Issue on ‘Women’s Filmmaking in the 2000s,’ vol. 12, no. 3 (2012), ------, From France with Love: Gender and Identity in French Romantic Comedy (I. B. Tauris, 2015), Introduction and Chapter 3.
- ------, ‘Sweet Nothings?: Imagining the Inexpressible in Contemporary French Romantic Comedy,’ Studies in French Cinema, vol. 13, no. 2 (2013), 171-187.
*Friday 24th. No class.* I will ask you to spend some time preparing answers to questions on the film to report back on during the following session, as the topics are linked.
10. W/c 27 March
Spanish cinema 1: comedy
Film: A mi madre le gustan las mujeres/ My Mother Likes Women (Daniela Fejerman & Inés París, Spain, 2002)
Reading:
- FOR TUESDAY: Rosa Montero, Anny Brooksbank Jones and Chris Perriam, ‘Gender and Sexuality’, in Spanish Cultural Studies. An Introduction, edited by Helen Graham and Jo Labanyi, 381-395. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1995. L
- FOR FRIDAY: Barbara Zecchi, ‘Comedy as a feminist strategy: Spanish women filmmakers reclaim laughter,’ in M. Harrod and K. Paszkiewicz (eds), Women’s Authorship and Genre in Film and Television (forthcoming Routledge, 2017). L
Further viewing: Semen, A Love Sample/Semén, Una historia de amor (París & Féjerman, Spain 2005)
Further reading:
- Juan Antonio Pérez Millán, “Women are also the future. Women directors in recent Spanish cinema”, Cineaste 29.1 (2003), 50-55.