Film studies
Enjoy a fresh look at big screen classics, ground-breaking titles and cult favourites featuring a cast of iconic names, former stars and the men and women who called the shots.
Check out our blog post on our new Cultureplex Ciné-Club, where once a week, for 12 weeks (and throughout the academic year in terms 2 and 3), we will watch and discuss film.
Study in-person, or online from the comfort of home, with classes that allow you to participate in discussions with fellow adult students and share your passion for Film as part of a learning community. We offer daytime, evening and weekend courses, both short and long. Our tutors are experts in their fields and experienced educators. Tutors share their knowledge and passion for Film through presentations, screenings, interactive discussion, analysis, and other activities.
Many students return to take more courses, telling us they enjoy being part of our City Lit literary community. Our popular courses often sell out quickly, so we invite you to browse and book your place now.
- The occult on screenCourse start date: Tue 30 Apr 2024
Location on this date: Keeley Street
Tutors: Gillian McIverSurprisingly, not every film that features the occult is a horror film. Certainly, many of them are; we will consider classics such as Haxan from 1922, Rosemary’s Baby, The Craft, Angel Heart, The Witch and Hereditary. Other films, such as Kenneth Anger's Lucifer Rising and A Dark Song, attempt to treat the occult seriously as secret or hidden knowledge. We'll examine the cultural backdrop of occult films and questions of representation, gender relations, and spirituality.Full fee £149.00 Senior fee £149.00 Concession £97.00 - How to read a film: a beginners' guide to cinemaCourse start date: Mon 13 May 2024 (and 2 other dates)
Location on this date: Keeley Street
Tutors: Paul SuttonThis course will develop your critical appreciation of the cinema by teaching you how to read and understand film texts. We will look at the elements that underpin film form – narrative, mise en scène, cinematography, editing and sound – alongside its historical development. We will consider film style by exploring classical, post-classical and art cinema and we will examine influential critical modes of analysis, such as genre, authorship and spectatorship.Full fee £149.00 Senior fee £119.00 Concession £97.00 - Reading images: exploring film studiesCourse start date: Wed 29 May 2024
Location on this date: Keeley Street
Tutors: Cristina MassaccesiThis comprehensive introductory course provides an overview of the main historical, technical and theoretical aspects of filmmaking and film analysis. In its exploration of aspects of film theory as it relates to film aesthetics and film history, the course develops certain ideas with rigour and depth.Full fee £99.00 Senior fee £99.00 Concession £64.00 - Fifties MusicalsCourse start date: Wed 16 Oct 2024
Location on this date: Keeley Street
Tutors: John Wischmeyer“The more beautiful everything is, the more it will hurt without you”—Gene Kelly as An American in Paris (1951) singing to Leslie Caron. Happy endings are hard won in fifties’ musicals and The End is where they were heading. MGM was the studio of musicals in the 1950s. During this decade other studios presented only occasional musicals. The musical was big business for Hollywood in the 1950s and so was the western, so bringing them together made sense. Annie Get Your Gun had been a big success for MGM so Warner Bros. decided to get a piece of the action with Calamity Jane (1953 David Butler with Doris Day). Judy Garland was sacked by MGM in 1951, then followed Joan Crawford to Warner Brothers where she staged a big comeback in, fittingly, A Star is Born (1954 George Cukor). Oklahoma (1955 Fred Zinnemann) and Carousel (1956 Henry King) from 20th Century Fox introduced Shirley Jones. And don’t forget Leonard Bernstein’s score for On the Waterfront (1954) that anticipated West Side Story (1961). (See related courses on Fifties Melodrama and Film Noir and 50 Films From the ‘50s: Hollywood’s Last Stand).Full fee £169.00 Senior fee £135.00 Concession £110.00
Can't see a course you want?
Add this category to your waiting list to set up alerts and we will update you when new courses are released online.
Add me to waiting list