Film Appreciation: How to Watch Movies Like A Professor (Premium Course)

Film Appreciation: How to Watch Movies Like A Professor

Professor Marc Lapadula / Yale University – $89 for the 2 class series.

The two classes are each 90 minutes and presented live from 7:00pm – 8:30pm ET

Thursday, February 11: Rebel Without a Cause (1955)

Thursday, February 18: Psycho (1960)

A link for viewing will be sent to you 1 day before the first class.

In addition to the seductive allure of Television in the 1950s, the intrusion of the House Un-American Activities Committee and its concomitant blacklist decimated the ranks of talented actors, producers, screenwriters, composers and directors and threatened to drain Hollywood’s once seemingly depthless talent pool. With this in mind, how did the decade of the 1950s and its after-effects that spilled over into the early 1960s manage to produce some of the most outstanding, provocative and controversial cinematic achievements in the history of the movies? The treacherous web of political limitations imposed at this time forced filmmakers to become much more sophisticated in the articulation and dissemination of their jaundiced view of society, compelling them to disguise their true artistic intentions and scathing critique of a culture headed towards self-destruction behind a mask of clever genre thrills. We will closely examine two outstanding films in their entirety that are shining examples

Part 1) Rebel Without a Cause – Starring James Dean and Natalie Wood, this classic 1956 film delves into the perpetual issues of teenage angst and rebellion in reaction and defiance to parental dysfunction and inaction. We will screen multiple clips from the movie that reveal director Nicholas Ray’s brilliant, multi-faceted portrayal of the social stresses put upon the nuclear family in upper middle-class suburban America during the decade immediately following World War II.

Part 2) Psycho (1960) For many scholars and movie critics, Alfred Hitchcock continues to be regarded as one of the most influential and significant filmmakers in the history of world cinema. Cultivating a career that spanned six decades, he found himself anointed the undisputed “Master of Suspense” with a slew of films that quite literally glued audience members to the edges of their seats. His subtexts masked a sophisticated creative ambition that he has rarely been fully given enough credit!

Marc Lapadula is a Senior Lecturer in the Film Studies Program at Yale University. He is a playwright, screenwriter and an award-winning film producer. In addition to Yale, Marc has taught at Columbia University’s Graduate Film School, created the screenwriting programs at both The University of Pennsylvania and Johns Hopkins where he won Outstanding Teaching awards and has lectured on film, playwriting and conducted highly-acclaimed screenwriting seminars all across the country at notable venues like The National Press Club, The Smithsonian Institution, The Commonwealth Club and The New York Historical Society.

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