Help. I’m looking for a hand full of well-made short films for a class I’m teaching. It’s a three-hour, once a week class which is a new format for me (well, I did it last spring and I don’t think I managed the hours as well as my students might have liked). I need a bag of tricks (any creative exercises you might want to share would also be appreciated).
Anyway, it’s an Intro to Film Studies course. I’ll be revisiting all the greatest hits: shorts from Edison and Edwin S. Porter, Georges Méliès, The Lumière Brothers, Griffith, Hepworth & Fitzhamon, Keaton’s Sherlock Jr., Lang’s M, Citizen Kane, Singin’ in the Rain, Taxi Driver, Boys Don’t Cry, In the Mood for Love, and The Purple Rose of Cairo. I’ve also got a few tricks up my sleeve focusing on a comparative analysis of Hitchcock’s Rear Window and Haneke’s Caché (looking at the differences between modernist and postmodern realism, taking a close look at star theory – Daniel Auteuil & James Stewart – and how these films subvert/tweak/play with their stars’ “constructed personae”, exploring issues surrounding production and distribution, especially the way Caché was marketed in the states, etc.). Finally, I’m going to allow the students to choose three films for the class to study that focus on either a specific genre, a specific star, a specific national cinema, or a specific historical category (French New Wave, German expressionism, Italian Neo-Realism, etc.). Students will work in small groups, choose one film for the class to see and critically engage (predominantly through a cultural studies lens), present research findings (each member of the group will develop a thesis-driven essay that engages one aspect of their umbrella subject; something we might imagine ending up on a smart blog as opposed to a cinema and media conference panel) and develop a set of discussion prompts or exercises for the class (I will get to play student for three weeks). I also have some creative projects in the works.
Anyway, I would like to have a collection of short films to pull out of the hat in case things get, well, dull. I do have a plan to do a lesson on documentaries and experimental films in which I draw upon shorts to illustrate my points (some stuff from Wolphin, Ken Loach’s doc in that 11.9.01 anthology, Guy Maddin, Stan Brakhage, Fernand Léger). Other shorts I might pull out: Lisa Marie Gamlen’s Benny’s Gym, Tom Tykwer’s “Faubourg Saint-Denis” which appears in Paris, Je T’aime, numerous Jane Campion shorts, Andrea Arnold’s Wasps, Martin McDonagh’s Six Shooter, Maya Deren films, Nash Edgerton’s Spider.
Anybody got any suggestions for other short films that work well with students in an educational setting? And if you are willing to gift me a useful class exercise that has worked for you in the past (I focus as much on form as I do on content and reception), that would be much appreciated.
What was the name of that great Australian zombie short?
Jeff,
The film textbook Looking at Movies is accompanied by a DVD on film concepts as well as a DVD with several short films; the lectures on film concepts refer to and make use of the short films on the other disc. The short films are by students,not noted filmmakers, so it may not be what you are looking for. I can’t vouch for the short films because I haven’t seen them yet, but the discs already do half the work for you—you can show your class a ten minute short film along with the corresponding lecture on a film technique, keyed to this film. Previous editions of the textbook included a DVD in which film concepts were keyed to sequences from famous films (the editing lesson, for example, provided a sequence from Battleship Potemkin). This DVD was extremely helpful as well.
Kino.com is a great place to find film collections; the boxed set Movies Begin contains about six hours of films from its first decade or so. I am also keen on the short films of Jan Svankmajer and the Brothers Quay.
Hey Jeff. I’m doing an intro to film course as well. Sounds like we’ve designed similar courses, too. (I’m doing Keaton’s Our Hospitality instead).
Chris Marker’s La Jetee.
And since you’re talking about the French New Wave, you might show Truffaut’s Les Mistons which is very playful (and wistful in a typical Truffaut way). It even has an homage to Lumière. And to gangster films. And to cinema in general.
I second Michael’s recommendation of The Movies Begin. It’s great–though it doesn’t have Porter’s Life of An American Fireman.
What about Warhol’s Blow Job? I keed, I keed. Anyway, isn’t that film 12 hours long or something? Or am I confusing it with Empire?
I wonder where I can find that Looking at Movies DVD (as I don’t think I own the text or if I do I don’t own the DVD). Sounds like a great primer. Yes, La Jetee! I have used that in the past and the kids enjoyed it. Les Mistons is a good idea as well. In the past I have included The 400 Blows, but students never love that film as much as I do so it’s always depressing. Fireman is a must, though I think I only have a version that edits the shots to give the impression that Porter was cross-cutting between the fire and the speeding horses. Sad that he wasn’t, but I can’t find the “original.” Anybody know a collection that includes that?
geez, Jeff, you have to work the system! get in touch with a Norton rep and get yourself a free copy….as for previous editions, you can probably find them for sale at alibris and the like. I think the Kino collection Before the Nickelodeon has the Porter film..check Kino.com.
The Australian zombie short is “I Love Sarah Jane”: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gYxs7Y7ulrM
Park Chan-Wook’s Cut does some nice stuff as a(nother) meta-film film, and it’s nasty good fun.
Netflix has a variety of short film anthologies — academy award, internation, and one just called Short! or something — and it’s hit or miss, but there are gems among them.
The opera anthology Aida is also hit or miss, but there’s a one-shot Julien Temple bit of whimsy, and a real range of kinds of filmmakers–including Godard and Altman.
I also love the Scorsese section of New York Stories, called “Life Lessons.”
I’d forgotten about Aida. Derek Jarman. I use Life Lessons in my Intro to Theatre: Stage and Screen course. It always goes over really well cause most of those kids have never heard of it. The Park Chan-Wook is also a good idea. I’ve seen it once and I thought it was a bit overdetermined (maybe it just didn’t thrill me as I wanted it to, but it did remind me of like the greatest Walker Art exhibit . . . so there’s that). I’d love to do Mother or Memories of Murder . . . maybe I should. I am now officially free associating.
And Michael: I’m trying out a different kind of text book for the class – Amy Villarejo’s Film Studies: The Basics (Routledge). It’s short, inexpensive, does a good job of introducing the ambivalences and inherent contradictions at work when studying film as cultural product.
I’ll be curious to see what films these students choose to be included in the syllabus.
I have a copy of the copyright version (or non-cross cut) Life of An American Fireman on VHS. The collection is called The Origins of Cinema Vol. 1 which is a pretty good collection, though the quality is poor. It also has Porter’s Uncle Josh at the Moving Picture Show which is great.
What about P.T. Anderson’s Cigarettes and Coffee?
reynolds, I would have thought you were a “Life without Zoe” kinda person.
Jeff–just pray it’s not The Pursuit of Happyness which I get papers about all the time….on the plus side Fight Club and recent Tarantino seem to be very popular with the students…..
They also love Crash which I’ve never seen but I’m not inclined in its favor.
Where can I find Cigarettes and Coffee? Is it a special feature on one discs (I’m pretty sure I own everything except Punch Drunk Love.
I was able to procure some shorts by Stephen Daldry, Mike Leigh, Lars von Trier, Ridley Scott, Lukas Moodysson, Chris Nolan, and Tom Tykwer . . . but I’m not sure exactly how much use I might get out of any of them. Leigh’s includes a very young David Thewlis. And then there was that series of short “films” directed by a phalanx of cinematic luminaries which served as a unique marketing strategy by BMW: The Hire.
I wonder if Cigarettes and Coffee is a bonus feature on the Hard Eight DVD? I know it’s on YouTube.
Hey, is that short film by Ridley Scott the Chanel No. 5 commercial?
No, it’s something from 1965. I haven’t watched it all the way through yet.