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Reading List

Film Year 1: preliminary reading list

Students are encouraged to acquire the following book, and to read it extensively before September. It is a core text for the compulsory module FLM4204 US Cinema: Key Concepts

  • Richard Barsam and Dave Monahan, Looking at the Movies: An Introduction to Film (New York: WW Norton, 2012, 4th edition).

Another very useful book is Annette Kuhn and Guy Westwell, the Oxford Dictionary of Film Studies (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2nd Edition, 2020). It is handy to have a copy of this on your desk but, once you are registered as a student, it can also be accessed via the QMUL library.

For FLM4202 Approaches and Analysis, the following books are recommended:

  • James Chapman, Cinemas of the World: Film and Society from 1895 to the Present, (London: Reaktion Books, 2003)
  • Russell Meeuf and Raphael Raphael (eds.) Transnational Stardom: International Celebrity in Film and Popular Culture (New York: Palgrave MacMillan, 2013) 

The following books will be referred to by lecturers teaching on first year modules, and will be useful for subsequent years of study:

  • Pam Cook (ed.), The Cinema Book (London: BFI, 2008, 3rd edition)
  • Elizabeth Ezra, European Cinema, (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2003)
  • Barry Grant (ed.), Auteurs and Authorship: A Film Reader (Wiley Blackwell, 2008)
  • Paul McDonald, The Star System: Hollywood and the Production of Popular Identities (London and New York: Wallflower Press, 2000)

Recommended preparatory reading for Scriptwriting: Creativity and Technique (semester 1 compulsory module for Single Honours only):

  • John Yorke, Into The Woods: How Stories Work and Why We Tell Them (Penguin Books, 2013)
  • Christopher Vogler, The Writer’s Journey: Mythic Structure for Storytellers and Screenwriters (Pan, 1998, 2nd edition)

Recommended reading for Production Skills (semester 2 compulsory module for Single honours only). Below is the book reference and a link to the text online via the QM Library.

Proferes, Nicholas. Film Directing Fundamentals : See Your Film Before Shooting, Taylor & Francis Group, 2004. ProQuest Ebook Central, https://ebookcentral.proquest.com/lib/gmul-ebooks/detail.action?docID=232113

Rosenthal, Alan, and Ned Eckhardt. Writing, Directing, and Producing Documentary Films and Digital Videos, Southern Illinois University Press, 2015. ProQuest Ebook Central, https://ebookcentral.proquest.com/lib/gmul-ebooks/detail.action?docID=4414608

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