FILM M315-001 DIRECTING FOR CAMERA Course Term: SPRING 2021 Course Location: CM Building, Rm 422/402 Class hours: MW, 3:30-4:45 Screening: W, 4:55-7:35 Instructor: Miles Doleac, PhD Office Location: CM Building 412 Phone: 504-865-3430 Email:
[email protected] Office hours: Tu/Th, 11:15-1:00, M-W 2:00-3:15 or by appointment “To make a film is easy; to make a good film is war. To make a very good film is a miracle.” -Alejandro Gonzalez Inarritu REQUIRED TEXTS: Lumet, Sidney. Making Movies. New York: Vintage Books, 1996. Rabiger, Michael and Hurbis-Cherrier, Mick. Directing: Film Techniques and Aesthetics, 6th edition. London: Routledge Press, 2020. Weston, Judith. Directing Actors: Creating Memorable Performances for Film & Television. Studio City: Michael Wiese Books, 1999 COURSE AIM: This course aspires to answer seemingly simple questions: What does a director do? What is the director’s relationship and responsibility to the film? How should a director talk to actors and achieve the desired performance from said actors? How should they communicate their vision to cinematographers? In addition, the course screens and examines films from directors, who have been considered influential and/or pathbreaking in the medium and seeks to unpack, understand, and analyze the reasons for their significance. Directors are often likened to conductors. The best of them are able to deliver a clear, consistent vision, while enlisting cast and crew members to contribute their own unique talents and perspectives to serving that vision. We will cover every element of the directing process from script analysis to the editing room as we try to uncover the secrets to that elusive brand of direction that leads to the telling of coherent, entertaining, surprising, and inevitable stories.