Film & Television

• COM FT 524: International Cinema
  This course exposes students to a wide range of narrative, stylistic, and representational approaches in the film medium across the globe. Its broad, transnational, and transhistorical scope invites explorations of films and filmmakers seldom studied in traditional film history and offers students an opportunity to deepen their knowledge of the many levels on which film creation and film reception operate. This course is designed to help emerging filmmakers locate their own craft and creative impulses among historical and stylistic cinematic traditions and to guide emerging film scholars to challenge gaps and silences produced in traditional film history. As such, it encourages students to contemplate their own responsibilities as storytellers, directors, producers, critics, and scholars of cinema. The course material aims to raise the question of what can be gained and learned from appreciating, analyzing, and discussing a diverse group of films from distinct cultures and time periods and to destabilize traditional canons of World Cinema. *Undergrad pre-req: FT250
• COM FT 526: Directing
  Undergraduate Prerequisites: COM FT 353.
  Students learn all aspects of directing, with particular emphasis given to script analysis and working with actors. The director's involvement in blocking action, composing shots, managing the production process and editing are also covered. Acting experience is helpful but not required.
• COM FT 527: Crowdfunding and Distribution
  Undergraduate Prerequisites: FT201
  Graduate Prerequisites: COM FT 707 or COM FT 849.
  Whether you're producing web series, long or short format fiction, documentaries or video games, media makers are expected to build and develop their own audience, as well as raise the funds necessary to produce and get their work out in the world. In other words, a media maker must be more than just a creator. To be truly successful, you must also become a creative entrepreneur.
• COM FT 532: NBC: Anatomy of a Network
  Undergraduate Prerequisites: COM FT 303.
  Undergraduate Pre-req FT 303 NBC has the distinction of being the first national network on the air, and at various points in its history it has stood for corporate stodginess, quality programming, enviable target audiences, and abject failure. In this course students will analyze the different stages of TV's development by using NBC as a case study, approaching the network's history from various vantage points, including those of the larger industry, network executives, and early audiences. Driven by primary sources (NBC's back-office documents, industry trade articles, and NBC's radio and television programs) and scholarly literature, this course will explore the ways "America's network" has navigated the transition from radio to TV, monopolistic trends, inter-network competition, programming decisions, conglomeration, and competition with cable and the Internet.
• COM FT 534: Critical TV Industry Studies
  Undergraduate Prerequisites: COM FT 303.
  Whether you want to work in the television industry or focus your research on it, your connection to it will be incomplete without a critical interrogation of its history and processes. Tv industry studies is a scholarly reading and discussion-driven seminar that conceptualizes the u.s. television industry as a complex site of negotiation between producers and audiences, labor and management, creativity and commerce, and government and corporations. Whereas other television studies courses might privilege the intricacies at work within specific programs or genres, this class asks students to locate those programs within the broader context of a capitalist media system.
• COM FT 536: Film Theory and Criticism
  Undergraduate Prerequisites: Undergraduate pre-req: FT250
  An introduction to classical and contemporary film and media theory. Topics include montage theory, realism, structuralism, post-structuralism, semiotics, psychoanalysis, phenomenology, and cultural studies. The course includes screenings of films that have contributed to critical debate and those that challenge theoretical presuppositions.
• COM FT 538: City in Film
  
• COM FT 541: TV Genres
  Undergraduate Prerequisites: COM FT 303.
  This class uses fan studies and genre studies approaches to critically analyze the ways that fan practices have shaped and been shaped by the television industry as well as how fans have used their position to influence the norms of television. We will focus on genres with extremely active and integral fandoms and how they are similar or distinct: science fiction/fantasy, melodrama/soap operas, and sports.
• COM FT 542: Advanced Screenwriting
  Undergraduate Prerequisites: COM FT 412.
  Graduate Prerequisites: COM FT 713.
  The student will write a first-draft screenplay and two sets of revisions. In addition to participating in weekly discussions on aspects of screenwriting that are tailored to student needs, each student will complete and revise a full length motion-picture screenplay. 4cr.
• COM FT 544: Documentary Production
  Undergraduate Prerequisites: COM FT 353.
  Graduate Prerequisites: COM FT 707.
  This course is designed to develop skills necessary for producing long-form documentaries. There is an emphasis on exploring new, more engaging forms of storytelling and a broad range of stylistic approaches. It covers the entire process: finding a topic, developing a story structure, conceiving a style, shooting, editing, and post-production. Students develop their own ideas and form small groups to produce them.
• COM FT 545: Television and Childhood
  Children represent an important target for mediated messages. However, there are important rules, ethics and differences we should keep in mind when creating content for this audience. In this class, we will consider the effects messages have on behavior and development in younger populations. We will also consider design and programming decisions that influence these effects.
• COM FT 547: Avant Garde Cinema
  Undergraduate Prerequisites: COM FT 250.
  A survey of global avant-garde film and experimental media from the 1920s to the present. We will explore film, video, and digital video as mediums of unadulterated artistic expression resulting in daring, experimental forms and controversial contents. The course covers 1920s and early 30s high modernist cinema of "isms" (Dadaism, Surrealism, Impressionism), Transatlantic and international currents after World War Two including trance film, underground film, structuralism, and "psychedelic expanded cinema of split and multiscreen films (Kenneth Anger, Andy Warhol, Michael Snow, Peter Kubelka, Rudy Burckhardt), 1970s video art including feminist and gay/lesbian filmmakers, X-rated Europeans (Kren and the Vienna Secessionists) and international "trash" cinema auteurs, the digital video avant-garde, masters of found footage cinema, queer digital media, recent transnational trends. Disclaimer: Some of the films shown in this course contain sexually explicit and graphic bodily acts.
• COM FT 552: Special Topics
  Special Topics for Fall 2022. Course descriptions and more info sent out in the FTV newsletter. Email filmtv@bu.edu for more info. | FT 552 A1: Writing the Producible Short (Thompson) Pre-req | FT 310 FT 552 B1: Crowdfunding & Distribution (Geller) Pre-req FT 201. Students encouraged to come in with a script or concept that is already in production | FT 552 C1: Social Purpose Short (Zelnick/Egleson) Application only course | FT 552 B1: Late Nite Laughs pre-req FT 512 or FT 522
• COM FT 553: Film Analytics
  Graduate Prerequisites: .
  Navigating the line between artistry and analytics takes training and experience. In this course, we are going talk about different roles quantitative research plays in film and television. The knowledge and skills practiced throughout the course will enable you to better understand audiences' characteristics, behaviors, and responses. Furthermore, they will empower you to be able to decide what research (if any) should be trusted. You will learn how to assess the quality of research and conclusions, consider your own research, and analyze and interpret conclusions from existing data.
• COM FT 554: Special Topics
  Full course descriptions and addt'l information on Spring 22 Special Topics in Studies in FTV newsletter. Email filmtv@bu.edu for more information. | FT 554 A1 International Seminar (Youth and Childhood in World Cinema) (Guarana)--fulfills foreign cinema requirement. Pre-req FT 250. | FT 554 B1 Gangster Film (Hall) | FT 554 C1 (Burr) Stardom | FT 554 D1 True Crime (Jaramillo) fulfills TV studies requirement. pre-req FT 303 | FT 554 E1 The Musical (Roy Grundmann).
• COM FT 555: The Narrative Documentary Practicum
  Undergraduate Prerequisites: FT 402 B+ or Better. Or by permission of Instructor
  This practicum, designed for advanced film and television production students, focuses on the highly specialized filmmaking techniques used for the narrative documentary; that is, character-driven films about real people. The course also explores this tradition's rich legacy: from the Russians of the 1920s, through the CV movement of the 1960s, and on to the present day host of new films spawned by digital filmmaking technology.Course Prerequisites: FT 402 B+ or Better. Or by permission of Instructor.
• COM FT 556: American Independent Film-Part 1 The Foundational Masterworks
  The course comprises one unit of a four-semester survey (each part of which is free-standing and may be taken separately and independently of each other and in any order, with no prerequisites) of the major achievements of the most important artistic movement of the last sixty years in American film--the independent feature filmmaking movement, in which American narrative filmmakers broke away from the financial, bureaucratic, and (most importantly) imaginative influence of Hollywood values and entertainment story-telling methods to create the most important works in American film--a series of generally low-tech, low-budget, DIY, personal-expression films, made and distributed more or less outside the mainstream exhibition system. This section of the survey focuses on the foundational masterworks created by the first generation of American independent feature filmmakers. These are the works that not only changed film history at the point they were made but that continue to inspire generations of independent filmmakers with their example. Since women have made some of the best and most important works in this area, as many female filmmakers as possible are being included. Offered in the fall of odd numbered years. The course comprises one unit of a four-semester survey (each part of which is free-standing and may be taken separately and independently of each other and in any order, with no prerequisites) of the major achievements of the most important artistic movement of the last sixty years in American film--the independent feature filmmaking movement, in which American narrative filmmakers broke away from the financial, bureaucratic, and (most importantly) imaginative influence of Hollywood values and entertainment story-telling methods to create the most important works in American film--a series of generally low-tech, low-budget, DIY, personal-expression films, made and distributed more or less outside the mainstream exhibition system. This section of the survey focuses on the foundational masterworks created by the first generation of American independent feature filmmakers. These are the works that not only changed film history at the point they were made but that continue to inspire generations of independent filmmakers with their example. Since women have made some of the best and most important works in this area, as many female filmmakers as possible are being included. Offered in the fall of odd numbered years.
• COM FT 557: American Independent Film-Part 2 The Second Generation
  Graduate Prerequisites: consent of instructor.
  The course comprises one unit of a four-semester survey (each part of which is free-standing and may be taken separately and independently of each other and in any order, with no prerequisites) of the major achievements of the most important artistic movement of the last sixty years in American film--the independent feature filmmaking movement, in which American narrative filmmakers broke away from the financial, bureaucratic, and (most importantly) imaginative influence of Hollywood values and entertainment story-telling methods to create the most important works in American film--a series of generally low-tech, low-budget, DIY, personal-expression films, made and distributed more or less outside the mainstream exhibition system. This section of the survey focuses on the second generation of American independent feature filmmaking. Since women have made some of the best and most important works in this area, as many female filmmakers as possible are being included. Offered in the spring of even numbered years.
• COM FT 561: Contemporary East Asian Cinema
  Surveys important and influential films from India, Japan, mainland China, Hong Kong, Taiwan, and elsewhere in East Asia from the 1950s to the present, taking in the work of such directors as Satyajit Ray, Ozu, Mizoguchi, Kurosawa, Zhang Yimou, Tsai Ming-liang, and Wong Kar-wai. The course is designed to make students familiar with foundational styles of realism and fantasy in Asian film and with ways Asian films address changes and evolution in Asian culture and society. The course should help students understand certain traditions in Asian film, and prepare them to engage critically with the burgeoning, new and compelling filmmaking that comes from this part of the world.
• COM FT 565: Motion Picture Editing
  Undergraduate Prerequisites: FT353
  Graduate Prerequisites: COM FT 707.
  Given its central role in the filmmaking process, examining the way films are edited can reveal a lot about the inner workings of film and help students understand the art of filmmaking. Editing scenes from films, television shows, and other material in a classroom setting and then examining different versions of those scenes can help students become better editors and will help them evaluate/critique their future film and television work. The course is designed for students who have edited a number of exercises and films in previous classes. It provides an opportunity for students to develop advanced editing skills, while learning advanced digital editing techniques on the Adobe Premier. This is an advanced editing class, and not a course on how to use Premier. By editing scenes from episodic television shows, and other professionally shot footage, students will learn how to select (and reject) material, where and when to cut, how to create pace, how to control what the audience sees and does not see, how to add music and effects to increase the emotional content, and how to use visual effects to enhance the impact of the material.