Seeing Is Believing?: The Search for Cinematic Truth
FREN 241
Spring 2023
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01
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The French director Jean-Luc Godard once remarked that, "Cinema is the truth 24 times per second." Godard refers here to an interplay between truth, time, and the mechanics of film. But does cinema really show us the truth? What kind of reality is it able to capture and how does "truth" relate to its means of representation? This course examines how Francophone film treats the relationship of cinema to truth, covering aspects of film history, theory, and its technical construction. The course is organized around four main areas of inquiry: we first consider the role fantasy and spectacle in the early films from Georges Méliès and the Lumière Brothers, before exploring how cinema re-orients its relationship to the "real" via social realism and the experimental documentary style of the French New Wave. We then discover how cinematic "truth" is reclaimed by filmmakers outside of France, before finally turning to the highly-aestheticized, non-narrative films of "Cinéma du look."
This course will familiarize students with the basics of film analysis and critique, while also providing a foundation in the technical aspects of cinema and how it has evolved as both an art and a science. Each film will be accompanied by readings, and the theoretical framework of the course will derive from André Bazin's Qu'est-ce que le cinéma? and excerpts from Gilles Deleuze's Cinéma II: L'Image-temps. For their final project, students may submit either a traditional research paper or an original film project that engages with cinematic theories and techniques discussed over the course of the semester. |
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| Credit: 1 |
Gen Ed Area Dept:
HA RLAN |
| Course Format: Lecture / Discussion | Grading Mode: Graded |
| Level: UGRD |
Prerequisites: None |
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Fulfills a Major Requirement for: (COL)(FILM-MN)(FILM)(FRST-MN)(FRST)(GLEN-MN)(RMST) |
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Past Enrollment Probability: 75% - 89% |
| SECTION 01 |
Major Readings: Wesleyan RJ Julia Bookstore
Selected films by directors such as Georges Méliès, the Lumière brothers, François Truffaut, Robert Bresson, Chris Marker, Jean-Luc Godard, Agnès Varda, Chantal Ackerman, Ousmane Sembene, Djibril Mambety, Krzysztof Kiéslowski, and Euzhan Palcy. Films will be accompanied by short articles, and/or passages from the theoretical texts by Deleuze and Bazin.
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Examinations and Assignments:
Weekly online discussion posts (graded for completion); 3 short papers focused on frame analysis (3-5 pages) with re-writes; 1 in-class presentation; 1 final exam. |
Additional Requirements and/or Comments:
While any student who has completed FREN 215 (with a minimum grade of B) or has placed out of FREN 215 through the placement test may sign up for this course, it is an introductory course intended for students who have just completed FREN 215 or have not taken more than one course in French beyond 215 and not yet studied abroad in a French-speaking country. Readings, written assignments and class discussions will be in French. Only COL students may take this course CR/U. All others must take it for a letter grade. Students who are not admitted to the course through pre-registration are strongly encouraged to submit an enrollment request and attend the first class. |
| Instructor(s): Eyestone,Emily Walters Times: .M.W.F. 10:50AM-11:40AM; Location: FISK413; |
| Total Enrollment Limit: 15 | | SR major: 3 | JR major: 4 | | |
| Seats Available: 0 | GRAD: X | SR non-major: 0 | JR non-major: 0 | SO: 7 | FR: 1 |
| Drop/Add Enrollment Requests | | | | | |
| Total Submitted Requests: 1 | 1st Ranked: 0 | 2nd Ranked: 0 | 3rd Ranked: 0 | 4th Ranked: 0 | Unranked: 1 |
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