See also:
           -[Modernism via Film]-
           -[Film via Game]- The Hero's Journey also
      

Description:  This is a traditional film appreciation course,
              but taught from the point of view of modernism.
              And of course post-modernism, and post-post-modernism, ....


For more info, 
         email:  FrankVanPelt AT care2 DOT com -- ask for Frank.


(the film list is the same as the film-only class -- see below)

The Reading List

  BNW - Brave New World (& "BNW Revisited)
  
  1984 - Orwell
  
  Martian Time Slip - PK Dick (& "Maze of Death)

  Breakfast of Champions - Kurt Vonnegut

  Left Hand of Darkness -- Ursula K. Le Guin

  Library of Babel & Tlon - Jorge Luis Borges

  The Stranger -- Camus (& Myth of Sysaphis && The Plague)

  Theatre of the Absurd - Eslin (& absurdist plays)

  The Worldly Philsopheres - Robert Hielbroener

  No Exit -- J-P Sartre (& The Flies (play))

  Alice in Wonderland & Thru the Looking Glass - Lewis Carol

  Frankenstein - Mary Shelly

  Dracula - Bram Stoker

------ FILMS ----

  2001  (& 2010)

  day the earth stood still
  the matrix (excerpts)
  shakespear: Hamlet (film &/or text)
  Wargames
  Momento
  Wag the Dog






Film List

In addition to the films, music and readings in the aesthetics
will be introduced so that participants become acquainted with
the "cannon" of literary criticism of modernism.


Week  1 - Ancient times - The Greek influence
=======

Film:  "Jason and the Argnonauts"

Readings:  Plato and Aristotle



Week  2 - The Dark Ages to the Dawn of Modern Technology
=======

Film:  none (but i'm always open to suggestions)

 400 - 1400 The Age of Faith and Chivalry

Poem:  -["Quite Early One Morning" by Dylan Thomas]-

   Better formating: -["Quite Early One Morning" by Dylan Thomas]- (word doc)

Music:  Carl Orff "Carmina Burana"

1400 - The Renaissance
1700 - The Age of exploration


Week  3 - Behold the inventor!
=======

1700 - 1910 The Age of Modern Technology

Film:  "The Great Race"

Technology: The Steam Engine
            The Locomotive
            The telegraph (and shortly the telephone)
            Electricity
            Car & Air Plane 


Week  4 - The focus on ordinary/extraordinary people
=======

Film: Lust for Life - the artist as hero
      Beethoven as larger than life

Film: (extracts)  "Modern Times"  and  "The General"

Music: "Parade" by Erik Satie & Jean Cocteau


Week  5 - The Great War
=======

1914-1918 and its consequences

Film:   "Grand Illusion"

The absurdists and dadaists, etc.



Week  6 - The 1920's
=======

Film:  "Metropolis"






Week  7 - The 1930's
=======

Film:  "The Magnificent Seven"

   the myth of the west 
   the last decade before the total
   destruction innocence




Week  8 - The 1940's
=======

World War II

Film:  "Is Paris Burning?"





Week  9 - 1950's
=======

Youth takes center stage and the cold war

Film (extracts)  "The Giant Gilla Monster"
                 "Bucket Full of Blood"

Film:  "Day the Earth Stood Still"



Week 10 - 1960's 
=======

The New Idealism, and then the world in revolution

Film:  "The Dish"

Strangely enough, the idea of "international spy" caught
the imaginagion, viz....


TV (extract):  Opening of "The Prisoner"

                 http://www.netreach.net/~sixofone/  -- official fan site
      ref site:  http://www.portmeirion-village.com/ -- town in Wales where it was filmed

Spy shows:   The Man from U.N.C.L.E.  (tried to defuse the cold war)
             I Spy (one of the more mysterious and intriguing)
             Get Smart (the ultimate spoof)

And....      That Girl - precursor of the Mary Tyler Moore Show
             The Girl from U.N.C.L.E.  (see, even girls can be spies)
             Honey West

Note: The "send off" ep of Girl from UNCLE featured both Stephanie
      Powers and Robert Vaughn and in a bizare twist Boris Karlof
      in drag - with Vaughn recapping his Hamlet days as a young actor.



Week 11 - 1970's
=======

Enough of war and polarisation, the "credibility gap",...

Film:  "The Magic Christian"


Week 12 - 1980's
=======

Greed is good - Why not have it all?

Film:  "How to succeed in Business without Really Trying"

The emergence of the anti-hero and the non-hero
or why isn't my life like that one on TV?

Film (extracts):   "Die Hard"
                   "Desparately Seeking Susan"


Week 13 - 1990's
=======

Technology enables the rest of the world

Film:  "Lagaan: Once upon a time in India"




Week 14 - 2000's
=======

Film: "Wag the Dog"

Film (extract)  "The Matrix"



Week 15 - now, welcome to the 21st century
=======

Film:  "Ghost World"



Week 16 - Student presentations & chalk talks
=======


Now go forth and filminate!