Checking date: 20/04/2024

Versión en español

Course: 2024/2025

Film Genre
(13530)
Bachelor in Film, Television and Media Studies (Plan: 382 - Estudio: 211)


Coordinating teacher: FERNANDEZ-RODRIGUEZ LABAYEN, MIGUEL

Department assigned to the subject: Communication and Media Studies Department

Type: Electives
ECTS Credits: 3.0 ECTS

Course:
Semester:



Requirements (Subjects that are assumed to be known)
-Moving image history
Objectives
1. A broad knowledge of the most important approaches to film genre theory. 2. A broad knowledge of the history and problems of the main film genres. 3. A broad knowledge of the hybridation processes afecting Hollywood models in different contexts and the development of alternative formulas. 4. Competence to analyze and discuss the cultural, social and economic functions of film genres, and of their historical evolution in different settings.
Skills and learning outcomes
Link to document

Description of contents: programme
1. Genre Theory: An Introduction 2. What are Film Genres? Performance, narrative, and reception in film genre 3. A historical overview of film genre: the case of the film musical 4. A performative approach to film genre: film comedy 5. A transnational approach to film genres: horror cinema 6. A post-modern approach to film genre: the Western
Learning activities and methodology
1. Master classes. Theory-based classes. Students will acquire basic knowledge about film genre theory and history. Competences 1, 2 and 3 (1 ECTS). 2. Practical sessions. Fragments of especially relevant or representative films will be screened. Case studies. Competence 4 (0,5 ECTS). 3 Student's work. Guided study of theoretical-practical contents and learning materials. Students will be required to write an essay about specific aspects related to the class syllabus. Competences 1, 2, 3 and 4 (1,5 ECTS).
Assessment System
  • % end-of-term-examination 50
  • % of continuous assessment (assigments, laboratory, practicals...) 50

Calendar of Continuous assessment


Extraordinary call: regulations
Basic Bibliography
  • ALTMAN, Rick:. "A Semantic/Syntactic Approach to Film Genre". Cinema Journal, Vol. 23, No. 3 (spring), pp. 6-18 (in Film Genre Reader IV). 1984
  • Altman, Rick. Film/Genre. BFI. 1999
  • COHAN, Steven (ed.). Hollywood Musicals: The Film Reader. Routledge. 2002
  • Collins, Jim. "Genericity in the Nineties: Eclectic Irony and the New Sincerity" (Chapter of the book "Film theory goes to the movies"). Routledge. 1993
  • GRANT, Barry Keith (ed.):. "Film Genre Reader". (Austin, University of Texas Press, 1986 [3ª ed. ampliada, 2003]).
  • NEALE, Steve. Film Genre and Hollywood. Routledge. 2000
Additional Bibliography
  • CHURCH, David. Post-Horror: Art, Genre and Cultural Elevation. Edinburgh University Press . 2022
  • COURET, Nilo. Mock Classicism: Latin American Film Comedy, 1930¿1960. California University Press. 2018
  • GENETTE, Gérard. The Architext. An Introduction. (I to IV). University of California Press. 1992
  • GRANT, Barry Keith . Film Genre: From Iconography to Ideology. Wallflower Press. 2007
  • Gomez, Pablo. Science Fiction Cinema in the Twenty-First Century Transnational Futures, Cosmopolitan Concerns. Routledge. 2023
  • HENNEFELD, Maggie. Specters of Slapstick and Silent Film Comediennes. Columbia University Press. 2018
  • Horton, Andrew y Rapf, Joanna (eds.). A Companion to Film Comedy. Wiley-Blackwell. 2012
  • MERCER, John and SHINGLER, Martin . Melodrama. Genre, Style, Sensibility . Wallflower Press. 2004
  • Rodriguez Ortega, Vicente & Romero Santos, Ruben. Spanish Horror Film and Television in the 21st Century. Routledge. 2024

The course syllabus may change due academic events or other reasons.