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guidelines
for writing humanist film criticism
- Sources
- Primary
All films are potential subjects for humanist criticism. Think
of films that have had a powerful effect, made a distinct
impression, especially those that caused you to think or wonder.
Though mainstream Hollywood films can be investigated in this
way, don't fail to seek out foreign, cult, documentary, and
experimental films.
- Secondary
Read the film criticism of the film journals like Sight
and Sound, Film Comment or Literature/Film Quarterly.
Use the library card catalog and internet resources related
to your films.
- Method
See the film/s you want to write about more than once. Videos/lasers/DVDs
are very helpful here. Re-view key scenes to help locate the aesthetic
devices or the way themes are developed in specific detail. This
kind of close analysis of passages is the best way to support
your generalizations about the film. Observation of the film comes
first. Then comes the writing itself, building your argument with
logical support.
- Questions
the Writer Using the Humanist Approach Might Ask:
- Did
the film provoke a powerful emotional response?
- What
was the film's theme? Was it important or trivial? How did
the film reveal the theme?
- Was
the film complex, full of ambiguity in terms of plot resolution?
Was it ironic? Paradoxical? Straightforward? Historical?
- Were
the characters stereotypes or well-rounded?
- Did
the film's formal aspects-the lighting, composition, editing,
music, design, script, acting-add to the film's impact? Why?
Why Not? How?
- Does
the film belong to the larger body of work of a noted director?
- If
the film is an older movie, (why) is it still worth seeing
today?
- If
it is a Hollywood genre film, does is transcend its genre
to become art?
- Does
the film tell us something about the mass audience, popular
assumptions, American values, gender, class, race, ethnic,
or other national points of view?
- Does
the film tie to any of the topics, authors, issues studies
elsewhere in the course materials?
- Structure
- The film review should:
- have
a thesis;
- support
the thesis with evidence;
- present
the thesis one step at a time;
- avoid
serving as plot summary;
- should
move beyond the like/dislike approach to analysis.
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