Film History Short Paper outside resources
Short Paper Prompt
Answer the following question using roughly two pages.
You may use other resources if you’d like (outside resources), but do so sparingly.
Don’t cite Wikipedia. Use a proper citation style (e.g., Chicago, MLA) of your choice and provide a full bibliography at the end of your paper. Write using 1” margins, double spaced, and size 12 Times or Times New Roman font.
For this particular assignment, make sure to use the YouTube link of your chosen film in order to identify for your instructor the time code of the shots you’re analyzing (e.g., [30:20-30:25]).
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ycLOeCLJ9V0&feature=youtu.be
In A History of Narrative Film, David A. Cook writes that, in the 1920s, “studios became great factories for the large-scale production of mass commercial entertainment” (120). With focused writing that covers sufficient historical detail, explain in your first paragraph what Cook means by this. Why and how did studios develop this way?
For your second paragraph, pick two sequential shots to analyze from either The Immigrant (Charlie Chaplin 1917) or Sherlock, Jr. (Buster Keaton 1924). Use your topic sentence to state a clear argument about what these two shots together accomplish within the larger film. Then analyze in detail these two shots using formal terms (including correctly identifying shot types and analyzing the shots’ mise en scène) in a way that supports your argument. Finally, conclude your paragraph by stating how this shot fits within Cook’s assessment of Chaplin’s or Keaton’s larger artistic aims.
You are encouraged to sparingly employ quotes and citations from Cook to support your paper.
Shot types:
-Long shot
-Medium-long shot
-Medium shot
-Medium close-up
-Close-up
-Extreme close-up
