Film

In The Super Mario Bros. Movie, plumes of dust fill the New York City streets as the monster Bowser attacks the city. Mario, seemingly beaten, hides in a pizzeria. What inspires him to keep fighting? He sees himself in a TV ad for his plumbing business, wearing a superhero cape and flying next to the Freedom Tower. He finds solace in the representation of himself as a superhero and in a city that refused to concede that the game was over after 9/11. Such a scene is emblematic of a seminar that will explore the superhero’s relationship to the city’s history and its traumas. Our eye will move between Hollywood blockbusters and global art cinema to help us mull how the superhero exemplifies, for some, the excesses of the U.S. during the global War on Terror. We will see Batman’s alter-ego Bruce Wayne run towards what looks like an imploding World Trade Center on 9/11 (Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice) and witness the superhero framed as an ideological smokescreen for the callous administration of George W. Bush who used the attacks to justify an endless war (The Broken Circle Breakdown).

While strongly focused on the post-9/11 superhero and its links to New York City, the cross-media seminar will track the superhero’s initial rise in popularity during the trauma of World War II. It will mobilize the archival resources of Columbia's Rare Book & Manuscript Library collections around the papers of noted X-Men writer Chris Claremont, so students can read how the artist conceived of bringing histories around the Holocaust into his spectacular stories. Such dips into the archives will help us assess how such empowered figures offer surprising routes of representation for the disenfranchised. We will also consider the authoritarian possibilities of the vigilante Batman, situating Frank Miller’s The Dark Knight Returns against a cultural study that draws links between the comic and Bernhard Goetz who killed four black teenagers in a Manhattan subway in 1984. To further frame how the superhero serves as a potent means of socio-political critique, acclaimed artists and writers will be invited into the classroom. These include Paul Pope whose Batman: Year 100 (2006) presents a dystopian superhero that allegorizes the oppressive aspects of the War on Terror’s surveillance regime. A culminating field trip to the National September 11 Memorial Museum will be organized. There, students will visit “The World Trade Center in the Popular Imagination” exhibit which showcases the decades-long link between the superhero and the architectural marvel in popular culture. Grounded in Columbia’s and New York City’s resources, profoundly interdisciplinary, and punctuated by artist perspectives, the class will ultimately offer students tools to perform theoretically incisive research on American pop culture that joyfully flies across boundaries.

Cinema and videogames are moving-image-based media, and, especially over the past two decades, they have been credited with influencing each other. But how deep do their similarities actually go? In what way do the possibilities available to game developers differ from those available to filmmakers? How does each medium segment and present space, time, and action? What aesthetic effects are open to games that are not open to cinema, and vice versa? This course offers a comprehensive exploration of the dynamic relationship between cinema and video games. Through a combination of film screenings, gameplay, theoretical reading/discussions, and practical assignments, students will examine the historical, cultural, aesthetic, and narrative connections between these two influential media forms. The course aims to foster an understanding of how cinema and video games intersect, inform, and influence one another, providing a unique perspective on storytelling techniques within these mediums. The course will culminate in a final presentation where students will adapt an existing intellectual property, preferably a film or TV show, into a video game (or vice versa), justifying their creative choices.

Traditionally, stories have followed a linear path, with a clear distinction between teller and audience. Yet, since the late 20th century, this model is shifting. Today, postmodern fiction, video games, interactive films, VR, participatory theater and immersive experiences offer audiences agency, creating a challenge for creators: how do they uphold narrative integrity while allowing for choice, collaboration, and remixing?

In this class, we’ll examine how modern narrative designers craft stories across media that invite audience participation. Through history, analysis, and workshops, we’ll explore how creators design for interaction while preserving tone and themes, turning audiences into active participants.

For the final assignment, students will develop a 12-15 minute pitch presentation for an original story concept, adapting it into an interactive format that balances strong authorial vision with audience agency.

Criticism is an important skill to have, to appreciate and understand film more. But criticism isn’t black and white, and most importantly, it can help inform us of how to shape, tell, and develop a story that resonates with the audience.

This course will begin by exploring the basics of film criticism and film appreciation, as students develop their skills in analyzing and identifying components that make a film work (or fall short). As they approach the second half of the course, students will transform their skills in critiquing into productive feedback and use what they’ve learned to form and develop stories of their own, write a 1-2 page treatment, and finally pitch their story ideas in front of the class.

Everyone is interested in telling a story, but through the lens of film criticism, students will appreciate the creative process and learn how it is empowered by what we watch and most importantly, how we watch. Students will use this summer course to identify and prepare for areas of focus that they might be interested in pursuing (screenwriting, directing, producing) in their academic career.

This class focuses on the role of a creative producer during development of low budget film. Students will learn the framework for identifying good stories and developing them into a 3-5 minute short screenplay. We will explore the fundamental aspects of script development and the collaborative relationship between a producer and writer during the development phase. Students will learn critical elements such as writing an effective logline, treatment, and screenplay, and how to provide constructive notes and script analysis thereafter. Through lectures, screenings, writing assignments, and discussions, students will complete the course having written a first draft of a  short screenplay, revision and set of written notes as a producer.

This practical lab focuses on the fundamental aspects of development, planning and preparation for low budget films. While using a short film script as their own case study – students will learn pitching, development, script breakdown, scheduling, budgeting and fundraising. Discussion of legal issues, location scouting, deliverables, marketing, distribution and film festival strategy will allow students to move forward with their own projects after completing the class. Using weekly assignments, in-class presentations and textbook readings to reinforce each class discussion topic, students will complete the class having created a final prep/production binder for their project, which includes the script breakdown, production schedule, line item budget, financing/fundraising plan and film festival strategy for their chosen script.

Each student develops an original series concept and an accompanying pilot script. The class includes the basics of how to build a series for network, cable and streaming. There is a focus on the pilot as both a successful episode and a blueprint for an ongoing series that has a strong enough premise to sustain dynamic stories for multiple seasons. 

In a step-by-step process, students move from series concept to pilot stories, to outline and lastly to script. Both half-hour and one-hour series are covered.

Modern feature-length screenplays demand a specific architecture. In this class students will enter with an idea for a film, and during the first eight sessions build a coherent treatment; that is, a summary of the events and major emotional arcs of the film's three acts. In the final four sessions students will begin and complete the first act of their feature-length screenplay.

COURSE DESCRIPTION: This class will teach revising an original pilot script. We will review the basics of writing scripts for TV with an emphasis on character, structure, and an eye towards the current marketplace. We will also prepare for a professional career in the writers room, pitching original pilots, and work towards revising this sample for staffing as well as selling.

REQUIREMENTS: Students will revise one original pilot script during the class, with at least 3 full revisions of script and completion of a 6 page pitch document totaling no more than 10-12 minutes of pitch time.

NOTE: Students who did not enroll in S4030 TV Writing in Summer Session A may enroll in TV Writing: Revision if they have a completed pilot. Applications will be reviewed and students will be notified of their acceptance.

CLASS DESIGN: This class will parallel the professional TV development and revision process as closely as possible, as well as mimic the atmosphere of a writers room revising an episode’s script after first draft to give students the feeling of both these situations.

Students will receive detailed notes and pitches from the room to revise their sample. They will also write up their series as a pitch document and pitch the show to the class. The goal is for each student to finish at least a third draft of the pilot by the end of the semester.

THE RULES: Everyone participates. This is a workshop class so both your work and your feedback are vital to your classmates. You will not pass this class without being an ACTIVE participant.

WORK is due 48 hours prior to class, As this is a revision class, the reading load will vary week to week, but it could require reading full revisions each week. Your fellow students will need time to give thorough notes and feedback.

FEEDBACK NOTES are given orally in class and due in written form by MIDNIGHT after class. 1/2 page of notes, per script, double spaced, 12 point font. These may be bullet points, paragraph, or specific page notes. But you must deliver at least a 1/2 page of feedback.

I do not want you sending your written notes to classmates before we discuss the scripts as it stifles discussion in the room, and calcifies notes in the writers mind. You will need to deliver your written notes into the class Google Folder for notes.

CLASS DECORUM: This class will operate like a writers room. I will be expecting note sessions to operate more like writers pitching on show. We will talk about pitch etiquette in class— but your notes should be prescriptive. It is on the writer to accept or reject your pitch. I want all of you to assume the role of showrunner/ creator for your own projects, accepting or rejecting pitches with respect and open mind, and helping us understand your intention for the script.

The seminar zero in on the relationship between Hollywood and the Chinese film industry as a case study to tease out a cluster of issues concerning the politics, economy, and culture of transnational entertainment and media practices. The course aims to introduce students to foundational texts as well as the most updated research topics and approaches concerning Chinese cinema and media. Seminar participants are encouraged to utilize the research tools learned in the class to explore their own research topics and facilitate their own research projects.

Documentaries are proliferating with increasing intensity around the world. They circulate as market commodities, forms of entertainment, and vehicles for social change. In this class we will compare different national and regional contexts of contemporary documentary, including projects created within the media industries of China, Cambodia, Chechnya, Ukraine, Nigeria, and India. We will also examine the presence of “the global” within the United States, which involves exploring questions of immigration, border-crossing, and transnational co-production. Crucial to our course will be the close analysis of how documentaries actively address civil rights struggles, oppressive government regimes, cultural trends, environmental crises, and progressive social movements to create more inclusive, equitable communities. So, too, will we examine emerging technologies (AI, virtual and augmented reality), star-studded film festivals, and the reach and impact of mega studios such as Netflix and Wanda. Guest speakers (scholars, filmmakers, programmers) working in the field will enrich our class discussions. Site visits will offer the opportunity to engage with documentary through the cultural offerings of the city. This course fulfills the Global Core requirement.