Sunset Boulevard & the Murder of Hollywood
SUNSET BOULEVARD (1950, 110 min) is both one of the greatest film noirs and the best films about Hollywood ever made. The movie is packed with inside jokes, cameos, and […]
Read MoreShot By Shot: The Director as Visual Author
In this in-depth exploration of film directing, we focus on the director’s role in visual design – composing shots, choosing lenses, orchestrating movement and the overall pictorial “signature” of the […]
Read MoreJonathan Livingston Seagull
JONATHAN LIVINGSTON SEAGULL (1973, 99 min) follows a real life trained seagull and his narrative journey as an outcast from his flock as he ascends high into the sky. Intended […]
Read MoreExploring Melodrama in a Haunted House: Grey Gardens
In this 2-hour lecture, filmmaker Anna Weltner reappraises David and Albert Maysles’ GREY GARDENS (1975), a documentary portrait of two high-society women who now live in squalor in a crumbling […]
Read MoreHow Did We Get To Cinema?
Movies. Flicks. Motion Pictures. Moving Images. Silents. Talkies. Film. No matter what you call them, movies didn’t emerge from thin air. A combination of technological developments, popular entertainments, and physiological […]
Read MoreThe Last Laugh: Weimar Cinema in 2026
Analogies to the Weimar Republic are everywhere these days, some more helpful than others. They nevertheless signal for us a feeling that our own societies might be entering a similar […]
Read MoreTrauma and the Road to Recognition: Mad Max Fury Road
Often topping lists of the best action films of all time, MAD MAX: FURY ROAD, (120 min) George Miller’s visually stunning 2015 addition to the “Mad Max” canon manages to […]
Read MoreJuxtaposition: The Power of the Cut!
In this in-depth exploration of film editing, we examine both the magic invisibility that sustains continuity and flow, and its expressive force through collision of imagery. From the early silent […]
Read MoreZoot Suit: Exploring Chicano Cultural Identity & Self-Representation on Film
Luis Valdez is widely recognized as “the father of Chicano theater and cinema” for amplifying the Chicano (Mexican-American) experience through his significant body of theatrical and cinematic work. In ZOOT […]
Read MoreThe Enigma of Desire: Decision to Leave
DECISION TO LEAVE (2022, 138min) is a saturated contemporary noir from Korean director Park Chan-Wook which pays homage to VERTIGO by exploring the disorienting origins of desire. A detective’s search […]
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