Critical Essay Assignment

FA/FILM 1401 6.0 Introduction to Film (For Non-Majors) Fall/Winter 09-10 (McCullough)


CRITICAL ESSAY ASSIGNMENT

Due in tutorial March 30/31, 2010

- This is worth 25% of your final grade

- Late penalty: 5% per day off the graded result (not including weekends)

The essay must be on white 8 1/2” x 11” paper with a title page (including the essay title, the course number, your name, and your TA’s name), page numbers, and 1” margins. You should include a thesis statement, a methodological statement, a range of references to scholarly sources, and sequence analyses. As well, your essay should include proper footnotes or endnotes, bibliographical information, and a filmography.

For this assignment you will write a 7-10 page critical essay (~2,500 words). This is a formal essay (i.e., minimal first person perspective; presentation of a thesis substantiated by critical analysis and research). Your essay will be evaluated on the strength of the writing (including the clarity of the thesis statement, essay organization, and coherence of the presentation of evidence) and the quality of the research and critical analysis. You should use your assigned readings as exemplary film analyses and attempt to develop an essay writing style that is clear, well researched, and thoughtfully argued. Bordwell & Thompson include several sample analyses in their text and they discuss writing a critical essay on pp. 431-434.

Already, in your essay proposal, you will have indicated your thesis, your critical methodology and the sources that will help shape your argument. Your essay should use the proposal as a blueprint and you should include a variety of sequence analyses to illustrate your thesis. If your T.A. has indicated where your proposal could be improved you should make a special effort to respond to that advice in order to produce a stronger essay. While you may choose from a wide variety of topics, your essay must be rooted in the course material. For example, you may choose to write about a film, filmmaker, film movement, or film technique that we have studied in class; or, you may wish to analyze a film (not screened in class) using a critical methodology learned in the course (e.g., ideological, narrative, genre or formal analysis). Whenever possible you should use terminology, language and insights that derive from the material you have learned in the course. As a starting point, it would be useful to complete a sequence analysis (as Bordwell & Thompson have done with Citizen Kane) and this would indicate your comprehension of the formalist approach to film analysis and it would provide a way of organizing your thoughts about the films and prepare you for strong critical analyses. Because the range of possible topics and approaches for this project is wide and because there exist a number of easily accessible critical analyses of films (and thus the possibility for plagiarism is substantial), it is in your best interest to use as many opportunities to indicate that your essay is based on your own critical work and is based on material that you learned in the course. In short, you must demonstrate that your essay derives in a significant way from the course material.

Academic Honesty:


Any thesis or research which you borrow from another writer should be cited in a footnote, endnote or by other acceptable form of reference to source material. Theft of intellectual property is dealt with harshly by the university and can lead to academic penalty. For rules about plagiarism and other forms of academic dishonesty please refer to the Senate Policy on Academic Honesty. In this document there is ample discussion of the issue, including definitions of breach of academic honesty. Among other things the Senate policy discusses offences such as cheating; submission of one piece of work in satisfaction of two assignments without prior consent; impersonation; plagiarism and other misappropriation of the work of another; abuse of confidentiality; falsification or forgery of documents; obstruction of the academic activities of another; and aiding or abetting academic misconduct. If you are unclear about these definitions, please consult the course director or visit this location: http://www.yorku.ca/secretariat/legislation/senate/acadhone.html