While arts education is not currently prioritized by Bulgaria's conservative educational administration, non-governmental organizations such as Arte Urbana Collectif are pursuing a series of initiatives and projects in film education, geared specifically towards bringing together teachers and professionals. Here, we present an interview with…

In 2008 the New South Wales Board of Studies included Hayao Miyazaki's film "Spirited Away" as the prescribed text for the Higher School Certificate Japanese Extension course. A study of the film in this context requires students to engage with the text in three distinct ways: through language, cultural symbolism and relevance, and…

This essay examines Michael Winterbottom's 2002 film "In This World," which follows the journey of two Afghan migrants from Peshawar to London. Winterbottom's preparation involved travelling from London to Peshawar and then in reverse overland as far as Istanbul; he then returned to Peshawar and filmed the same journey using two…

A theoretical and historical account of the main preoccupations of makers of abstract films is presented in this book. The book's scope includes discussion of nonrepresentational forms as well as examination of experiments in the manipulation of time in films. The ten chapters discuss the following topics: art and cinematography, the first…

Recent instructional trends in the field of TESOL emphasize teaching language through course content. The dual focus of content-based English instruction (CBI) provides a way for language teachers to engage learners with challenging material while increasing their linguistic proficiency. This article describes a unit in a CBI course at a Japanese…

Muses on the reasons for a "director's cut" of the 1969 Soviet film "The Color of Pomegranates," produced after the official version had initially been heavily reedited. Offers historical background on the film. States that it places unusual demands on its audiences, especially because of its density of texture and its…

Examines the film "The Reincarnation of Golden Lotus" and the text upon which it is loosely based, the "Chin P'ing Mei," and the relationship between it and modern Chinese culture. States that the film's screenplay is much less an adaptation of the source novel than it is a female-centered reworking of a particular narrative…

Uses a case study of V. Pudovkin's film, "Return of Vasilii Bortnikov" (1953), to (1) address the possible influence of Hollywood-style continuity on the basic film technique of Soviet Socialist Realism; and (2) account for how the American model may have been modified as it was adapted to the Soviet situation. (PA)

This critical analysis focuses on the movement vocabulary and interaction of dancers in selected sections of the filmed version of "White Man Sleeps" (1988) by Siobhan Davies. The choreography is divided into five distinct parts, in accordance with divisions in the musical accompaniment from which the piece takes its name, a suite of…

This paper suggests ways in which video can be used in teaching college literature and cinema courses in order to promote audiovisual literacy. The method proposed presupposes an approach to narrative through narratology, the discipline that examines texts of narrative fiction as narratives, irrespective of their mode of manifestation (verbal,…

Akira Kurosawa, the most popular Asian film maker with audiences in the United States, has found in William Shakespeare's plays themes and plots that resonate within Japanese culture. While the translations of "Macbeth" into "Throne of Blood" and "King Lear" into "Ran" are quite direct and literal with only…

This paper outlines the fourth-year film appreciation course at Rand College of Education in Johannesburg, South Africa, designed to develop a greater critical awareness in students so they are able to distinguish between good and mediocre film and video material. Some attempt is made to establish what qualifies material to be regarded as…

Provides guidelines for instructors who teach entire courses on (or who include) films from Japan and China. Considers issues of concern in contemporary Asian cinema such as conflicts between tradition and modernity, indigenous definitions of cultural identity and artistic form, and internationalization. (KEH)

A film presented as factual may permit critical responses that question its purported factual objectivity and political neutrality. In class, Hans-Georg Gadamer's concept of effective-historical consciousness can be used to evaluate the allegedly propagandistic messages in Leni Riefenstahl's "Triumph of the Will." Analysis of this 1934…