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Summer and Fall 2025 Course Descriptions
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Summer 2025
Cult Films in American Culture (Nigrin)
01:175:266:E6:00100
This online lecture-discussion course focuses on the “cult” film from its origins in the 1920s to its evolution in American culture. Close analyses of cult films will be paired with readings by J. Hoberman and Jonathan Rosenbaum, Sigmund Freud, and others. According to Freud, for example, social organization for the primordial horde came about because of the incest taboo and the law of exogamy. Several of the films to be screened depict scenes that violate this organization and break the taboo. This course will explore how and why these violations permeate cult films. In addition, many cult films are open-ended metaphors for contemporary social anxieties. We will examine how some of these counter-culture films are a reaction to late ‘60s and ‘70s American society. Finally, this course will include in-depth analyses of the structure of celebrated American cult films ("mise-en-scene," editing, narrative form, set design, sound, and special effects) including: The Rocky Horror Picture Show, Eraserhead, Night of the Living Dead, Cat People, and others. Warning: some films may contain nudity, sexual situations, violence, profanity, substance abuse, and disturbing images.
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Cinema and the Arts (Nigrin)
01:354:312:E6:01023
This online lecture-discussion course focuses on the relationship between cinema and aesthetic movements in the arts. Films to be screened include Blood of a Poet, The Man Who Fell to Earth, 2001: A Space Odyssey, The Draughtsman’s Contract, The Red Shoes, Mulholland Drive, Eva Hesse, and others. Warning: some films may contain nudity, sexual situations, violence, profanity, substance abuse, and disturbing images.
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Fall 2025
Introduction to Film I (Ginsberg)
01:175:201:01: 09530
01:175:201:02: 09532
This course provides students with foundational exposure to film language and interpretation. Students will learn the central and primary terms of film criticism and textual analysis, with particular attention lent to formal, discursive, and narrative-compositional structures and practices such as editing, mise-en-scène, cinematography, framing, sound design, color, lighting, generic and authorial modalities and intertexts, and socio-systemic relationalities such as race, gender, sexuality and class. In this context, film spectatorship will be resituated as a practice of reading a cultural occasion that is at once an artform and an industrial product implicated, both ideologically and technologically, in an apparatus best understood and problematized through the generation and deployment of a shared academic vocabulary.
American Experimental Film (Nigrin)
01:175:265:01: 08416
This lecture-discussion course focuses on the history and development of the various American experimental cinema movements from its beginnings to the present. In-depth analyses of the structure and content of films by Andy Warhol, Maya Deren, Stan Brakhage, Sidney Peterson, Kenneth Anger, Bruce Baillie, Yoko Ono, and others. Emphasis on the "mise-en-scene," editing, non-narrative form, sound, and special effects in the films of these celebrated experimental filmmakers. Warning: some films may contain nudity, sexual situations, violence, profanity, substance abuse, and disturbing images.
World Cinema I (Ginsberg)
01:175:321:01: 09533
This course offers a historiographic survey of several key international cinema movements of the 20th-century interwar years and immediate post-World War II period, which have come to be understood in contemporary, transnational-era hindsight as examples of “world cinema.” Students will gain critical exposure to Soviet cinema of the 1920s-30s, early art and commercial films of France, Germany, England, and Scandinavia, colonial-era films of Egypt, India, and Brazil, films of imperial Japan and fascist Germany, Spain and Italy, and the first wave of international avant-garde films made largely in Europe. In the process, students will be encouraged to analyze and critique these movements and films with respect to their political, economic, socio-cultural, and ideological conditions of production and reception.
Topics in World Cinema: The Artivism of Global Women Filmmakers (Martin-Márquez)
01:175:377:01: 09534
Recent events in national contexts as different as the United States and Iran have evidenced that women continue to be second-class citizens in many parts of the globe. Yet ever since the origins of cinema, and often against all odds, women filmmakers have succeeded in marshaling the power of this mass medium to address a host of pressing issues, often but certainly not limited to the experiences of girls and women, and sometimes with the goal to mobilize viewers. We will study a wide variety of films—fiction, documentary, experimental, and hybrid forms—from a broad range of nations (possibly including Angola; Argentina; Cuba; Colombia; Czechoslovakia; France; India; Japan; Iran; Kenya; South Africa; Tunisia; the UK; and the US). This course will situate individual works and creators within their national and regional contexts, and also address the complexities of intersectionality, as women filmmakers grapple with multiply imbricated vectors of identity. We will deploy but also scrutinize a range of theoretical approaches to cinema, including for example auteurism, which exalts (traditionally male) directors as creative geniuses; "gaze" and other feminist film theory; genre studies; and haptics, which explores the film medium’s engagement with our embodied experiences.
Topics in World Cinema: Middle Eastern Film (Ginsberg)
01:175:377:03: 09537
This course engages in a critical analysis of cinema produced in the MENA/SWANA region and its diaspora. It theorizes a range of cinematic modalities and discursive themes in an attempt to understand what “Middle Eastern cinema” means, how peoples of the region perceive the films they make, and why such films, especially from the Arab world, have only been studied minimally by scholars, whether regionally or internationally. The course is necessarily interdisciplinary and international in scope, while placing emphasis on concepts key to film criticism and production, with special attention lent to the contradictions of contemporary film theory when utilized to read Arab cinema and existing interpretations of Middle Eastern films. In this context, the course will focus on areas of integral importance to Middle Eastern cinema, such as regional self-perceptions, the question of Palestine, anti-colonial struggles, the representation of women, the critique of political systems, and the significance of Middle Eastern cultures.
Classics of Italian Cinema (Gambarota)
01:560:345:01: 10974
This course provides a historical introduction to Italian cinema, concentrating on examples of classical genres and movements, such as the early silent epic, the classics of neorealism, auteurs of the 50’s, 60’s and 70’s, the commedia all’italiana (comedy, Italian style), and the spaghetti Western. We will examine issues of representation and production of societal values, e.g., gender, family relations, and national identity vs. local cultures. No knowledge of Italian is required. No prerequisites.
Contemporary German & European Cinema (Karl)
01:175:349:01: 21333
Students will be introduced to a variety of contemporary German and European films from 2007 to the present which reflect upon the current cultural and socio-political climate of the European Union. In light of the 2008 economic crisis, the refugee and humanitarian crisis, the Coronavirus pandemic as well as the Russian invasion in Ukraine, the EU has faced many challenges. We will tackle these issues through close critical analysis and ask ourselves what it means to build and maintain a European Union after 1945. Pairing the formal and stylistic specificities of contemporary German & European filmmaking with essays, poems, and short fiction, we will investigate the formation of history, memory, and cultural identity in Europe today, shed light on the role of film festivals, consider the impact of streaming platforms, and reframe the concept of national cinema. The course includes several workshops to train and hone your writing skills, including instructions on how to write a film review. Additionally, you will get to know and personally interact with filmmakers via virtual guest visits.
Seminar: Film Theory (Fresko)
01:175:420:01: 09539
This course will survey major theoretical debates about the cinema: from early attempts to define the medium to arguments about its realist or formative qualities; from studies of films as mass culture to questions about authorship in industrial and independent contexts; from Marxist analyses of cinema’s ideological functions to psychoanalytic elaborations of the “apparatus” and the implications of spectatorship via race, gender, and sexuality; and the changing conditions of "film" in the wake of its transformation by digital technologies. What are the fundamental aesthetic properties of the medium of motion pictures? What are its psychological and social effects? How can we examine the politics of cinematic representation? These and similar questions will guide our study of a wide variety of film literature, including the writings of André Bazin, Siegfried Kracauer, Sergei Eisenstein, Walter Benjamin, Christian Metz, Jean-Louis Baudry, Laura Mulvey, James Baldwin, bell hooks, Gilles Deleuze, and more.
Remembering Alan Williams
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Photo © Sam Vladimirsky (detail)
The Department of French and the Program in Cinema Studies are deeply saddened by the passing of Professor Alan L. Williams, our beloved colleague of many years, on August 16, 2023.
2021 Essay Award Winners!
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Congratulations to Stephanie Man, Oakley Mastej, and Priyanka Sarkhel, who have won the 2021 Cinema Studies Essay Award!
Oakley Mastej 
Priyanka Sarkhel
Stephanie Man
Congratulations to Will Pagdatoon!
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Congratulations to Will Pagdatoon on his receipt of the prestigious Henry Rutgers Scholar Award for his Senior Honors thesis, “Gazing Upon Varda’s Cinécriture: Rewriting Patriarchal Cinema Towards a Feminist Cinema.” Will graduated this May from the School of Arts and Sciences as a Cinema Studies major. Working with Professor Sandy Flitterman-Lewis in the English Department as well as the Program in Cinema Studies, Will’s thesis examined the work of filmmaker Agnès Varda (1928-2019). Varda was the sole female filmmaker associated with the French New Wave of the 1960s, and one of the most significant filmmakers in world cinema more generally. She was the recipient of numerous awards, including a 2017 Honorary Award from the Academy of Motion Pictures Arts and Sciences and was nominated that same year for Best Documentary for Faces Places (2017).
Cinema Studies 2020 Graduates!
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- Nancy Arana (major)
- Areg Avetisyan (major)
- Avery Chang (minor)
- Anisha Cherian (minor)
- John DeJesus (minor)
- Tiffany Dimaculangan (major)
- Adam Forrest (minor)
- Jared Gaudreau (major)
- Zhaoyang Liu (major)
- Andrew Mazza (minor)
- William Albert Pagdatoon (major)
- Aimee Rabino (major)
- Alana Sackman (minor)
- Karan Sandhu (major)
- Kayla Scammacca (minor)
- Tanner Sutton (minor)
- Luis Veras (minor)
2019 Essay Award Winners
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Congratulations to our 2019 Essay Award Winners! Christiane Fischer (L) won the Graduate award for her essay on the aesthetics of touch in Wong Kar-Wai, and Jessica Fitzner (r) won the Undergraduate award for her paper on women's desire and representation in Petzold's film Phoenix.
2019 Cinema Studies Graduates
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Congratulations to our wonderful Cinema Studies graduates! Pictured on the left are CS majors Hager Selym and Estefany Mendez-Recio. Below is CS major Martha Ugwu. Also graduating: Majors: Dayna Hagewood, Fran Magen and Xinyue Wang; Minors: Delaney Alton, Sarina Bhutani, John DeJesus, Catherine Gural, Ellen Lee, Felix Ortiz-Cruz, and Marisa Tamini. We are very proud of you, and wish you great success and happiness in your professional and personal endeavors!
Small Grants Program for Graduate and Undergraduate Students
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DEADLINE: Monday April 1, 2019
The Cinema Studies Program is delighted to continue our program in support of graduate and undergraduate student research in the discipline (including scholarly media projects such as film restoration or film essays), and undergraduate filmmaking projects. Applications may be submitted by graduate students pursuing the Graduate Certificate in Cinema Studies and who are still eligible for SGS funding, and by undergraduate students who are declared Majors or Minors in Cinema Studies. Awards will be granted based on need, for legitimate reimbursable expenses only, and based on the academic or creative merits of the proposed film/film studies project (please note that we are not able to provide funding for projects that are not focused specifically on film). Reimbursements will generally be applied to term bills. SAS travel and research reimbursement policies will be observed; for more information, please consult: https://policies.rutgers.edu/sites/policies/files/40.4.1%20-%20current.pdf
Awardees are required to submit a one-page report indicating how they used the funds by December 1, 2019; their projects may be featured on the Cinema Studies website.
Graduate students must submit a 250-500 word description of their research project, as well as a budget detailing how they plan to use the funds (for example, travel to archives; acquisition of necessary primary research materials; travel to an academic conference to present a film paper; etc.). Please note that these funds are meant to supplement other sources of graduate student research support provided by Rutgers’ School of Graduate Studies, or by home department or other academic unit funds. Generally, CS grants to graduate students will not exceed $500.
Undergraduate students must submit a 250-500 word description of their research or filmmaking project, as well as a budget detailing how they plan to use the funds (for example, for travel to archives; acquisition of primary research materials; equipment rental; mise-en-scène costs; etc.). Generally, CS grants to undergraduate students will not exceed $250.
All applications will be evaluated by the Cinema Studies Awards Committee.
Please complete the application form on the second page and send it along with the other required application materials, all in one electronic file labeled “CS grants YOUR LAST NAME,” to the Director of Cinema Studies, Professor Susan Martin-Márquez:
Congratulations to all of our graduating majors and minors!
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Four of our CS majors braved the pouring rain on May 13 to march with Cinema Studies in the SAS Convocation: l to r: Elorm Ocansey, Tom Evans, Dan Bacsik, and Dak Johnson.
Cinema Studies Program Awards 2018
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The Cinema Studies Program held its Awards Lunch on April 26, 2018. We honored two faculty members who are retiring, Professors John Belton and Richard Koszarski. CS students and faculty will miss you!
We also celebrated the tenuring and promotion to Associate Professor of Rhiannon Welch, and presented the Undergraduate Essay Award to Dayna Hagewood and Gabrielle Woods, and the Graduate Essay Award to Chiara Degli Esposti. Several other graduating senior majors were present: Chelsea Lebron, Elorm Ocansey, and Austin Renna—congratulations!
Associate Professor Rhiannon Welch
Retiring professors John Belton and Richard Koszarski (center) with CS students and faculty
Essay Award winners, left to right: Dayna Hagewood (undergraduate); Chiara Degli Esposti (graduate); Gabrielle Woods (undergraduate)
On April 24, 2018 members of the Senior Seminar presented their final projects in a symposium they organized on “Neorealism as Counter Cinema.” Congratulations to the students on a wonderfully stimulating series of talks, and many thanks to Professor Rhiannon Welch for inspiring and mentoring them throughout the semester!
Student presenters, left to right: Thomas Evans; Elorm Ocansey; Dorian Alton; Andrew Schuller; Marcus Grey; Erin Keane; Benjamin Peraria; Anjali Patil; Johanna Morales; Gabrielle Woods; Chelsea Lebron; Bruce Lemyre; Bronwyn Kelly; Molly Burns; Dongshen Cai; and Hector Ayarza