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University of Hertfordshire Film Level Three: British Cinema Dr . Steven Peacock

University of Hertfordshire Film Level Three: British Cinema Dr . Steven Peacock. Dr. Steven Peacock. S.Peacock@herts.ac.uk Ext 5702, R324 Office hours: Mons 10-12 and Fris 9-10 Lectures Weds 9-10 N205 Seminars Weds 10-11 and 11-12 in R041 (starting next week)

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University of Hertfordshire Film Level Three: British Cinema Dr . Steven Peacock

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  1. University of Hertfordshire Film Level Three: British Cinema Dr. Steven Peacock

  2. Dr. Steven Peacock S.Peacock@herts.ac.uk Ext 5702, R324 Office hours: Mons 10-12 and Fris 9-10 Lectures Weds 9-10 N205 Seminars Weds 10-11 and 11-12 in R041 (starting next week) Screenings Weds 2-5 in N208

  3. Assessments ONE: Group Presentation (30%) TWO: Essay (2500-3500 words, 70%) Deadline: Week Eleven,Wednesday 12th December, 12.30. FULL DETAILS OF ASSESSMENTS AND CRITERIA ASAP

  4. Key Texts Robert Murphy (ed.), The British Cinema Book: Second Edition (London: BFI, 2001) Justine Ashby and Andrew Higson, British Cinema: Past and Present (London: Routledge, 2000)

  5. Rule Britannia? The BBC and British Film Council, Summer 2007

  6. Rule Britannia? • ‘It's time British cinema went to work on what psychotherapists would call its "low self-image". • What a sorry, retrograde, inward-looking, cliche-driven sense of nationhood is laid before us by their choices. • Then we could toss Brief Encounter in the burn-bag and replace it with A Canterbury Tale, which has plenty of interesting things to say about the sexually repressed English without being sexually repressed itself.’ John Patterson, ‘Classic Cinema’, The Guardian, Saturday August 4 2007.

  7. Questioning British Cinema • Low Position in Academic Film Criticism • Is British Film ‘of Value’? • Does it Warrant and Reward Close Scrutiny? • What are its Markers of Style? • Collective or Individual Appraisal?

  8. Exemplary Sets of British Films • The Warrior (AsifKasapadia, GB/France/Germany/India 2001) • The Crying Game (Neil Jordan, GB 1992) • Brassed Off (Mark Herman, GB/US 1996) • The Wicker Man (Robin Hardy, GB 1973) • Distant Voices, Still Lives (Terrence Davies, GB 1988) • Mike Bassett: England Manager (Steve Barron, GB 2001) • The Third Man (Carol Reed, GB 1949) • Sexy Beast (Jonathan Glazer, GB/Spain/US 2000) • Elizabeth (ShekharKapur, GB 1998) • Goldfinger(Guy Hamilton, GB 1964) • Bend it Like Beckham (GurinderChadha, GB 2002) • This is England (Shane Meadows, GB 2007)

  9. Exemplary Sets of British Films A NEW GOLDEN AGE? • Wallace and Gromit in the Curse of the Were-Rabbit (Nick Park, GB/US, 2005) • Hot Fuzz (Edgar Wright, 2006) ‘There's such euphoria surrounding our film industry right now... The Brit film bonanza... • Notes on a Scandal (Richard Eyre, 2006) • The Queen (Stephen Frears, 2006) • Casino Royale (Martin Campbell, 2006)

  10. Exemplary Sets of British Films • A Mighty Heart (Michael Winterbottom, US/GB) • Atonement (Joe Wright, UK) • December Boys (Rod Hardy, Australia/UK/USA) • Run, Fat Boy, Run (David Schwimmer, UK/USA) • Shoot ‘Em Up (Michael Davis, US) • The Bourne Ultimatum (Paul Greengrass, UK/US)

  11. A British Film Culture? • Problems of Collectivisation • Segregation in the Global Age • Shifting Definitions • Climate Change

  12. National Cinema Andrew Higson Alan Lovell • ‘...critical discourses do not simply describe an already existing national cinema, but...produce the national cinema...’ • (Andrew Higson, Waving the Flag: Constructing a National Cinema in Britain, Clarendon Press 1995, p. 3) • ‘the persistent linking of British film production with the question of national identity is odd.’ • (Alan Lovell, ‘The British Cinema: the known cinema?’ in Robert Murphy (ed.), The British Cinema Book (1997, p. 241).

  13. National Cinema • ‘Why do we think of clusters of films as a national cinema? • Why has this relationship between the nation and film become so widely and uncritically accepted? • What work does such a categorisation of films perform?’ • (Paul Willemen ‘Introduction’, in ValentinaVitali and Paul Willemen (eds.), Theorising National Cinema, (London: BFI, 2006), p.1).

  14. National Cinema: Definitions • Films produced within a particular nation state • A large group of films, a body of textuality • Implications in discourse about cinema • Shifting parameters: consumption and production

  15. National Cinema: Definitions • DEFINITIONS IN ECONOMIC TERMS: • Where are these films made, and by whom? • Who owns and controls the industrial infrastructures, the production companies, the distributors and the exhibition circuits? • DEFINITIONS IN TEXT-BASED TERMS: • What are these films about? Do they share a common style or world view? What sort of projections of the national character do they offer? To what extent are they engaged in exploring, questioning and constructing a notion of nationhood in the films themselves and in the consciousness of the viewer?

  16. National Cinema: Identification • Comparison with Other Cinemas • Comparison with Economies and Cultures • AGAINST COLLECTIVISATION: • The range of films in circulation within a nation state • The range of sociologically specific audiences for different types of film • The range and relation between discourses about film circulating within cultural and social formulation

  17. National Cinema – British Cinema Incoherence Coherence • ‘An unknown cinema’ (Lovell 1969) • ‘Utterly amorphous, unclassified, unperceived’ (Wollen 1969: 115). • The Dominant National Aesthetics • The National and the Regional • Popular British Film Genres • Cultural Specificity and Individuality • British Film Culture Now

  18. Dominant National Aesthetics Realism (Free Cinema, British New Wave, Modern Takes on Social Realist Aesthetics – Loach, Frears and Meadows) Art Cinema (Davies, Greenaway, Jarman, Glazer)

  19. National and Regional Scottish Film Culture The Workshop Movement and After

  20. Popular British Genres Comedy Thriller Horror Period Drama Crime Film Social Realism

  21. Module (Week by Week) • Rule Britannia? • The Red Shoes: British Mavericks • Saturday Night, Sunday Morning: Free Cinema and the British New Wave - Social Realism • This Sporting Life: Reconsidering the British New Wave - Expressive Criticism • Kes: Modern Realism: Ken Loach's Art in the Service of the People • Secrets and Lies: Modern Realism: Mike Leigh's Class Acts • The Wicker Man: Alternative Visions - British Horror • Red Road: Dystopian Britain • Sexy Beast: Reloading the British Gangster Genre • A Cock and Bull Story: Postmodern Britain • Casino Royale

  22. Sabotage (Alfred Hitchcock, UK: 1936) Do not dismiss the mainstream.

  23. The Wicker Man (Robin Hardy: UK, 1973) http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UEOQqnHMSMc

  24. The Constant Gardener (Fernando Meirelles, UK/Germany: 2005) Style and Meaning Themes and Concerns Synthesis

  25. This Sporting Life (Lindsay Anderson, UK, 1963) Undramatic Achievements Artistic Possibilities within the Everyday

  26. A Cock and Bull Story (Michael Winterbottom, UK: 2005) Postmodern Play Knowing Ruptures Direct Address Artificiality Declarations

  27. Distant Voices, Still Lives (Terrence Davies, UK: 1988) Usual Signs Artistry within the Routine Possibility within Convention

  28. Aims and Methods • Studying films closely • Words to match experience • Connecting films and ideas in unexpected and provocative ways • Thinking critically about films, the way we experience them, and their impact on society and culture

  29. Aims of the Module The module relates developments in British cinema to those in culture and society. It explores the manner in which the ideologies of nation, class, gender and sexuality have been represented and communicated in films from the 1940s to the present. While the emphasis will predominantly be on recent British cinema, the theoretical and critical approaches will have a much broader application. The module looks historically at the films of the British New Wave directors such as KarelReisz, Lindsay Anderson, Ken Loach and Tony Richardson, as well as the alternative routes of British cinema. Our work culminates in a study of more modern British directors, genres and concerns.

  30. ‘The highest aim, purpose and justification for any university training in the arts is the eternal debate about questions of value – the value we attribute to the works of art and entertainment, including films, that reflect our sense of value in our own lives and within the culture in which we live.’ Robin Wood, Personal Views: Explorations in Film (Revised Edition), (Detroit: Wayne State University Press, 2006), p. 4.

  31. Summary of Key Concerns • British Cinema as a National Cinema • National and International Situation • Consumption, Production, Representation • Specificity (Cultural, Artistic) • Effects of Cataloguing, Collectivisation and Matters of Evaluation

  32. The RED SHoes (Michael Powell and EmericPressburger, UK: 1948)

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