Post-Cinema
ENGLISH 5070/7006
Topics in FIlm (5070)/Media Theory (7006): Post-Cinema
Winter 2019
Monday & Wednesday, 2:30 - 5:00 pm
State 326
Web address for this page:
http://www.shaviro.com/Classes/PostW19.html
5057 Woodward, Room 9309
Office hours: Monday and Wednesday 12:30 pm - 1:30 pm, and by appointment
This course will consider some of the ways that movies have changed in the 21st century. Digital technologies for production, distribution, and reception have been revolutionized in the past twenty years or so. It is still possible to make older-style movies with the new technologies, and many filmmakers continue to do so. But new technological developments have led to new possibilities for audiovisual invention and expression, and many filmmakers have explored these possibilities. We will look at a wide range of movies, music videos, and other audiovisual media, and read attempts by critics to theorize the differences that these experiments have brought to the ways that we experience, understand, and imagine movies. Some classes will involve feature film screenings followed by discussion; others will focus on readings and short clips.
The main reading for this class comes from an online, open source collection of essays: Post-Cinema: Theorizing 21st Century Film, edited by Shane Denson and Julia Leyda, 2016 (henceforth designated as PC). We will read all the essays in this volume over the course of the semester. It is available at http://reframe.sussex.ac.uk/post-cinema/. You can either read individual chapters online, or download the entire volume as a single PDF.
Additional texts will be made available in the form of web links or PDFs.
Class requirements include regular attendance, participation in class discussion, one in-class presentation, and completion of writing assignments:
- Two short exercises (1000 words each) (due on Feb 22 & on April 5)
- Final project, either in the form of a paper (3000 words for undergraduates; 6000 words for graduate students), or in the form of a video essay (you must consult with me if you choose this option) (due on April 29, one week after the last class)
- All writing assignments should be emailed to me at shaviro@shaviro.com
LEARNING OUTCOMES:
By the end of the course, successful students will have learned about the technological and aesthetic changes that have occurred in filmmaking in the 21st century.
In addition, by the end of the course successful students should be able to:
- Demonstrate in-depth knowledge of course topic(s).
- Demonstrate expertise in close reading, analysis, and argument.
- Think creatively and generate fresh perspectives.
- Conduct advanced research by developing a research question; locating, evaluating, and integrating primary and secondary resources; and placing project in the context of relevant scholarship .
- Write with fluency, clarity, and style.
In addition, by the end of the course successful graduate students should be able to:
- Write arguments that are coherent, organized, and consistent.
- Engage in scholarly conversations in the field as part of advanced research.
- Relate course knowledge to issues within English Studies.
- Successfully apply appropriate field-specific and interdisciplinary methodologies to the course topic.
January 7: Introduction
- Shane Denson and Julia Leyda, “Perspectives on Post-Cinema: An Introduction” (PC)
- Chaos Cinema Part I (Matthias Stork) (video)
- Michael Bay: What is Bayhem? (Tony Zhou, Every Frame a Painting) (video)
- Why is it So Hard to Remember What Happens in Transformers?* (Lindsay Ellis) (video)
- Volumetric Cinema (Kevin L. Ferguson) (video)
January 9: Intensified Continuity and Beyond
January 14: Post-Narrative Cinematic Language: Domino
January 16: Digital Cinema
- The Other Side of the Wind (Orson Welles, 1976/2018)
January 28: NO CLASS (WEATHER)
January 30: NO CLASS (WEATHER)
February 6: Images of Futurity
- Patricia Pisters, “Flash-Forward: The Future is Now” (PC)
- Sergi Sánchez, “Towards a Non-Time Image” (PC)
- David Rambo, “The Error-Image” (PC)
- Mark B. N. Hansen, “Algorithmic Sensibility” (PC)
- Mark B. N. Hansen, “Ubiquitous Sensation” pdf
February 11: Anthropocene Cinema
- Leviathan (Lucien Castaing-Taylor & Verena Paravel, 2012)
- Leo Goldsmith, “The Violence of Sensation” http://www.reverseshot.org/reviews/entry/1682/leviathan
- Adrian Ivakhiv, “The Art of Morphogenesis” (PC)
- Selmin Kara, “Anthropocinema” (PC)
- Billy Stevenson, “The Post-Cinematic Venue” (PC)
- Shane Denson, “Post-Cinema after Extinction” pdf
February 13: NO CLASS (I will be out of town)
February 18: Discorrelation
- Shane Denson, “Crazy Cameras, Discorrelated Images, and the Post-Perceptual Mediation of Post-Cinematic Affect” (PC)
- Shane Denson et al., “Post-Continuity, the Irrational Camera, Thoughts on 3D” (PC)
- Skype visit from Shane Denson
February 20: New Articulations of Space and Time
- Andreas Sudmann, “Bullet Time and the Mediation of Post-Cinematic Temporalities” (PC)
- Steven Shaviro, “Splitting the Atom” (PC)
- Steen Ledet Christiansen, “The Morph-Image” pdf
February 25: The Audiovisual Essay
February 27: Graphics, Special Effects, and 3D
- Coraline (Henry Selick)
- Leon Gurevitch, “Cinema Designed” (PC)
- Caetlin Benson-Allott, “The Chora Line” (PC)
March 4: Post-Genre? (1)
- Detention (Joseph Kahn, 2011)
March 6: Post-Genre? (2)
- Holy Motors (Leos Carax, 2012)
March 18: Post-Cinema in the Art Gallery: Center Jenny
March 20: Reordering the Senses: McLuhan
- Marshall McLuhan, Understanding Media: The Extensions of Man, Part I pdf
- Felix Brinker, “On the Political Economy of the Contemporary (Superhero) Blockbuster Series” (PC)
- Bruce Isaacs, “Reality Effects” (PC)
- Steen Christiansen, “Metamorphosis and Modulation” (PC)
- Elena Del Rio, “Biopolitical Violence and Affective Force” (PC)
- Julia Leyda et al., “Post-Cinema, Digitality, Politics” (PC)
- Paranormal Activity (Oren Peli, 2007)
- WTF IS THAT? The Pre- and Post-Cinematic Tendencies of Paranormal Activity (Allison De Fren & Brian Cantrell) (video)
- Julia Leyda, “Demon Debt” (PC)
- Therese Grisham, et al., “The Postcinematic in Paranormal Activity and Paranormal Activity 2” (PC)
- Nick Rombes, “Six Asides on Paranormal Activity 2” https://filmmakermagazine.com/23766-six-asides-on-paranormal-activity-2/
- Steven Shaviro, “The Glitch Dimension” pdf
April 1: Interfaces and Networks: Unfriended
- Unfriended (Leo Gabriadze, 2014)
- Shane Denson, “The Horror of Discorrelation” pdf
- Alexander Galloway, The Interface Effect (selections) pdf
April 3: Phenomenologies of Post-Cinema
April 8: Dislocations: Upstream Color
April 10: Post-Cinematic Affect
- Steven Shaviro, “Post-Cinematic Affect” (PC)
- Paul Bowman et al., “Post-Cinematic Affect: A Conversation in Five Parts” (PC)
April 15: Post-Television?
- Random Acts of Flyness (Terence Nance, 2018) (1st episode)
- Writings TBA
April 22: Music Videos
- Dirty Computer (Janelle Monae; Andrew Donoho, Chuck Lightning, et al.)
- Whack World (Tierra Whack; Thibaut Duverneix and Mathieu Léger)