Film Studies

Component 1 (Examined) 35%: American Film

Hollywood since the 1960’s and Contemporary American Independent Film

Component 2 (Examined) 35%: European Film

British Film and Non-English Language European Film

For BOTH components, learners must study:

1. Two Hollywood films, one produced between 1961 and 1990 and the other more recent (a two-film study)
2. One contemporary American independent film (produced after 2010)

All films will be studied through the framework for studying film:

1. The key elements of film form – cinematography, mise-en-scène, editing and sound, which have significance both individually and in combination with one another
2. The structural elements of film form – narrative and the processes of narration, including the role of the screenplay in providing narrative structure, and genre (where relevant to the film studied)
3. How film creates meaning and generates response, including how it functions as a medium of representation
4. Film as an aesthetic medium
5. The spectator and spectatorship
6. The social, cultural, political, historical and institutional, including production, contexts of film
7. Critical approaches to studying film – arising from the idea of film as 'constructed' and including different conceptions of narrative.

Component 3 (Non Examined Assessment) 30%: Production

An extract from a film that highlights narrative construction OR a screenplay and digitally photographed storyboard.

Component 1 35%: American and British Film

Classical Hollywood, Hollywood since the 1960’s, Contemporary American Independent Film and British Film

Component 2 35%: Varieties of Film

Film Movements, Documentary Film, Global Film and The Short Film

For BOTH components, learners must study:

For this specification, these underpinning elements have been used to create a framework for studying film, which learners will be able to apply to all the films they explore:

1. The key elements of film form – cinematography, mise-en-scène, editing and sound, which have significance both individually and in combination with one another
2. The structural elements of film form – narrative and the processes of narration, including the role of the screenplay in providing narrative structure, and genre (where relevant to the film studied)
3. How film creates meaning and generates response, including how it functions as a medium of representation
4. Film as an aesthetic medium
5. The spectator and spectatorship
6. The social, cultural, political, historical and institutional, including production, contexts of film
7. Critical approaches to studying film – arising from the idea of film as 'constructed' and including different conceptions of narrative, ideology and the idea of the 'auteur'
8. Key debates (the realist versus the expressive in film and the digital) and filmmakers' theories of film.

Component 3 30%: Cross-Media Production

A complete short film (4-5 minutes) or a screenplay alongside an evaluation.