HISTORY OF CINEMA
- Overview
- Assessment methods
- Learning objectives
- Contents
- Full programme
- Delivery method
- Teaching methods
- Contacts/Info
No prerequisites are required.
The assessment of the course contents will take place through an oral test aimed at verifying:
- the knowledge of the contents related to the course manual;
- the analytical skills developed by the student with reference to the films in the programme, which are to be watched fully:
- the knowledge and critical capacity with respect to the in-depth texts provided by the professor on the monographic part of the course.
The mark for the oral test (marked in thirtieths) will take into account the accuracy and quality of the answers (60%), as well as communication skills and the ability to adequately justify statements, analyses and judgements (40%).
The student must have achieved a total mark of 18/30 to pass the learning assessment.
The course aims to provide historical, linguistic and theoretical tools useful for the knowledge and understanding of cinema at an international level, from its beginnings (end of the 19th century) to the present day, and for the reading of the cinematographic work, intended both as an aesthetic-cultural product and as an economic and social product (institutional part). The general objective is to place the history of cinema within the broader framework of 20th century history, investigating how and to what extent the medium has been permeable to the political, economic, cultural and social changes that have accompanied its development.
The course also includes an in-depth study of an author and/or a genre and/or a theme and/or a historical event (monographic part) in order to understand the declinations assumed in the different historical periods within the cinematographic representational forms.
At the end of the course, students will be able to:
- recognise and understand the main forms of expression in the history of cinema by relating them to the historical context of reference;
- grasp the evolutions that have affected the cinematographic language;
- read and analyse a film text in depth, taking into account the context of production and that of reception;
- develop communication and expository skills in the field of cinema.
The course is structured on three levels, which complement each other:
1) Definition and analysis of methodological and theoretical issues of film history and historiography (indicatively 10 hours, institutional part)
2) Identification and stylistic-formal analysis of the main production trends in film history through the recognition of significant trends, films and authors (approximately 38 hours, institutional part). For each era it is proposed to identify:
- the relationship with the context (political, economic, social and cultural);
- the modes of reception and interpretation (also diachronically);
- the repercussions on contemporary reality
3) Definition and analysis of the cinematic representation of Italian relationship with the African imaginary: from the Italo-Turkish war to fascist colonialism, from the processes of decolonisation and re-elaboration of colonial trauma to contemporary migration. The theme will be tackled by placing historical events in dialogue with the forms of representation and interpretation developed by Italian cinema during the 20th century (approximately 20 hours, monographic part).
The study of the following texts is required:
- D. Bordwell, K. Thompson, Storia del cinema. Un’introduzione, a cura di D. Bruni, E. Mosconi, 6e, McGraw Hill, Milano, 2022, chapters 1-17 and 19-20;
- In-depth essays provided by the professor and uploaded on the course E-Learning page.
Students are also required to fully watch and prepare 15 films, also covered in the classroom. They are, in chronological order:
- Cabiria (G. Pastrone, ITA, 1914)
- Il gabinetto del dottor Caligari (R. Wiene, GER, 1920)
- Sciopero! (S.M. Ėjzenštejn, RUS, 1925)
- Lo squadrone bianco (A. Genina, ITA, 1936)
- Via col vento (V. Fleming, USA, 1939)
- Umberto D. (V. De Sica, ITA, 1952)
- Questa è la mia vita (J-L. Godard, FRA, 1962)
- Appunti per un’Orestiade africana (P.P. Pasolini, ITA, 1970)
- Taxi Driver (M. Scorsese, USA, 1976)
- Tempo di uccidere (G. Montaldo, ITA, 1989)
- Nikita (L. Besson, FRA, 1990)
- Come un uomo sulla Terra (D. Yimer, ITA, 2008)
- Terraferma (E. Crialese, ITA, 2011)
- Fuocoammare (G. Rosi, ITA, 2016)
- Io Capitano (M. Garrone, ITA, 2023)
The learning objectives of the course will be achieved through the mode of frontal lectures during which significant scenes and sequences from representative films will be brought to attention and analysed.
The professor receives students by appointment, to be arranged by writing to m.piredda@uninsubria.it, at the Rossi Pavilion or online according to specific needs.