SYLLABUS

COURSE REQUIREMENTS

Readings

Required:

Begleiter, Marci 2001 From Word to Image: Storyboarding and the Filmmaking Process National Book Network, CA
McCloud, Scott; 1993 Understanding Comics, The Invisible Art Kitchen Sink Book, Harper Perennial NY

Recommended

Berger, Arthur Asa; 1978 The Comic Stripped American Penguin Books; NY
Perry, George and Alan Aldridge; 1971 The Penguin Book of Comics Penguin Books, Alan Lane, The Penguin Press London and Baltimore
Wertham, Frederic; 2004 Seduction of the Innocent Main Road Books, Laurel NY (This is a reprinted version)

Assignements

Attendance

TENTATIVE LIST OF FILMS TO BE SHOWN

FIRST WEEK

Jan 2: Older comic book films: Joe Palooka, Li'L Abner
Jan 3: comics made from single panels - not sequential art: Adams Family/ Adams Family Values
Jan 4: Comics as biography: American Splendor
Jan 5: Comics look at history: Prince Valiant

SECOND WEEK

Jan 8: Sex and comics: Barbarella
Jan 9: Comics as Musicals: Annie/Li'L Abner
Jan 10: Films that look like comics: Dick Tracey
Jan 11: Graphic Novels: Sin City
Jan 12: Superheroes week: What started the big budget films: Superman the Movie

THIRD WEEK

Jan 15: NO CLASSES
Jan 16: Superheroes week: What is a superhero? Batman/Batman Begins
Jan 17: Superheroes week: Spiderman
Jan 18: Superheroes week: X-Men
Jan 19: Final Examination

In addition to the films listed above, the serial Flash Gordon will be shown in "installments" - one episode per class meeting.

Films made from comics or graphic novels are both similar and dissimilar to other films. Like other films, there is a text and subtext which need to be analyzed and like other films, there are the standard questions of how the films approach the subject matter filmicly.

The "Films from comics" genre (if that term is appropriate) differ from other films in several ways in which the following are a few.

. (a) genre in that it is adapted from a visual medium which has in general been seen by millions of people odd who come with certain expectations about what should happen. Although there is some parallel with theater performances, this is somewhat different because the visual medium of comics is not live. There would have to be some discussion about a drawn character = animated in some cases; a drawn character played by a human; a drawn character played in part by a human and in other parts as CGI and finally a drawn character depicted solely in CGI.

(b) There are relationships between story boards and comics which may in some way make them a natural match for films

(c) There is a question about how much of the visual style of the film is carried over from the art work itself. Backgrounds drawn in like comic book – Flash Gordon, Dick Tracy, Sin City etc.

(d) There are parallels with other genres in that “origin” stories in the super hero sub-genre are as well known as bible stories so that the audience already knows the story, rarely tolerates any variation from the origin story or of the main characters’ basic personalities. Non origin stories have greater latitude but certain kinds of violations are acceptable and other not. There is a great deal of social comment about these things.

(e) The transformation into very different genres (e.g. musicals – Annie from Little orphan Annie, Li’l Abner from Li’l Abner.

(f) The initial appearance of comic book characters in serials (Flash Gordon, Buck Rogers and even earlier silent serials)

POSSIBLE FILMS FOR CONSIDERATION FOR PAPERS
(Others may be used)

OLDER COMICS

COMICS MADE INTO MUSICALS

GRAPHIC NOVELS