Option C: Representations of the Other Europe: Cinema in Communist and Post-Communist Central and Eastern Europe

ECTS allocation : 10 credits (22 contact hours; plus student workload of 220 hours)
Module Coordinators : Justin Doherty and Balázs Apor
Teaching Staff : Justin Doherty, Balázs Apor, Ewa Grzegorczyk, Jana Fischerová, Clemens Ruthner

Aims

The aim of the course is to explore the experience of Communism and its aftermath in a number of East and Central European countries, as expressed through the medium of film.

Working methods

The course will follow a standard lecture-seminar format. Each week students will be required to familiarize themselves with a set film work or body of work, as well as to complete reading assignments; students will have the opportunity to present their own work individually in the form of seminar papers, to be delivered in the second (seminar) hour on a weekly basis. Knowledge of the relevant languages is not a requirement for this course.

Learning outcomes

Students should be able to

• Appreciate and analyze critically cinematic works from a range of East and Central European cultures
• Have a critical understanding of the experience of living in Communist societies
• Have a critical understanding of the problems and challenges faced by post-Communist societies

Syllabus

Topics:

Hungary (BA):
Peter Bacso: A tanu (The witness) 1969
Marta Meszaros: Temetetlen halott (The unburied dead), 2004

Russia (JD):
Andrei Tarkovsky, Mirror, 1974
Nikita Mikhalkov, Burnt by the Sun, 1994

Poland (EG):
Krzysztof Zanussi, Camouflage (1977)
Krysztof Kieslowski, Dekalog (Decalogue) 1988

Czech Republic (Jana Fisherová, UCD)
Jiri Menzel, Closely Observed Trains, 1966
Jan Sverák, Kolja (Kolya), 1996

Former Yugoslavia/Balkans (CR)
Theo Angelópoulos, Le Regard d'Ulysse, 1995
Emir Kusturica, Underground,1995

Assessment

Students will write an essay of 3,500-5,000 words on an approved topic relating to the content of the course.

Preliminary Bibliography :

• Anikó, Imre, East European Cinemas . New York: Routledge, 2005
• Apor, Péter and Sarkisova, Oksana (eds), Past for the eyes : East European representations of communism in cinema and museums after 1989 . Budapest: Central European University Press, 2008
• Goulding, Daniel   J. (ed.) Post New Wave Cinema in the Soviet Union and Eastern Europe. Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1989.
• Hill, John and Pamela Church Gibson (eds) The Oxford Guide to Film Studies. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1998.
• Iordanova, Dina. Cinema of the Other Europe: The Industry and Artistry of East Central European Film. London: Wallflower, 2003.
• Liehm, Mira and Antonín J. Liehm. The Most Important Art: Eastern European Film after 1945. Berkeley: University of California Press, 1977.
• Skvorecký, Josef. All the Bright Young Men and Women:   A Personal History of the Czech Cinema. Toronto: Peter Martin, 1971.
• Taylor, Richard et al, The BFI Companion to Eastern European and Russian Cinema. London: British Film Institute, 2000