How can we define “ style” in film?

you will answer the questions with a shorter essay (approximately one BB pages each).

The questions could focus on the nature of documentaries, the notions of art cinema, the possible definitions of independent cinema, the traits that distinguish avant-garde films.

· How can we define “ style” in film? Can you identify some stylistic traits in the films seen in class? Have you seen any other films by Orson Welles or Sean Baker? Do you have a favorite director? If you do, how would you explain what makes his/her films consistently relevant to you?

· Consider the documentary seen in class, Peck’s I Am Not Your Negro. How does the film convey meaning? Does it use devices such as voice-over narration, formal parallels, opening/closing patterns? In other words, how is the film organized around the life of the novelist, poet, and playwright James Baldwin and how does Peck weave Baldwin’s life and writings with the events of his time?

· Would you agree with the statement that “most documentaries do have a point of view, and always have”? Why? How can we detect a point-of-view in documentaries that do not make it explicit?

· What modes of production are characteristic of the avant-garde cinema? What films have we seen in class that would be considered part of the avant-garde? Why?

· Compare and contrast Un Chien Andalou and Meshes of the Afternoon, two avant-garde films seen in class. In what ways does each film puncture and rupture the development of the diegesis? In other words, how do the films’ plots constantly frustrate our attempts to reorganize them in narrative form? Give one example of each. You may use the ones mentioned in class.

· In The Florida Project the story centers around a group of films and their families. Whose narrative point of view do we share? Whose perceptual subjectivity? Which character connects the stories? How does the film end? How does the end convey meaning? How does it relate to the opening sequence?

· Describe and explain the concepts of intertextuality and hybridity in relation to film genres and authorship. Give one example for each concept from a film or films that have been screened in class.

· What makes independent cinema independent? Drawing on the lecture and on the readings, describe and explain two challenges that American independent producers and filmmakers face that clearly distinguish independent film production from mainstream production.