Directions:

1. Choose two of the questions listed below.
2. Choose scenes from the films you are writing about. Carefully review and take notes on the scenes you are writing about to use these as supporting details.
3. Number and answer the questions you have chosen.
4. Submit your writing as a file upload below. It will be run through Turnitin.com to check for originality of the material. This exam is due on  March 4th at 11:59pm.
   

In order to earn high scores, you will need to make an argument, with a straightforward thesis statement, defend your argument using ideas from the readings or examples from the films and clips seen in class, and provide specific analysis of ideas or scenes. Be as specific as possible in your answers. Demonstrate that you know the material and can synthesize it into a developed argument (about three paragraphs).

Requirements:

• Double-spaced, MLA Format
• The response to each question should be at least 1.5 double-spaced pages, no more than 3 pages per response. The exam cannot be longer than 6 double-spaced pages.
• Copy the number of the prompt and the question and paste it at the top of each of your responses.
• Each argument or response should be distinct; you may refer to or draw from points you’ve made in the other prompt, but make sure that you are writing two separate responses. 
• Do not copy or re-use analyses of scenes done for classwork already. 
• If any additional sources are cited, please include an MLA Works Cited page at the end of the exam. 

Question prompts (choose and respond to two only):

1. Carefully review a scene from Sherlock Jr., Brazil or M. Describe the mise-en-scene and the development and use of cinematic space, including details about some of the following: the use of off-screen space, lighting, blocking, costume, positions of the actors relative to the camera. Demonstrate how the film’s use of space coincides with its theme or motifs by making a concise argument.

2. Of the films seen in class, which one best exemplifies the ideas in Andre Bazin’s “Ontology of the Photographic Image?” In your response you must summarize and outline the main ideas in the article; you must also briefly summarize the plot and main characters of the film. Then, analyze a scene that you have selected from the film to show how its cinematography, lighting and mise-en-scene exemplify Andre Bazin’s ideas about the nature of photography and cinema.

3. Compare and contrast Brazil and The Truman Show/The Conformist by considering how the ideas in Edward Branigan’s “Apparatus Theory” can be applied to analyzing the spectator’s position in cinema. Be sure to make an overarching argument about whether these two films can be considered more alike or more different on the basis of your comparisons.

4. At the beginning of the course, we spent time discussing the concept of film diegesis. Choose one example of diegetic sound that represents or symbolizes a thematic aspect of a film we have viewed in class. How does the use of this diegetic sound structure, strengthen, complicate, or perhaps detract, from the film’s expression and meaning?

5. Choose one of the assigned chapters in Filmish: The Eye, The Body, Sets and Architecture, Voice and Language, or Time. In essay form, summarize the main ideas and the supporting details/ideas in the chapter. Apply three main or supporting ideas in that chapter to films viewed in class. These cannot be scenes that we have already analyzed in the class but may include other scenes that have not already been examined. Keep in mind that you should use this question as a prompt for writing a specific argument about how the ideas in a chapter in Filmish are applicable to the film you’ve chosen.