One consequence of co-editing The Routledge Companion to World Cinema is that one’s horizons are continually expanding, as is one’s ‘to watch’ (i.e. to buy) list as fascinating films are described in chapters like restaurant reviews offering haptic descriptions of great meals.
The problem is that when I find time to do my day job, which means designing new modules for undergraduate students, my choices as to content have become so ample that I struggle to contain the films I want to teach in the few weeks available per term.
And you would think that a module title like American and World Cinema 1 and 2 would be a doddle, right?
American and World Cinema 1 was. That was based on the dialogues and discourses that have been taking place since forever and have underpinned my own research and writing and teaching for many years. But for part 2, knowing that sequels are usually inferior, I wanted to aim for a Coppolaesque redux. Ten weeks is not enough for a world survey. I wouldn’t even get out of the Midlands. So it had to be thematic. But I didn’t want to go the auteurist route so it seemed like genre might be a good idea.
Current thinking is gangs and gangsters in World cinema.
Yeah? Not bad? You’d quite like to do a module on that? Me too.
Here’s what I have on the syllabus so far. Remember it’s a film per week for ten weeks. Order to be revised, no doubt.
Tsotsi
City of God
Sonatine
Chungking Express
La Haine
A Bittersweet Life
The Harder They Come
Sin nombre
Animal Kingdom
The Wire
Okay so far?