Veidlapa Nr. M-3 (8)

Course Description Status: Approved

Course Description Version: 25/26.R.1.00

Description Period: 2025./26 academic year rudens semestris

Study Course Accepted: -

Study Course Description

Film Language, Stylistics and Photography

Main Study Course Information

Course Code
KSK_289
Branch of Science
Communication Theory; Media and communications
ECTS
3.00
Target Audience
Communication Science; Information and Communication Science
LQF
Level 6
Study Type And Form
Full-Time; Part-Time

Study Course Implementer

Course Supervisor
Dita Rietuma
Structure Unit Manager
Ieva Puzo
Structural Unit
-
Contacts

Riga, 16 Dzirciema Street, kfko@rsu.lv, +371 67409183

About Study Course

Objective

In the 19th century films were born as “animated photography” – a static image got the uniqueness of motion and the ability to “capture” the flow of time. Since the origins of film development film trends and stylistic searches have affected the visual culture of the 20th and the 21st century, and photography is also its component.

Preliminary Knowledge

None.

Learning Outcomes

Knowledge

1.After mastering the course students: • Will recognise, know, compare different film stylistics and analogues in photography. • Will recognise authors in film and photography, whose work reflects the most essential stylistic directions. • Will know, justify technical means used to obtain certain image characteristics.

Skills

1.After mastering the course students: • Will use certain stylistics for the creation of own photographic work. • Will define and use technical means to create certain stylistics. • Will make the selected stylistics suitable for the requirements of certain formats.

Competences

1.After mastering the course students: • Will evaluate audiovisual works – film and photo works. • Will find one’s way around film culture heritage and its reflections in photography. • Will use a diverse stylistic palette in creating own work. • Will be able to show responsible and knowledge-based activity in creating own creative work.

Assessment

Individual work

Title
% from total grade
Grade
1.

Individual work
-
-
To approbate the knowledge obtained at lectures and seminars when creating different photo works, to create in student groups the work on the given topic within the scope of set stylistics.

Examination

Title
% from total grade
Grade
1.

Examination
-
-
• Participation in lectures. • Participation and activity in seminars. • Creative project – photo work reflecting certain stylistics.

Study Course Theme Plan

FULL-TIME
Part 1

  1. Lecture

Modality
Location
Contact hours
On site
Auditorium
2

Topics

Introductory lecture

  1. Lecture

Modality
Location
Contact hours
On site
Auditorium
2

Topics

Film and reality. Ontology of a photographic image. Elements of film language. Editing. Use of plans. Use of close-ups (Jeanne d’Arc by Theodor Dreyer, works of Sergei Eisenstein, etc.)

  1. Lecture

Modality
Location
Contact hours
On site
Auditorium
2

Topics

Film and reality. Ontology of a photographic image. Elements of film language. Editing. Use of plans. Use of close-ups (Jeanne d’Arc by Theodor Dreyer, works of Sergei Eisenstein, etc.)

  1. Lecture

Modality
Location
Contact hours
On site
Auditorium
2

Topics

Set-up – use of deep set-up (works by Orson Welles – Citizen Kane, The Magnificent Ambersons, etc.). Drama of the set-up (Alfred Hitchcock, Michelangelo Antonioni and other works). Conventions of the classical (Hollywood) film stylistics

  1. Lecture

Modality
Location
Contact hours
On site
Auditorium
2

Topics

Genres and visual stylistics (musical film, melodrama, gangster film, western). Stylistics of film noir as an alternative to the classical Hollywood style conventions. Visual stylistics, lighting peculiarities of film noir. Post-modern reflection in the visual culture at the turn of the 20th and 21st century. Modernism trends (in the 20s of the 20th century), their visual and stylistic conventions – expressionism, impressionism, surrealism and their echoes in the modern visual culture

  1. Class/Seminar

Modality
Location
Contact hours
On site
Auditorium
2

Topics

Experimental culture – work of Maya Deren and Stan Brakhage. Quest of documentary films, their stylistics and impact on photography – modernism in Man with a Movie Camera by Dziga Vertov, totalitarian aesthetisation in Olympia by Leni Riefenstahl, etc. Watching and analysis of films

  1. Class/Seminar

Modality
Location
Contact hours
On site
Auditorium
2

Topics

Experimental culture – work of Maya Deren and Stan Brakhage. Quest of documentary films, their stylistics and impact on photography – modernism in Man with a Movie Camera by Dziga Vertov, totalitarian aesthetisation in Olympia by Leni Riefenstahl, etc. Watching and analysis of films

  1. Class/Seminar

Modality
Location
Contact hours
On site
Auditorium
2

Topics

Italian neorealism, French New Wave, Danish Dogma realism trends genealogy in the 20th century. Stylisation – French New Wave and European art film experience (Alain Resnais, Jean-Luc Godard, Federico Fellini, Pedro Almodavar, etc.). Watching and analysis of films

  1. Class/Seminar

Modality
Location
Contact hours
On site
Auditorium
2

Topics

Italian neorealism, French New Wave, Danish Dogma realism trends genealogy in the 20th century. Stylisation – French New Wave and European art film experience (Alain Resnais, Jean-Luc Godard, Federico Fellini, Pedro Almodavar, etc.). Watching and analysis of films

  1. Lecture

Modality
Location
Contact hours
On site
Auditorium
2

Topics

Notion of look, narrative interaction between film art and photography (Blow-up by Michelangelo Antonioni, Rear Window by Alfred Hitchcock, Peeping Tom by Michael Powell)
Total ECTS (Creditpoints):
3.00
Contact hours:
20 Academic Hours
Final Examination:
Exam (Written)
PART-TIME
Part 1

  1. Lecture

Modality
Location
Contact hours
On site
Auditorium
2

Topics

Introductory lecture

  1. Lecture

Modality
Location
Contact hours
On site
Auditorium
2

Topics

Film and reality. Ontology of a photographic image. Elements of film language. Editing. Use of plans. Use of close-ups (Jeanne d’Arc by Theodor Dreyer, works of Sergei Eisenstein, etc.)

  1. Lecture

Modality
Location
Contact hours
On site
Auditorium
2

Topics

Set-up – use of deep set-up (works by Orson Welles – Citizen Kane, The Magnificent Ambersons, etc.). Drama of the set-up (Alfred Hitchcock, Michelangelo Antonioni and other works). Conventions of the classical (Hollywood) film stylistics

  1. Lecture

Modality
Location
Contact hours
On site
Auditorium
2

Topics

Genres and visual stylistics (musical film, melodrama, gangster film, western). Stylistics of film noir as an alternative to the classical Hollywood style conventions. Visual stylistics, lighting peculiarities of film noir. Post-modern reflection in the visual culture at the turn of the 20th and 21st century. Modernism trends (in the 20s of the 20th century), their visual and stylistic conventions – expressionism, impressionism, surrealism and their echoes in the modern visual culture

  1. Class/Seminar

Modality
Location
Contact hours
On site
Auditorium
2

Topics

Experimental culture – work of Maya Deren and Stan Brakhage. Quest of documentary films, their stylistics and impact on photography – modernism in Man with a Movie Camera by Dziga Vertov, totalitarian aesthetisation in Olympia by Leni Riefenstahl, etc. Watching and analysis of films

  1. Class/Seminar

Modality
Location
Contact hours
On site
Auditorium
2

Topics

Experimental culture – work of Maya Deren and Stan Brakhage. Quest of documentary films, their stylistics and impact on photography – modernism in Man with a Movie Camera by Dziga Vertov, totalitarian aesthetisation in Olympia by Leni Riefenstahl, etc. Watching and analysis of films

  1. Class/Seminar

Modality
Location
Contact hours
On site
Auditorium
2

Topics

Italian neorealism, French New Wave, Danish Dogma realism trends genealogy in the 20th century. Stylisation – French New Wave and European art film experience (Alain Resnais, Jean-Luc Godard, Federico Fellini, Pedro Almodavar, etc.). Watching and analysis of films

  1. Lecture

Modality
Location
Contact hours
On site
Auditorium
2

Topics

Notion of look, narrative interaction between film art and photography (Blow-up by Michelangelo Antonioni, Rear Window by Alfred Hitchcock, Peeping Tom by Michael Powell)
Total ECTS (Creditpoints):
3.00
Contact hours:
16 Academic Hours
Final Examination:
Exam (Written)

Bibliography

Required Reading

1.

Robert Sklar. World History of Film. New York, Harry Abrahams Incorporated, 2002

2.

Rudolf Arnheim. From Film as Art. Film and Reality. The Making of A Film. Film Theory and Criticism, Edited by Leo Braudy, Marshall Cohen. New York, Oxford. Oxford University Press, 1999

3.

Stanley Cavell. From the World Viewed. Photograph and Screen. Film Theory and Criticism, Edited by Leo Braudy, Marshall Cohen. New York, Oxford. Oxford University Press, 1999

4.

Truffaut, Francois. A Certain Tendency of the French Cinema. In: Movies and Methods. Volume I. Edited by Bill Nichols. Berkley, Losangeles, London. University of California Press. 1976

5.

Bordwell, David. The Art Cinema as a Mode of Film Practice. In Film Theory and Criticism. Introductory Readings (Fifth Edition). Edited by Leo Braudy, Marshall Cohen. New York, Oxford. Oxford University Press, 1999.

6.

Andre Bazin. From What is Cinema? The Evalution of the Language of Cinema. Film Theory and Criticism, Edited by Leo Braudy, Marshall Cohen. New York, Oxford. Oxford University Press, 1999

7.

Andre Bazin. From What is Cinema? The Ontology of the Photographic Image. Film Theory and Criticism. Edited by Leo Braudy, Marshall Cohen. New York, Oxford. Oxford University Press, 1999

8.

Stan Brakhage. From Metaphors of Vision. Film Theory and Criticism. Edited by Leo Braudy, Marshall Cohen. New York, Oxford. Oxford University Press, 1999

9.

Maya Deren. Cinematography. The Creative Use of Reality. Film Theory and Criticism. Edited by Leo Braudy, Marshall Cohen. New York, Oxford. Oxford University Press, 1999

10.

Bela Balasz. From Theory of the Film. The Close-up. The Face of Man. Film Theory and Criticism. Edited by Leo Braudy, Marshall Cohen. New York, Oxford. Oxford University Press, 1999

11.

Ervin Panofsky. Style and Medium in the Motion Pictures. Film Theory and Criticism. Edited by Leo Braudy, Marshall Cohen. New York, Oxford. Oxford University Press, 1999

12.

Ervin Panofsky. Style and Medium in the Motion Pictures. Edited by Leo Braudy, Marshall Cohen. New York, Oxford. Oxford University Press, 1999

13.

Benjamin, Walter. The Work of Art in the Age of Mechanical Reproduction. In Film Theory and Criticism. Introductory Readings (Fifth Edition). Edited by Leo Braudy, Marshall Cohen. New York, Oxford. Oxford University Press, 1999

14.

Todd, Anthony. Autorship and the films of David Lynch. Aesthetic receptions in contemporary Hollywood, New York: I.B. Taurus Publishers, 2012

15.

Collins, Luke. 100% Pure Adrenalin. Gender and Generic Surface in Point Break. Gender Meets Genre in Postwar Cinemas. Edited by Christine Gledhill. Urbana, Chicago, Springfield. University of Illinois Press, 2012

Additional Reading

1.

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Other Information Sources

1.

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