ENG 4115 Fall 2023 Parker-Flynn

In this course, we will approach film theory organically through an examination of Alfred Hitchcock’s body of work as a film director. Indeed, French film critics of the 1950s encouraged a re-evaluation of film—and thus a re-invention of film theory itself—based on the belief that a director’s films reflect his/her individual artistry. Hitchcock was one of their primary and strongest prototypes of director as auteur, or author, who wields what they would designate as the “camera-pen.” Hitchcock’s body of work has since attracted substantial attention by film criticism, and his films have been analyzed through a variety of theoretical approaches, including structural, psychoanalytic, and feminist.

We will read film theory (Eisenstein, Bazin, Metz, Heath, Bellour, Doane, Mulvey, Modelski) and address the complex historico-theoretical relation between film theory and cinema with a particular focus on Hitchcock. We will further consider Hitchcock’s films as instruments that allow for the displacement of anxiety and the dispossession of socially unacceptable desires, fears, and traumatic memories. Film study will be comprised of both theoretical and mechanical elements; students will attend to structural elements such as cinematography, mise-en-scène, and sound.

Films for study will include: The Lodger, Rebecca, Suspicion, Shadow of a Doubt, Rope, Rear Window, Vertigo, Psycho, and The Birds.

Requirements: This course satisfies the requirement for coursework in Understanding Genres.