POPULAR! 1022 - Introduction to Film Studies
What is a blockbuster? What is a cult film? What is digital cinema? Discover the answers to these questions and others in a broad introduction to the study of cinema. Students will learn the basic vocabulary of film studies and gain an informed understanding of the different critical approaches to film analysis. 1.0 course

2152B - Bollywood Cinema
Bollywood Cinema, the mainstream Hindi-language film industry in India, has produced the most popular films of the 21st century. Through lectures and weekly screenings, students will analyze how these films represent issues of gender, religion, caste, class, the diaspora, and India’s place in the global cultural imagination. 0.5 course

POPULAR! 2159A/B - Disney (Disney Dream Factory)
Benjamin Barber in The New York Times argued "whether Disney knows it or not, it is buying much more than our leisure time. It has a purchase on our values, on how we feel and think, and what we think about." This course offers a closer look at Disney as one of America's most long-standing "dream factories," examining the cultural narratives, industrial strategies, fantasies and ideologies that fuel Disney’s global impact in the 20^th and 21^st century. In addition to analyzing key Disney animated features, we will also look at the studio’s early cartoons, educational and advertising films, nature documentaries, live action films and propaganda shorts. We will study Disney's relationship to art, politics and ecology and also examine the "invention" of childhood, notions of "familyv entertainment and constructions of race, class and gender in Disney filmmaking. Films might include Bambi, Sleeping Beauty, Tron, Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs, Song of the South, Steamboat Willy, Fantasia, The Lion King and Frozen. 0.5 course

2164B - Animation/Anime
This course explores the power of animation, with a particular emphasis on Japan. Students will study Japanese anime films and multimedia franchises as artistic expressions, as industrial products with relations to other cultural forms, and as objects through which consumers construct their social lives. This is a non-essay course, so the emphasis is on hands-on group work (analyzing images, putting together a sequence, researching anime's "media mix"), as well as regular forum posts and a final examination. The emphasis is on my own "otaku 1.0" history—science fiction, posthumanism, and apocalypse—but you will also have the opportunity to discuss your favorite contemporary animation. No prior knowledge of Japanese is required. 0.5 course

2212G - Adapting across Page, Stage, and Screen (cross-listed with English 2112G and Theatre Studies 2212G)
How does the shape an artwork takes contribute to its aesthetic and political power? When artworks flex across form and media how do their messages change? What did Marshall McLuhan mean when he said "the medium is the message"? How do genre and form shape social and political discourse? In this course, students explore these questions and more as they investigate texts that assume multiple cultural forms and represent a diversity of perspectives. 0.5 course

2252F - World Cinema
A survey of the history of world cinema, with a focus on postwar film cultures in areas such as Africa, Latin America, Asia, Europe, and Australia. Students will study films as expressive audiovisual texts and examine larger social, economic, and cultural patterns of influence in the global cultural economy. 0.5 course

2254F - Classical Hollywood Cinema
This course traces a history of American film from the silent period to the end of the studio era. Topics include the establishment of the Hollywood style, major directors/genres, as well as key industrial, technological, and cultural factors in the development of Hollywood cinema. 0.5 course

3309F - Film and Popular Culture
In this course students are encouraged to develop a critical understanding of the role film plays in shaping popular culture. Topics may include: children's film, dystopian film, and fantasy film. 0.5 course

3311G - Special Topics in Film Studies: Pop.Sound.Cinema.
This course explores the history, technology and aesthetics of popular music and the moving image, tracing their convergence and synchronization from early cinema to the digital music video. Topics may include: the concert film, pop art and pop music, New Hollywood and the soundtrack, sound theory, the rise and fall of MTV, the avant-garde and visual music, the pop star on screen, the body in motion, afrofuturism. 0.5 course

3361G - Stardom
This course examines stardom in its cultural, historical, industrial, and national contexts. The course may examine the development of the star system in a specific national context, focus on a particular star or stars, a historical period or movement, or a specific theoretical aspect of the star phenomenon. 0.5 course

3368G - Film Production
This course will explore the stylistic functions of basic film elements, e.g., camera movement, editing, sound, and colour, through the analysis and production of films. You will practice storytelling skills and evaluate various AI-powered script generation tools and platforms available, considering factors such as ease of use, customization options, and output quality.

Students will work through a series of collaborative studio projects aimed at developing knowledge and technical proficiency regarding: pre-production planning and scriptwriting, composition and visual communication, manual camera control, colour grading, lighting, audio recording and sound design, as well as editing and stylization in post-production.

Studio production and experimentation will be complemented by online technical demonstrations, lectures, readings, discussions, and viewings aimed at developing critical response skills, conceptual foundations, and language appropriate for image evaluation and analysis. These will provide students with versatile tools and approaches through which ideas about filmmaking may be explored, and developed, culminating in a video production project. Remote production techniques related to the pandemic will be explored if necessary. No prior experience with digital technology and/or video production is required. 0.5 course

3371F - Film Theory
This course will investigate major writings in two areas of classical film theory: the realism-formalism debate and the auteur theory. Additional topics in film poetics and semiotics will also be discussed. 0.5 course

NEW! 4356G - Avant-Garde Cinema
This course explores the history, politics, and aesthetics of avant-garde film practices, examining the development, major trends, and techniques of experimental and nonnarrative filmmaking in relation to key art movements and theoretical debates of the 20th century. Topics include formalism, surrealism, political modernism, pop art, and feminism. 0.5 course

NEW! 4375F - Politics and Performance in the Japanese New Wave
This course focuses on Japanese cinema as part of a global new wave in the 1960s that scandalized audiences with unsettling representations of sex, violence, and politics. Topics include the ethics and aesthetics of new wave filmmaking and the role of these films in the development of film studies. 0.5 course

NEW! 4401 - Script to Screen: Advanced Digital Film Production (cross-listed with MediaComm 4401)
Using a script they have already written, students will produce a polished short film ready for film festival submission. Lectures, group work, and hands-on instruction help students further develop their abilities to produce, direct, and edit a film, from storyboards to the red carpet. 1.0 course

4409E - Undergraduate Thesis
Individual instruction in the selection of a topic, the preparation of materials, and the writing of a thesis. Students who wish to take this course must apply to the Program Director. The course is restricted to students in fourth year of an Honours Specialization in Film Studies. 1.0 course

Fall/Winter

4409E / 001

Various

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