IT314 ITALIAN CINEMA: INDIVIDUAL PERSPECTIVES ESSAY TOPICS, 2014-15 You are required to write an essay of EITHER 2,500 words, worth 50% of your overall mark for the module (plus a onehour written exam in summer 2015, also worth 50%) OR 5,000 words, worth 100% of your overall mark for the module. One word-processed copy of your essay must be uploaded via Tabula, and a hard copy handed in to Harpal Singh, the Italian Departmental Secretary (H405), by 4pm on Monday 5th January 2015 (term 2, week 1). See your handbook and the Department’s Guide to Essay Writing (http://www2.warwick.ac.uk/fac/arts/italian/current/resources/) for full details of how to produce and submit an assessed essay. You are reminded of the penalty for late submission of assessed course work: 5% of the total mark attainable (100%) per day of late submission will be deducted from the mark awarded for the work, up to a maximum of 20% deducted from work submitted on Friday of the week of the deadline. Work submitted after Friday will be awarded a mark of zero. Please also note that plagiarism will be penalized. For guidance, see the relevant section in the Department’s Guide to Essay Writing and the plagiarism statement from the University Calendar, displayed on the Italian Department's noticeboard. Questions for 2,500-word essays: You may wish to devise your own essay question; if so, please see me before the end of term to agree the question. 1. Outline and discuss the ways in which Bellissima AND/OR another of the films you have studied offers a series of reflections on cinema as creative practice and as popular cultural product. 2. ‘[The] domain of the irrational is, for Fellini, the ultimate source of artistic inspiration and creativity’ (BONDANELLA). Discuss, with close reference to Otto e mezzo AND/OR to another film you have studied for this module. 3. ‘If there is essentialism in Antonioni, it is the essentialism of the unconscious, of the absolute impenetrability that qualifies the most intimate core of the subject’ (VIGHI). Discuss the representation of subjecthood with close reference to Il deserto rosso AND/OR to another film you have studied for this module. P.T.O. Jennifer Burns H4.11 j.e.burns@warwick.ac.uk IT314 ITALIAN CINEMA: INDIVIDUAL PERSPECTIVES 4. Outline and discuss the impact of gender roles on constructions of the self, as expressed in ONE OR MORE of the films which you have studied for this module. 5. Outline and discuss the representation of friendship, and/or the absence of it, in ONE OR MORE of the films which you have studied for this module. 6. Outline and discuss the motif of adventure as expressed in ONE OR MORE of the films which you have studied for this module. 7. Outline and discuss the representation and function of space (interior and/or exterior, urban and/or rural, built and/or natural environments) in relation to individual consciousness in ONE OR MORE of the films which you have studied for this module. 8. With close reference to ONE film studied for this module, analyse ONE of the following aspects of film form and style: mise-en-scène cinematography sound editing. Topics for 5,000-word essays: For the longer essay, you are expected to devise an essay title of your own, which you should develop with the advice of the module tutor. The following offer some suggestions of areas you may wish to consider, but are by no means exhaustive. Please identify a topic of interest (either one of those below or one of your own making) and then arrange an appointment with me to discuss it. autobiography and/or memory dream and fantasy gender and sexualities innocence and/or corruption psychoanalysis and/or neurosis self-referentiality intertextuality and intermedia citation point of view the interaction between subjectivity or individual consciousness and objective reality detailed sequence analysis of a number of sequences from one or more films Jennifer Burns H4.11 j.e.burns@warwick.ac.uk