Thursday, March 31
Students took an "open handout" 36 pt. quiz over early Soviet film, and we graded it together in class.
HW due Friday:
Single-scene analysis essay.
Thursday, March 31, 2011
Wednesday, March 30, 2011
Wednesday, March 30
We returned to the two handouts which discuss Russian Constructivism, reread portions of them, and looked at more relevant images onscreen (reviewing several from yesterday in the process). Stage set designs by Meyerhold, montage artworks by Alexander Rodchenko, and Vladimir Tatlin's scale model of the never-built monument to the Second International were among those images.
HW due Thursday: Review handouts and notes for the unit test on early Soviet film in class class Thursday.
HW due Friday: Single-scene analysis essay.
We returned to the two handouts which discuss Russian Constructivism, reread portions of them, and looked at more relevant images onscreen (reviewing several from yesterday in the process). Stage set designs by Meyerhold, montage artworks by Alexander Rodchenko, and Vladimir Tatlin's scale model of the never-built monument to the Second International were among those images.
HW due Thursday: Review handouts and notes for the unit test on early Soviet film in class class Thursday.
HW due Friday: Single-scene analysis essay.
Tuesday, March 29, 2011
Tuesday, March 29 Referring to the "Great Experiment" handout and the box on "Russian Art Movements" on the handout about Dziga Vertov, we examined Russian avant garde art of the Revolutionary period in the context of other images of the time. We looked at projected images of Picasso, futurist designs, Russian icon paintings, and Russian constructivist works themselves. HW due Thursday: Quiz over early Soviet film. HW due Friday: Outside viewing essay
Monday, March 28, 2011
Monday, March 28 Mr. P announced that the quiz over early Soviet film will be on Thursday (not Tuesday), that it will be "open handout" and that students should use the next two class periods to make sure their questions about the material are answered. We watched a section of the first reel of Man with a Movie Camera three times: twice to determine our own reading of how juxtaposed images of people doing different kinds of work related to each other (whether by contrast or analogy) and once with Yuri Tsivian's voiceover commentary to hear his read on the question. We also watched two other segments with Tsivian's commentary on the film as a statement on seeing (seeing things anew) and on the preoccupation with the machine. HW due Thursday: Quiz over early Soviet cinema. We then watched part of Ferdinand Leger's modernist film from 1924, Ballet mecanique, and compared it with the Vertov film.
Friday, March 25, 2011
Friday, March 25
We reviewed expectations for the Single-scene Analysis essay due next Thursday (March 31), stressing that it is not to contain plot summary, and is not to be a review, but is to explain in the first paragraph how the chosen scene is representative of the film's themes, feel, and/or techniques, and then proceed to do a close analysis of a short scene examining the use of at least two major elements of filmcraft.
We then turned to just such analysis (of film editing) in The Man with a Movie Camera, and we listened to Yuri Tsivian's voiceover commentary on the first few minutes of the film.
HW due Monday:
Read yesterday's handouts if you haven't done so already.
HW due next Thursday:
Outside viwing essay.
We reviewed expectations for the Single-scene Analysis essay due next Thursday (March 31), stressing that it is not to contain plot summary, and is not to be a review, but is to explain in the first paragraph how the chosen scene is representative of the film's themes, feel, and/or techniques, and then proceed to do a close analysis of a short scene examining the use of at least two major elements of filmcraft.
We then turned to just such analysis (of film editing) in The Man with a Movie Camera, and we listened to Yuri Tsivian's voiceover commentary on the first few minutes of the film.
HW due Monday:
Read yesterday's handouts if you haven't done so already.
HW due next Thursday:
Outside viwing essay.
Thursday, March 24, 2011
Thursday, March 24
Students received three new handouts: one (mostly pictures and mainly review) on montage; one on Dziga Vertov; and one on "The Great Experiment" -- currents in post-Revolutionary Russian art of the twenties.
We watched the last twenty minutes of The Man with a Movie Camera and began to discuss it.
HW due Friday:
Read the three new handouts.
Coming up next Tuesday:
Quiz over Early Soviet Film (seven handouts and two films).
Students received three new handouts: one (mostly pictures and mainly review) on montage; one on Dziga Vertov; and one on "The Great Experiment" -- currents in post-Revolutionary Russian art of the twenties.
We watched the last twenty minutes of The Man with a Movie Camera and began to discuss it.
HW due Friday:
Read the three new handouts.
Coming up next Tuesday:
Quiz over Early Soviet Film (seven handouts and two films).
Wednesday, March 23, 2011
Tuesday, March 22, 2011
Tuesday, March 22
We returned to the subject of montage in The Battleship Potemkin and examined the "dialectic" of Eisenstein's editing by looking at the the three cherubs and the three stone lions at the conclusion of the Odessa Steps sequence. We then watched the famous shower scene from Hitchcock's Psycho, with its fifty cuts from seventy-seven camera angles as a similar exercise in creating an effect less from what is shown than from the skillful juxtaposition and pacing of images.
We returned to the subject of montage in The Battleship Potemkin and examined the "dialectic" of Eisenstein's editing by looking at the the three cherubs and the three stone lions at the conclusion of the Odessa Steps sequence. We then watched the famous shower scene from Hitchcock's Psycho, with its fifty cuts from seventy-seven camera angles as a similar exercise in creating an effect less from what is shown than from the skillful juxtaposition and pacing of images.
Monday, March 21, 2011
Monday, March 21
We returned to our analysis of the Odessa Steps sequence in Potemkin, then watched a clip from The Fast and the Furious which manipulates time in a similar way for dramatic effect. (There's nothing new under the sun.) Finally we turned to Eisenstein's invocation of the Marxist dialectic as a principle of montage (!) as outlined in the yellow handout.
Mr. P announced that there would be no quiz until after we watch and discuss a second Soviet film, The Man with a Movie Camera, at which time there will be a unit test over Soviet montage.
HW due March 31:
First outside viewing paper.
We returned to our analysis of the Odessa Steps sequence in Potemkin, then watched a clip from The Fast and the Furious which manipulates time in a similar way for dramatic effect. (There's nothing new under the sun.) Finally we turned to Eisenstein's invocation of the Marxist dialectic as a principle of montage (!) as outlined in the yellow handout.
Mr. P announced that there would be no quiz until after we watch and discuss a second Soviet film, The Man with a Movie Camera, at which time there will be a unit test over Soviet montage.
HW due March 31:
First outside viewing paper.
Friday, March 18, 2011
Friday, March 18
Students checked out films for their Outside Viewing essay (due March 31).
We viewed again the Odessa Steps sequence of Potemkin up to the killing of the mother carrying her injured son, referring to Anna Chang's analysis of the visual elements in that scene (blue handout).
Mr. P offered this analysis as an example of what students should attempt in their upcoming essays.
HW due Thursday, March 31:
First outside viewing essay. Single scene analysis.
Students checked out films for their Outside Viewing essay (due March 31).
We viewed again the Odessa Steps sequence of Potemkin up to the killing of the mother carrying her injured son, referring to Anna Chang's analysis of the visual elements in that scene (blue handout).
Mr. P offered this analysis as an example of what students should attempt in their upcoming essays.
HW due Thursday, March 31:
First outside viewing essay. Single scene analysis.
Thursday, March 17, 2011
Thursday, March 17
St. Patrick's Day -- Éirinn go brách!
Students received an assignment sheet for the first outside viewing essay, which is to be an analysis of a single scene in the student's chose film (as approved by Mr. P), and went over it briefly. On Friday students will be able to check out a film for the purpose.
We then read from Anna Chen's piece on Potemkin (the blue handout), focusing on her detailed analysis of the famous Odessa Steps sequence.
HW due Thursday, April 7:
Single Scene Analysis, 800 words minimum.
St. Patrick's Day -- Éirinn go brách!
Students received an assignment sheet for the first outside viewing essay, which is to be an analysis of a single scene in the student's chose film (as approved by Mr. P), and went over it briefly. On Friday students will be able to check out a film for the purpose.
We then read from Anna Chen's piece on Potemkin (the blue handout), focusing on her detailed analysis of the famous Odessa Steps sequence.
HW due Thursday, April 7:
Single Scene Analysis, 800 words minimum.
Monday, March 14, 2011
Monday, March 14
We finished watching The Battleship Potemkin (Parts 4 & 5), after which students wrote down at least three similarities and three differences between that film and The Birth of A Nation and we shared what people had written about both form and content. We remarked upon their similarity as political propaganda about rebellions and their difference in which side (ruling class or underclass) each supported. We recorded their similar use of editing and also how much further Eisenstein took editing techniques he had largely learned from Griffith.
HW due Wednesday:
Review the white and blue handouts assigned for today and read the green and yellow ones.
We finished watching The Battleship Potemkin (Parts 4 & 5), after which students wrote down at least three similarities and three differences between that film and The Birth of A Nation and we shared what people had written about both form and content. We remarked upon their similarity as political propaganda about rebellions and their difference in which side (ruling class or underclass) each supported. We recorded their similar use of editing and also how much further Eisenstein took editing techniques he had largely learned from Griffith.
HW due Wednesday:
Review the white and blue handouts assigned for today and read the green and yellow ones.
Thursday, March 10, 2011
Thursday, March 10
We followed up yesterday's post-Birth of a Nation, Betty Boop discussion with images of the great black vaudevillian Bert Williams both in and out of blackface, and with "Clayton Bigby, Black White Supremacist." We then talked for some time about the complexities of racial ideology in the U.S.
Afterwards, we watched the first section of Sergei Eisenstein's The Battleship Potemkin, stopping just before the mutiny sequence.
We followed up yesterday's post-Birth of a Nation, Betty Boop discussion with images of the great black vaudevillian Bert Williams both in and out of blackface, and with "Clayton Bigby, Black White Supremacist." We then talked for some time about the complexities of racial ideology in the U.S.
Afterwards, we watched the first section of Sergei Eisenstein's The Battleship Potemkin, stopping just before the mutiny sequence.
Tuesday, March 8, 2011
Tuesday, March 8
We watched the very end of Birth of a Nation. Students took a quiz over the handouts about D.W. Griffith and Reconstruction, and we graded it together.
Next we watched a 1930 staged interview between Grifith and Walter Huston reeking with nostalgia for the Old South and the KKK, and followed that up with "I'll be Glad When You're Dead, You Rascal You," a Betty Boop cartoon starring Louis Armstrong; we then pondered its rather complex racial attitudes.
We watched the very end of Birth of a Nation. Students took a quiz over the handouts about D.W. Griffith and Reconstruction, and we graded it together.
Next we watched a 1930 staged interview between Grifith and Walter Huston reeking with nostalgia for the Old South and the KKK, and followed that up with "I'll be Glad When You're Dead, You Rascal You," a Betty Boop cartoon starring Louis Armstrong; we then pondered its rather complex racial attitudes.
Monday, March 7, 2011
Monday, March 7
Students finished their checklists of techniques in Birth o9f a Nation while we almost finished watching the film. The glorious Invisible Empire (to the strains of Wagner's "Ride of the Valkyries")had rescued Elsie Stoneman from Silas Lynch's vile clutches and rescued the Aryan brothers, Northern and Southern, from the marauding crazed negroes, and the two pairs of Stoneman/Cameron lovers had united in a double wedding ceremony. Only the final mystic vision of a peaceful Christian Aryan nation, and the choral singing of our national anthem, remains for Tuesday.
Students finished their checklists of techniques in Birth o9f a Nation while we almost finished watching the film. The glorious Invisible Empire (to the strains of Wagner's "Ride of the Valkyries")had rescued Elsie Stoneman from Silas Lynch's vile clutches and rescued the Aryan brothers, Northern and Southern, from the marauding crazed negroes, and the two pairs of Stoneman/Cameron lovers had united in a double wedding ceremony. Only the final mystic vision of a peaceful Christian Aryan nation, and the choral singing of our national anthem, remains for Tuesday.
Friday, March 4, 2011
Friday, March 4
Students received two more handouts related to Birth of a Nation, a two-page biography of D.W. Griffith and a six-page excerpt from Howard Zinn People's History of the United States which offers a radically different view of Reconstruction from that of Griffith's film.
We watched more sections of the film, including the Moment of Inspiration (birth of the KKK) and the Death of Flora.
HW due Monday:
Read the two handouts.
Students received two more handouts related to Birth of a Nation, a two-page biography of D.W. Griffith and a six-page excerpt from Howard Zinn People's History of the United States which offers a radically different view of Reconstruction from that of Griffith's film.
We watched more sections of the film, including the Moment of Inspiration (birth of the KKK) and the Death of Flora.
HW due Monday:
Read the two handouts.
Thursday, March 3, 2011
Thursday, March 3
Students took a brief quiz over the Birth of a Nation handouts, and we graded them together.
Then we returned to watching the film, skipping over many parts, pausing for major developments and new characters (including Silas Lynch), and remarking on important techniques which students recorded on their checklists.
Students took a brief quiz over the Birth of a Nation handouts, and we graded them together.
Then we returned to watching the film, skipping over many parts, pausing for major developments and new characters (including Silas Lynch), and remarking on important techniques which students recorded on their checklists.
Wednesday, March 2, 2011
Wednesday, March 2
Mr. P announced that there will be a brief quiz Thursday over the two handouts concerning Birth of a Nation which students received Tuesday.
Students received a two-page worksheet (adapted from the filmsite.org handout from yesterday) with a checklist of distinctive techniques used in Birth; students are to supply for each technique at least one example of its use in the film.
We watched the beginning of the film with two main objectives: to identify some of the techniques from the list and to identify the major characters and the movie's underlying premises.
HW due Thursday:
Read/review the two handouts from Tuesday in preparation for a quiz.
Mr. P announced that there will be a brief quiz Thursday over the two handouts concerning Birth of a Nation which students received Tuesday.
Students received a two-page worksheet (adapted from the filmsite.org handout from yesterday) with a checklist of distinctive techniques used in Birth; students are to supply for each technique at least one example of its use in the film.
We watched the beginning of the film with two main objectives: to identify some of the techniques from the list and to identify the major characters and the movie's underlying premises.
HW due Thursday:
Read/review the two handouts from Tuesday in preparation for a quiz.
Tuesday, March 1, 2011
Tuesday, March 1
We watched the cinematographic counterpart to yesterday's documentary on film editing, the first half hour of Visions of Light, a documentary on motion picture photography from the American Society of Cinematographers.
Afterwards, Mr. P briefly introduced Birth of a Nation and distributed two handouts about the film, which we will begin watching tomorrow.
HW due Wednesday:
Read the two handouts.
We watched the cinematographic counterpart to yesterday's documentary on film editing, the first half hour of Visions of Light, a documentary on motion picture photography from the American Society of Cinematographers.
Afterwards, Mr. P briefly introduced Birth of a Nation and distributed two handouts about the film, which we will begin watching tomorrow.
HW due Wednesday:
Read the two handouts.
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