Fall 2015 FILM STUDIES 212 Instructor: Zach Finch

TR 2:00pm-3:50pm Curtin 104

“Introduction to the Fantasy Film”

*More detailed syllabus forthcoming

Course Description

For the last decade-plus, the fantasy film reigns as one of the most popular (if not the most) of film genres. Billion-dollar franchises like The Lord of the Rings, Harry Potter, and The Chronicles of Narnia paved the way for many other recent fantasy film series based on popular books, like Percy Jackson and The Golden Compass, to hit cineplexes worldwide. At the same time, scholars and critics in recent years tackled some of the genre’s most pressing questions and issues. Clearly, fantasy is not just for children.

This course will confront the histories of fantasy fictions and fantasy on film. While fantasy fiction in the West has its roots in Homer and Ovid, Katherine Fowkes points out that “modern fantasy is an inheritance of the nineteenth century. The post-Enlightenment era with its increasingly rational and scientific worldview provided a specific moment that influenced the production and consumption of fantasy” (15). In addition to its reactions to the Industrial Revolution and the Enlightenment, Fowkes states that “changing conceptions of childhood coincided with a reconsideration of the role of imagination as both a mental faculty and an artistic product” (15). Modern fantasy provides a space for imagination and alternative ways of looking at and conceiving of the world (and, indeed, other worlds) in response to modern turns toward rationality, industrialization, and alienation.

As we think about fantasy film, we will work through several key concepts and points of critical contention. First, questions of genre definition will be ever-present as “fantasy” often slips into, and/or draws from, and/or assimilates science fiction and horror. As we attempt to describe the fantasy film, we will examine terms like “ontological rupture” (Fowkes) and the “fantastic” (Todorov), as well as the purposes of fantasy proposed by writers like J.R.R. Tolkien and W.R. Irwin. This class examines fantasy’s potential (often unfulfilled) to challenge the status quo, as noted by Rosemary Jackson. We will also talk about mythology and the works of Roland Barthes and Joseph Campbell as ways to identify mythic elements in fantasy films, and those elements’ significances in terms of societies’ ideologies, representations, and assumptions.

From the work of Melies to German Expressionist films like Die Nibelungen (1924) to The Wizard of Oz (1939) and beyond, films based on fantasy literature have been among the most beloved worldwide. Screenings will include films from the early twentieth-century to the present day. Some of the Required Readings will Include:

Campbell, Joseph. The Hero with a Thousand Faces. Princeton: Princeton UP, 1973.

Cogburn, Jon and Mark Silcox, eds. Dungeons and Dragons and Philosophy: Raiding the Temple of Wisdom. Chicago: Open Court, 2012.

Fowkes, Katherine. The Fantasy Film. West Sussex, UK: Blackwell, 2010.

Gilbey, Ryan. Groundhog Day. London: BFI, 2004

Irwin, W.R. The Game of the Impossible: A Rhetoric of Fantasy. Urbana: University of Illinois P, 1976.

Jackson, Rosemary. Fantasy: The Literature of Subversion. New York: Metheuen, 1981.

Todorov, Tzvetlan. The Fantastic: A Structural Approach to a Literary Genre. Trans. Richard Howard. Ithaca, NY: Cornell UP, 1975.

Other selections may be read from canonical fantasy literature, possibly including:

The 1,001 Nights Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland and/or Through the Looking Glass by Lewis Carroll Peter Pan by J.M. Barrie The Lord of the Rings by J.R.R. Tolkien The Chronicles of Narnia by C.S. Lewis The Golden Compass by Philip Pullman

* You will not be required to purchase texts for this course!

Some of the Screenings will Include:

Georges Melies selections Lost Horizon (1937) Harvey (1950) Brigadoon (1954) Groundhog Day (1993) Harry Potter and the Sorcerer’s Stone (2001) The Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring OR The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey (2001, 2012) The Chronicles of Narnia: The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe (2005) Pan’s Labyrinth (2006) (Mexico/Spain) Academic Exercises

- 7-10, two-page (double-spaced) screening responses on the film and readings for each week - Mid-term exam on readings, key terms, film information - Small group presentation on a film, focusing on production, reception, key themes and ideas - Film Analysis Paper, 8-10 pages

Working Grade Breakdown

Attendance and In-Class Participation (20%) Screening Responses (25%) Small Group Presentation (10%) Mid-Term Exam (15%) Film Analysis Paper (25%)

Course Objectives

1. Improve critical thinking, reading, viewing, speaking, and writing skills. 2. To enhance students’ appreciation of, and engagement with, film and film studies. 3. To challenge and revise the idea that the fantasy film is the most “escapist” of all genres in an “escapist” medium and thus less worthy of study than other types of cinema. 4. To reach a better understanding of the world through critical engagement with fantasy that values leisure, joy, wonder, and imagination equally as much as reason, efficiency, and utility.

General Education Requirement

This course meets the criteria for General Education Requirement Humanities credit at UWM by addressing “questions, issues and concepts basic to the formation of character and the establishment of values in a human context; … induc[ing] an organic study of letters and knowledge; [and providing] literary, aesthetic and intellectual experiences which enrich and enlighten human life,” as specified in UWM Faculty Document No. 1382. The course uses humanistic means of inquiry, including critical use of sources and evaluation of evidence, judgment and expression of ideas, and organizing, analyzing and using creatively substantial bodies of knowledge drawn from both primary and secondary sources. In addition to addressing other GER Humanities criteria, the course introduces substantial and coherent bodies of historical, cultural and literary knowledge to illuminate human events in their complexities and varieties, and enhances appreciation of literary and other arts by thoughtful, systematic analyses of language and artifacts such as novels, stories and films.

UWM seeks Essential Learning Outcomes throughout the undergraduate curriculum in four key areas: Knowledge of Human Cultures and the Physical and Natural World; Intellectual and Practical Skills; Personal and Social Responsibility; and Integrative Learning. GER courses in particular contribute to these learning outcomes. Student work in GER courses is assessed individually for course-specific outcomes and goals, and holistically as part of departmental self- assessment of learning outcomes throughout the major.