UNIVERSITY OF LONDON

BIRKBECK COLLEGE

SCHOOL OF HISTORY OF ART, FILM AND VISUAL MEDIA

MA Film and Visual Media

2003

Professor Laura Mulvey and Professor Lucia Nagib

PERSPECTIVES ON WORLD CINEMA (OPTION COURSE)

Introduction

In the first instance, the course introduces films of outstanding importance that have made significant contributions to the concept of 'world cinema' but are also difficult to see in this country and derive from unfamiliar film cultures. The course is then designed to introduce

these film cultures, with a certain amount of interdisciplinary study, through their reflection of and contribution to contemporary political and aesthetic debates. Most particularly, the course will address ways in which history and memory are represented in these marginal cinemas from the 'developing' world. The course is divided into two sections:

1. Cinema and Social Change: the Brazilian case

(Lucia Nagib, Leverhulme Visiting Professor)

This section of the course starts with the Cinema Novo movement of the 60s and then examines its place as a point of reference back for the Brazilian 'renaissance' cinema of the 90s.

2. From Third Cinema to World Cinema

(Laura Mulvey)

This section of the course is itself divided into two cases. African cinema introduces themes of colonialism, resistance and post-colonial culture while the New Iranian Cinema articulates problems of politics and censorship within a new national film culture. Questions about the representation of women are important throughout; this section of the course also addresses the difficulties faced by marginal cinema in a global market.

Course Assessment:

One essay of 5,000 words to be submitted on 17^th March 2003.

Course Timetable:

Lecture/Screenings: Tuesdays, 6 – 9.00 pm, Room 1, 43 Gordon Square.

Seminars: Thursdays, 6 – 7.30 pm, Room 308, 43 Gordon Square

PART 1: CINEMA AND SOCIAL CHANGE - THE BRAZILIAN CASE

7^th January, Week 1. Glauber Rocha and the 'Aesthetics of Hunger'

Lecture: The revolutionary prophecy of the 'backlands turning into a sea'

in Glauber Rocha's films and writings.

Screening: Black God, White Devil (Glauber Rochca 1964), including comparative clips of François Truffaut's The 400 Blows (1959) and Behind the Sun (Walter Salles 2001).

Please note that in the first week of the term the lecture/screening will take place in Viewing Theatre 1 at the British Film Institute, 21 Stephen Street, London, W1T 1LN. The rest of the term’s lecture/screenings will be held in Room 1, 43 Gordon Square.

Seminar: Discussion of passages of Rebellion in the Backlands (Euclides da

Cunha), Glauber Rocha's An Aesthetics of Hunger and others.

14^th January, Week 2. Utopia and visions of paradise in Brazilian imagery

Lecture: The sea and the failed Eldorado: cinematic echoes of the military

coup (late 1960s) and the Collor government (early 1990s). Clips of Glauber

Rocha's Land in Trance (1967).

Screening: Foreign Land (Walter Salles and Daniela Thomas 1995), with

comparative clips of The State of Things (Wim Wenders 1982).

Seminar: Discussion of Thomas More's Utopia, Sérgio Buarque de Holanda's

Visions of Paradise, Marilena Chauí's The Foundational Myth, Ismail Xavier's Allegories of Underdevelopment, and others.

21^st January, Week 3. National identity in a globalised world: the recent sertão

(backlands) films

Lecture: When the backlands became a sea: the celebration of the sertão.

Screening: Crede-mi (Bia Lessa/Dany Roland, 1997) and Perfumed Ball (Lírio Ferreira/Paulo Caldas, 1997). Clips of: Bocage, The Triumph of Love

(Djalma Limongi Batista, 1998), Corisco & Dadá (Rosemberg Cariry, 1996) and others.

Seminar: Discussion of Ismail Xavier's Brazilian cinema in the 1990s,

Rosemberg Cariry on the sertão's legends, Lúcia Nagib's The New Cinema

Meets Cinema Novo, among others.

28^th January, Week 4. The recent favela (shanty town) films

Lecture: Death on the beach: the prohibited sea.

Screening: Midnight (Walter Salles and Daniela Thomas, 1999). Music video

My Soul (Paulo Lins/Kátia Lund, 1999). Clips of City of God (Fernando

Meirelles/Kátia Lund, 2002).

Seminar: Discussion of Paulo Lins' Cidade de Deus, Zuenir Ventura's Cidade

partida and others.

4^th February, Week 5. The cannibalistic utopia

Lecture: The noble/cannibal savage in Brazilian literature and cinema.

Oswald de Andrade, Mario de Andrade and the anthropophagic (cannibalistic)

movement. Brazilian Tropicalism in cinema.

Screening: How Tasty Was My Little Frenchman (Nelson Pereira dos Santos,

1970/72) and clips of Macunaíma (Joaquim Pedro de Andrade, 1970).

Seminar: Discussion of Montaigne's Des Cannibales, Jean de Léry, Hans

Staden, Thévet, Freud's Totem and Tabu and Oswald de Andrade's manifestoes.

Reading Week: 10^th – 14^th February

PART 2: FROM THIRD CINEMA TO WORLD CINEMA - SELECTED CASES

18^th February, Week 6 Introduction

Lecture: The colonial, the national and the global - an overview of

transition through a cinematic lens.

Screening: Alexandria Why...? (Youssef Chahine, Egypt 1979), Cuban shorts

Seminar: Discussion of Franz Fanon's The Wretched of the Earth, Pines and

Willemen's Questions of Third Cinema and Shohat and Stam's Unthinking

Eurocentrism, Youssef Chahine (bfi flim classic)

25^th February, Week 7 Memories of colonialism in Africa:1

Lecture: Representations of history/images of women

Screening: The Silences of the Palace (Moufida Tlatli Tunisia 1994) clips

from Sarraounia (Med Hondo, Mali) and Ceddo (Ousmane Sembene Senegal 1976)

Seminar: Discussion of Manthia Diawara's African Cinema, Ousmane Sembene's

Gods Bits of Wood

4th March, Week 8 Memories of colonialism in Africa: 2

Lecture: Post-colonial desire

Screening: Xala (Ousmane Sembene Senegal 1974) clips of ToukiBouki (Djbril Diop Mambety , Senegal 1973)

Seminar: Discussion of Laura Mulvey's 'Ousmane Sembene's Xala', Oguibe and Enwezor's Reading the Contemporary African Art from Theory to the Marketplace

11^th March, Week 9 In the Aftermath of the Islamic Revolution 1

Lecture: Problems of representation/creating a new cinema

Screening: Through the Cherry Trees (Abbas Kiarostami Iran 1994),

The Wind Will Carry Us (Abbas Kiarostami Iran 2000)

Seminar: Discussion of Tapper (ed) The New Iranian Cinema: Politics,

Representation and Identity and Darwishi's Iranian Cinema: Past, Present

and Future

18th March, Week 10 In the Aftermath of the Islamic Revolution 2

Lecture: Representing the unrepresentable: the problem of women on the

Islamic screen

Screening: Under the Skin of the City (Rakshahn Bani Etemand Iran 2001)

with clips from some of her earlier films.

Seminar: Discussion of articles on the images of women in film.

READING LIST:

Part 1

Susan Buck-Morss,. Dreamworld and Catastrophe - The Passing of Mass Utopia in East and West. (Cambridge, Massachusetts/ London: The MIT Press, 2000)

Gregory Clayes and Lyman Tower Sargent, The Utopia Reader. (New York and London: New York University Press, 1999)

Stephen Greenblatt (ed.), New World Encouters. (Berkeley-Los Angeles: University of California Press, 1992)

Randal Johnson and Robert Stam (eds.), Brazilian cinema (expanded

edition). (New York: Columbia University Press, 1995)

Lúcia Nagib (ed.), New Brazilian Cinema. (London: I.B. Tauris, 2003)

Robert Stam, Tropical Multiculturalism - A Comparative History of Race in

Brazilian Cinema & Culture. (Durham and London: Duke University Press, 1997)

Ismail Xavier, Allegories of Underdevelopment Aesthetics and Politics in

Modern Brazilian Cinema (Minneapolis and London: University of Minnesota Press 1997)

Part 2

Imruh Bakari and Mbye Chan, African Experience of Cinema (London: British Film Institute, 1994)

F. Darwishi, Iranian Cinema: Past, Present and Future (London: Verso, 2002)

Manthia Diawara, African Cinema: Politics and Culture (Bloomington, Indiana University Press, 1992)

John Downing (ed.), Film and Politics in the Third World (New

York: Autonomedia, 1987)

Frantz Fanon, The Wretched of the Earth (Harmondsworth: Penguin, 1967)

June Givanni (ed), Symbolic Narratives (London: British Film Institute, 2001)

Jim Pines and Paul Willemen (eds.), Questions of Third Cinema (London: British Film Institute, 1989)

Richard Tapper (ed), The New Iranian Cinema: Politics, Representation and

Identity (London: IB Tauris Press, 2002)