Required and Recommended Texts and/or Materials

PHL365 Film and Philosophy will be using electronically available readings, either via e-reserve at the library or via online open access websites.

The course is closely related to the following book, which is highly recommended reading:

Robert Sinnerbrink, New Philosophies of Film: Thinking Images (London and New York Continuum, 2011).

A copy of this book will be kept in the Reserve section of the Macquarie University library. Copies may also be purchased via the Co-op bookstore (http://www.coop-bookshop.com.au/bookshop/action/InstTextSelect?inst_name=macquarie-university).

Technology Used and Required

This unit uses an ilearn website and Echo360 lecture recordings (https://ilearn.mq.edu.au/login/MQ/). The website contains links to lecture notes, ilecture recordings, and other materials you might need for the course.

Attendance

Attendance and Participation Mark

For internal students, this will represent commitment to attending tutorials and participating in discussion. Attendance at a minimum of 75% of tutorials (9/12) is, under normal circumstances, a requirement for passing the unit.

For external students, this will represent commitment to the on-campus sessions, and to participating in the weekly online tutorial discussion via the website Discussion Board. External students who do not participate in the online tutorial discussion (responding to weekly tutorial questions and engaging with other students' responses) will be marked down accordingly.

Examination(s)

This unit has no formal examination.

Assignment submission

Bar-Coded Arts Coversheet

All written assignments will be submitted electronically (both for internal students and for external students). All students must attach a completed coversheet to all submitted work. A personalised assignment coversheet is generated from the student section of the Faculty of Arts website at:

http://www.arts.mq.edu.au/current_students/undergraduate/admin_central/coversheet

Please provide your student details and click the Get my assignment coversheet button to generate your personalised assignment cover sheet. No other coversheets will be provided by the Faculty.

All written work must also be submitted through Turnitin. A link for each assignment will be available on the PHL365 website.

Extensions and penalties

Requests for extensions must in normal circumstances be made in writing before the due date.

Extensions of less than one week may be granted by your tutor if reasonable grounds are given and some written documentation can be produced. All email extension requests must mention the Unit Code in the Subject Heading. Extensions of more than one week must be made in writing (or by email) to the unit convenor (Robert Sinnerbrink). Note that such applications for extensions must be accompanied by appropriate written documentation (medical certificates, etc.). Approvals for extensions will be noted on the essay cover page.

Essays that are handed in later than the due date where no extension has been granted, or that are handed in later than the extension date, will be penalised for lateness by deducting

3% for each day late (e.g. if your raw mark is 70% (a Credit) but your essay is two days late, you will receive 64% (a Pass)).

All late essays must be submitted within 14 days of the essay due date. No essay will be accepted after this time unless there are deemed to be special circumstances.

Special Consideration Policy:

http://www.mq.edu.au/policy/docs/special_consideration/policy.html

Applying for Special Consideration

Students applying for Special Consideration circumstances of three (3) consecutive days’ duration, within a study period, and/or prevent completion of a formal examination must submit an on-line application with the Faculty of Arts. For an application to be valid, it must include a completed Application for Special Consideration form and all supporting documentation.

The on-line Special Consideration application is found at:

http://www.arts.mq.edu.au/current_students/undergraduate/admin_central/special_consideration.  

Essays that are handed in later than the due date where no extension has been granted, or which are handed in later than the extension date, will be penalised for lateness by deducting 3% for each day late (e.g. if your raw mark is 70% (a Credit) but your essay is two days late, you will receive 64% (a Pass)).

All late essays must be submitted within 14 days of the essay due date. No essay will be accepted after this time unless there are deemed to be special circumstances.

PHL365 Film and Philosophy

Week 1 (Aug 5-6): What is philosophy of film/film-philosophy?

What is “philosophy of film”? Can films “philosophise”? The distinction between philosophy of film and ‘film as philosophy’ or ‘film-philosophy’.

Week 2 (Aug 12-13): Ontologies of the Moving Image

Andre Bazin’s ontology of the cinematographic image. Noel Carroll’s critique and alternative account. Some questions about the phenomenology of moving images and our ‘desire for reality’.

Week 3 (Aug 19-20): Understanding Film Narrative

How and why do films makes sense? Theories of narrative and of narrative comprehension. Carroll’s ‘erotetic’ model of narrative. Critical questions from an aesthetic and phenomenological point of view.

Week 4 (Aug 26-27): Cognitivism Goes to the Movies

The ‘cognitivist turn’ in film theory. What can cognitivist theories offer to philosophy of film? The challenge of cognitivist approaches to art cinema.  Critical questions for cognitivism.

Week 5 (Sept 2-3): Affect and Emotion in Cinema

Theories of affect and emotion in the cinema. Cognivitist and phenomenological approaches: a rapprochement? The Diving Bell and the Butterfly (Julian Schnabel) as case study.

Week 6 (Sept 9-10): Cinematic Ethics

The relationship between emotion, morality, and cinema. Moral judgment and aesthetic manipulation. Can cinema ‘do’ ethics? The problem of theorising cinematic disgust.

Week 7 (Sept 16-17): READING WEEK

MID-SEMESTER BREAK (Sept 20-Oct 6)

Week 8 (Oct 7-8):  Gilles Deleuze’s Philosophy of Film

Deleuze's theses on movement and time. The concept of the movement-image and how they are composed into a filmic whole. The breakdown of the sensory-motor action schema and the discovery of the time-image. How time-images disrupt narrative and provoke thought.

Week 9 (Oct 14-15): Stanley Cavell’s Philosophy of Film

Cavell’s analysis of the cinematic image. Film and the metaphysics of representation. What happens to human figures when projected on the screen? How to ‘read’ a film philosophically.

Week 10 (Oct 21-22):  Film as Philosophy: Pro and Contra

The ‘film as philosophy’ thesis. Livingston’s critique of the strong version; Wartenberg’s defense of a ‘moderate’ versions; Mulhall’s and Smuts’ defences of different kinds of ‘bold’ thesis. Critical questions about the relationship between philosophical theory and film criticism.

Week 11 (Oct 28-29): Film-Philosophy Case study (1): Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind (Michel Gondry)

Memory, morality, and self-overcoming in Michel Gondry’s unorthodox love story.

Week 12 (Nov 4-5): Film-Philosophy Case Study (2): Fight Club (David Fincher)

Platonic, sceptical, critical, and Nietzschean themes in David Fincher’s Fight Club.

Week 13 (Nov 11-12): Film-Philosophy Case Study (3): The New World (Terrence Malick)

Nature, culture, and the violent encounter between worlds in Terrence Malick’s mythopoetic historical drama.