UWC G10 Film May '24

G10 Course Outline

"As we struggle to make sense of our place in the world, we think we have a clear grasp of the problems. But the problems we face today are based on how the world appears to work. Plato referred to these appearances as shadows. When we don’t understand how the world truly is—its deep structure—how can we fit into it? The solution is to use stories as a model. Story is innate to human beings. It’s how we learn. It’s how we process the world and how we find our place in it. If you understand story, you’ve got a framework for life." Truby, John. The Anatomy of Genres

• Genre Theory
  Genre as cultural memories. Have you ever wondered why we as an audience identify certain films as Horror, Drama, or Comedy? Genre theory helps us categorize films and reveals more about cultural norms than we realize. By viewing Dystopian films as allegories we can see how they warn about how things could go wrong if we don’t change, on the nightmare caused by humans trying to become all-powerful, and emphasize a society of slavery. Dystopian films can help us process our current world by showing us a future that might be, they don't predict the future, they criticize the present. This is the power of Genre Theory, it can help us categorize films and process the world and events we are living through. 

• Genre Deep-dive: Horror
  Vampires, werewolves, and ghosts. How is the Horror and Sci/Fi genre a form of mythmaking? How do filmmakers create suspense? How do horror and sci-fi films address our deepest anxieties about life and the nature of being human? How do the great filmmakers create suspense? We'll examine Hitchcock's directing style and compare how modern filmmakers like Jordan Peele transcend the Horror genre. 

• Auteur Theory and Film Criticism
  Who gets to be an Auteur, what makes an Auteur, can only  Directors become Auteurs?  We'll explore Auteur Theory, its problematic history, and demystify the Auteur to analyze how a writer, editor, director, and even an actor can be an Auteur, after all, the Mission Impossible franchise wouldn't be the Mission Impossible franchise without Tom Cruise. 

• Multi-genre films and modern storytelling
  Over a hundred years of filmmaking and millennia of storytelling have taught us one thing, there is no one way to tell a story, no one plot that will unlock an Academy Award. But, we have learned that mixing genres can make for great films. Why has the multi-genre film become the norm of modern storytelling? We'll explore multi-genre films and analyse why some genres seem to go together, and in the process start the creative process of subverting genre. 

• G10 Exhibition
  Grade 10 learners will curate their work made in the G9/10 UWC Film program and exhibit their work to the UWCSEA East public at the High School Library.

This exhibition is meant as a celebration of the films they have created in the UWCSEA East Film Program.