The course will review the main phases and steps of film production, from writing to editing - analogue and digital - up to post-production techniques; the fundamental syntactic figures of the film will be analysed in the classroom, with examples taken from films that are significant for the history of cinema; after an in-depth historical survey, the language of the film will be discussed in relation to contemporary modes of production and students will be led to reflect on the main theories on digital media.
In addition to a historical-theoretical survey of movements, forms of production and authors in the history of cinema, the course will focus on the analytical perspective of the language of film.

FIRST PART. LANGUAGE AND PRODUCTION.
Elements of narratology; framing; camera movements; grammar of editing, between analogue and digital; sound; post-production and special effects, from analogue to digital.

SECOND PART. A DIACHRONIC JOURNEY THROUGH THE HISTORY OF CINEMA
Historical and technological transitions in the history of cinema; documentary and non-fiction; modern cinema; video art; transition from analogue to digital; contemporary aesthetics and found-footage.

THIRD PART. DIGITAL LANDSCAPES
Serial narratives between technological horizon and cultural practices; digital media theory; remix culture practices; artificial intelligences.

David Bordwell, Kristin Thompson, Film History: An Introduction, McGraw-Hill, New York 2018 [1st edition: 1998].

Brian McKernan, Digital Cinema: The Revolution in Cinematography, Post-Production, and Distribution, McGraw-Hill, New York 2005.

Robert Edgar-Hunt, John Marland, Steven Rawle, The Language of Film, AVA Publishing, Lausanne 2010.


The following films, discussed in class, are recommended for viewing:
Nosferatu (Nosferatu, eine Symphonie des Grauens, Friedrich W. Murnau, 1922)
Battleship Potëmkin (Bronenosets Potëmkin, Sergej M. Ėjzenštejn, 1925)
Bringing Up Baby! (Howard Hawks, 1938)
Citizen Kane (Orson Welles, 1941)
Rome Open City (Roma città aperta, Roberto Rossellini, 1945)
Bicycle Thief (Ladri di biciclette, Vittorio De Sica, 1948)
Rear Window (Alfred Hitchcock, 1954)
400 Blows (Les Quatre Cents Coups, Francois Truffaut, 1959)
Breathless (À bout de souffle, Jean-Luc Godard, 1960)
8½ (Federico Fellini, 1963)
Blow up (Michelangelo Antonioni, 1966)
Once Upon a Time in the West (C’era una volta il west, Sergio Leone, 1968)
2001: A Space Odyssey (Stanley Kubrick, 1968)
The Conformist (Il conformista, Bernardo Bertolucci, 1970)
Taxi Driver (Martin Scorsese, 1976)
Star Wars (George Lucas, 1977)
Blade Runner (Ridley Scott, 1982)
Body Double (Brian De Palma 1984)
Pulp Fiction (Quentin Tarantino, 1994)
Toy Story (John Lasseter, 1995)
Matrix (Larry & Andy Wachowski, 1999)
Amélie (Le Fabuleux Destin d'Amélie Poulain, Jean-Pierre Jeunet, 2001)
The House of Flying Daggers (Shí miàn mái fú, Zhang Yimou, 2004)
The divine (Il divo, Paolo Sorrentino, 2008)
Avatar (James Cameron, 2009)
Interstellar (Christopher Nolan, 2014)
The Shape of Water (Guillermo del Toro, 2017)
Luca (Enrico Casarosa, 2021)