Posted: February 9th, 2015

Film Language

Paper, Order, or Assignment Requirements

Film Language
Step 1: Watch one of the following films:
Lolita (1962)
Barbarella
Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf?
Bonnie and Clyde
The Graduate
Easy Rider
Midnight Cowboy
Medium Cool
M*A*S*H*
A Clockwork Orange
Guess Who’s Coming to Dinner?
Shaft
Sweet Sweetback’s Baadasssss Song
Step 2: Discuss (in at least two well-developed paragraphs) how the film relates to the 1960s as discussed in Chapter 15 of your textbook and/or the American Cinema viewing. Write about the film in relation to the demise of the Production Code and the advent of the ratings system, and one or more of the following topics:
The Baby Boomer generation’s challenging of repressive codes established by their conservative elders
The American Civil Rights Movement/race relations
Anti-Vietnam War sentiment
The women’s movement
Changing morality (increased sexual permissiveness, drug use, use of more vulgar/violent language)
Step 3: Choose a scene (no more than five minutes in length, with at least eight shots) and do a shot-by-shot analysis, using the film terminology.
Step 4: Discuss how your chosen scene and the film techniques used therein serve to express the themes mentioned in Step 1 of your assignment. Write at least one paragraph.
Step 5: CITE YOUR SOURCES. As usual, this includes your Works Cited list AND your in-text citation. If you do not do both, you will not get credit for the assignment. You must refer to at least one of the required books or video viewings. Remember to cite the film you watch. Do not quote IMDB, and do not cite Wikipedia — these are not considered scholarly academic sources for quotation.