Beginning Film Studies

Beginning film studies offers the ideal introduction to this vibrant subject. Written accessibly and with verve, it ranges across the key topics and manifold approaches to film studies. Andrew Dix has thoroughly updated the first edition, and this new volume includes new case studies, overviews of recent developments in the discipline, and up-to-the-minute suggestions for further reading. The book begins by considering some of film's formal features - mise-en-scène, editing and sound - before moving outwards to narrative, genre, authorship, stardom and ideology. Later chapters on film industries and on film consumption - where and how we watch movies - assess the discipline's recent geographical 'turn'. The book references many film cultures, including Hollywood, Bollywood and contemporary Hong Kong. Case studies cover such topics as sound in The Great Gatsby and narrative in Inception. The superhero movie is studied; so too is Jennifer Lawrence. Beginning film studies is also interactive, with readers enabled throughout to reflect critically upon the field.

Beginning film studies offers the ideal introduction to this vibrant subject. Written accessibly and with verve, it ranges across the key topics and manifold approaches to film studies. Andrew Dix has thoroughly updated the first edition, and this new volume includes new case studies, overviews of recent developments in the discipline, and up-to-the-minute suggestions for further reading. The book begins by considering some of film's formal features - mise-en-scène, editing and sound - before moving outwards to narrative, genre, authorship, stardom and ideology. Later chapters on film industries and on film consumption - where and how we watch movies - assess the discipline's recent geographical 'turn'. The book references many film cultures, including Hollywood, Bollywood and contemporary Hong Kong. Case studies cover such topics as sound in The Great Gatsby and narrative in Inception. The superhero movie is studied; so too is Jennifer Lawrence. Beginning film studies is also interactive, with readers enabled throughout to reflect critically upon the field.

Inventing Film Studies offers original and provocative insights into the institutional and intellectual foundations of cinema studies. Many scholars have linked the origins of the discipline to late-1960s developments in the academy such as structuralist theory and student protest. Yet this collection reveals the broader material and institutional forces—both inside and outside of the university—that have long shaped the field. Beginning with the first investigations of cinema in the early twentieth century, this volume provides detailed examinations of the varied social, political, and intellectual milieus in which knowledge of cinema has been generated. The contributors explain how multiple instantiations of film study have had a tremendous influence on the methodologies, curricula, modes of publication, and professional organizations that now constitute the university-based discipline. Extending the historical insights into the present, contributors also consider the directions film study might take in changing technological and cultural environments. Inventing Film Studies shows how the study of cinema has developed in relation to a constellation of institutions, technologies, practices, individuals, films, books, government agencies, pedagogies, and theories. Contributors illuminate the connections between early cinema and the social sciences, between film programs and nation-building efforts, and between universities and U.S. avant-garde filmmakers. They analyze the evolution of film studies in relation to the Museum of Modern Art, the American Film Council movement of the 1940s and 1950s, the British Film Institute, influential journals, cinephilia, and technological innovations past and present. Taken together, the essays in this collection reveal the rich history and contemporary vitality of film studies. Contributors: Charles R. Acland, Mark Lynn Anderson, Mark Betz, Zoë Druick, Lee Grieveson, Stephen Groening, Haden Guest, Amelie Hastie, Lynne Joyrich, Laura Mulvey, Dana Polan, D. N. Rodowick, Philip Rosen, Alison Trope, Haidee Wasson, Patricia White, Sharon Willis, Peter Wollen, Michael Zryd

With film studies taking the centre stage and becoming a significant paper within the discipline ‘Journalism and Mass communication’, there is a rising demand and need for a comprehensive book that will deal with basic concepts of film theories and production. Keeping this need in mind, the book is an edited volume which will introduce the basic concepts of film production and theories to the beginners. The highlight of this book is a detailed overview of key foreign film movements and important landmarks in the journey of Indian films with special reference to notable directors and their contributions. The book attempts to throw light on the basic technical aspects of film making as well. A section of the book has also been devoted to emerging concepts in the discipline like focus on film marketing and new technologies, convergence, and the rise of OTT. This book will serve as an introductory guide for any student of media studies interested in film. Table of Contents 1. Film Studies in Mass Communication: An Indigenous Approach to Science and Art of Filmmaking Dr. Mausumi Bhattacharyya 2. European Film Movements Malvika Sagar and Dr. Nithin Kalorth 3. Between Minimum and Maximum Japanese Style of Filmmaking through Ozu and Kurosawa Sooraj K. Nambiar 4. A Historical Perspective of Iranian Cinema: From Film Farsi to New Wave and the Contemporary Transnational Presence Kanika K Arya and Prof. Manish Verma 5. Paradoxical Past, Cultural Renaissance of New Wave and Contemporary Commercial and Artistically Viable Trends of Korean Cinema Kanika K Arya and Prof. Manish Verma 6. Ray, Ghatak and Sen: Knowing the Pioneers of India’s Parallel Cinema Pooja Radhakrishnan 7. Traces of ‘Bollywood’, Tracking the Trajectory of Hindi Cinema in India Vishesh Azad 8. Chaplin & his Films Dr. Priyanka Roy 9. Bergman and Fellini: The cult Filmmakers Dr. Mou Mukherjee Das 10. Filmmaking Essentials: Basic Camera Movements, Direction and Editing Lokesh Chakma 11. Eisenstein and Montage Ruma Saha & Dr. Sharmila Kayal 12. Basics of Sound for Film Dr. Moina Khan 13. Documentary Film: A Chronicle of Real Life Dr. Moon Jana 14. Media Convergence and OverTheTop Technology Nisha Thapar 15. Film Marketing Dr. Debastuti Dasgupta

This title examines what it really means to study film, encouraging the reader to question the dominant theories as well as understanding the key approaches to cinema. The book provides an overview of the construction of film studies and examines the application of theories to film texts.

The Routledge Encyclopedia of Film Theory is an international reference work representing the essential ideas and concepts at the centre of film theory from the beginning of the twentieth century, to the beginning of the twenty-first. When first encountering film theory, students are often confronted with a dense, interlocking set of texts full of arcane terminology, inexact formulations, sliding definitions, and abstract generalities. The Routledge Encyclopedia of Film Theory challenges these first impressions by aiming to make film theory accessible and open to new readers. Edward Branigan and Warren Buckland have commissioned over 50 scholars from around the globe to address the difficult formulations and propositions in each theory by reducing these difficult formulations to straightforward propositions. The result is a highly accessible volume that clearly defines, and analyzes step by step, many of the fundamental concepts in film theory, ranging from familiar concepts such as ‘Apparatus’, ‘Gaze’, ‘Genre’, and ‘Identification’, to less well-known and understood, but equally important concepts, such as Alain Badiou’s ‘Inaesthetics’, Gilles Deleuze’s ‘Time-Image’, and Jean-Luc Nancy’s ‘Evidence’. The Routledge Encyclopedia of Film Theory is an ideal reference book for undergraduates of film studies, as well as graduate students new to the discipline.

Verhoeff investigates the emergence of the western genre, made in the first two decades of cinema (1895-1915). By analyzing many unknown and forgotten films from international archives she traces the relationships between films about the American West, their surrounding films, and other popular media such as photography, painting, (pulp) literature, Wild West Shows and popular ethnography. Through this exploration of archival material she raises new questions of historiography and provides a model for historical analysis. These first traces of the Western film reveal a preoccupation with presence and actuality that informs us about the way in which film, as new medium, took shape within the context of its contemporary visual culture. In The West in Early Cinema gaat Nanna Verhoeff op zoek naar de nog onbekende beginjaren van het westerngenre tijdens de eerste twee decennia van het medium film 1895-1915). Aan de hand van onbekende en vergeten films uit internationale filmarchieven traceert zij de relaties tussen films over het Westen, omringende filmgenres uit deze periode, en andere populaire media als fotografie, schilderkunst, (pulp)literatuur, Wild West Shows en populaire etnografie. Deze sporen van het genre tonen een grote actualiteit en variatie, die laat zien op welke manier de film als nieuw medium een vorm vond binnen de toenmalige visuele cultuur.

This engaging and accessible introduction explores the intricacies of the film world to show how anyone can gain a broader understanding and a more pleasurable experience of film. Addressing general questions about why and how to study film, topics discussed include: the movie industry, from Hollywood to Bollywood who does what on a film set the history, the technology and the art of cinema theories of stardom, genre and film-making. Including illustrations and examples from an international range of films drawn from over a century of movie-making and a glossary of terms for ease of reference, Film Studies: The Basics is a must-have guide for any film student or fan.