An analysis of Italian cinema as seen in the development of specific film genres such as neorealism, comedy, self-reflexive cinema. Occasionally the course will concentrate on a specific director and study their individuality through style, theme, and personal development. When offered cross-listed with Film 145 Global Media, this course counts toward Film & Media upper-division major requirements.

Understood, variously, as magical, dreamlike, a ghostly projection, ‘writing with light,’ moving images often appear to us as an ephemeral, immaterial form. And yet, cinematic production, distribution, and consumption have always relied upon natural resource extraction, petrochemicals, and biohazards that have lasting, material effects on the landscapes and bodies behind the scenes and projected onscreen. Cinema thus both makes and marks worlds, indelibly. This course explores a selection of films made in and around Italy beginning in the 1950s that engage the ecological imagination as they intersect with human and more-than-human worlds—from volcanoes to goat birth and death, from air pollution to toxic waste dumps. Films by: Vittorio De Seta, Luchino Visconti, Michelangelo Antonioni, Pier Paolo Pasolini, Gillo Pontecorvo, Alice Rorhwacher, Cecilia Mangini, Giovanna Taviani, and Michele Frammartino. Readings by: Erika Balsom, Laura Di Bianco, Nadia Bozak, Melody Jue, Elena Past, Karen Pinkus, and Monica Seger.

Enrollment in screening section is required.

Upper-division Italian Studies classes with instruction in English may be taken in Italian (by completing readings and written work in Italian) if the student has completed Italian 101, and with permission of the instructor.

Repeat Rules

Requirements class fulfills