Description
How do filmmakers portray themselves, their art, their business and their lives in their movies? Sometimes funny, sometimes tragic or poignant or frightening and sometimes sizzling with sex. How do filmmakers portray themselves, their art, their business and their lives in their movies? Sometimes funny, sometimes tragic or poignant or frightening and sometimes sizzling with sex.
This SDG will examine how filmmakers from different eras and countries utilize the various genres of cinema (drama, comedy, mystery, horror, animation and the musical) to depict their own unique perspective on the art and business of filmmaking. Among the issues we will consider are a film's narrative structure, its visuals, thematic content, the era when made, production history and its creative team. We will also factor in the topics of race and gender. As there is no textbook, members will be expected to research their chosen film and provide the group with a limited amount of recommended reading or viewing material.
All films are readily available from Amazon, Netflix and many can be taken out from a local library.
Weekly Topics
During the fourteen weeks we will view / discuss one film a week. (Pending availability) these films are :
Show People, King Vidor, 1928 (silent)
A Star is Born, William Wellman, 1937
Sullivan Travels, Preston Sturges, 1941
Sunset Boulevard, Billy Wilder, 1950
Singing in the Rain, Stanley Donen / Gene Kelly. 1952
Kaagaz Ke Phool (Paper Flowers), Guru Dutt (India), 1959
Peeping Tom, Michael Powell (Great Britain), 1960
8 ½, Federico Fellini (Italy), 1963
Day for Night, François Truffaut (France), 1973
The Front, Martin Ritt. 1976
The Player, Robert Altman, 1992
The Watermelon Woman, Cheryl Dunye, 1996
Baadasssss!, Mario Van Peebles, 2006
Hugo, Martin Scorsese. 2011
Possible alternatives if any of the above films are not available at the time of the SDG: Adaptation, Spike Jonze, 2002 or White Hunter, Black Heart, Clint Eastwood, 1990 or Millennium Actress, Satoshi Kon, 2001
Bibliography
There is no text. All films will be available to view on a streaming service such as Amazon or Netflix. The discussion leader for each film (with the assistance of the SDG leader) will be responsible for recommending a limited amount of relevant materials concerning the assigned film.
