ME3417 The Middle Ages and the Movies
   
Lecturer Professor Robert Bartlett (Room 9, 71 South Street)
   
Credits 30
   
Availability 2012-13, Semester 1
   
Class Hour View Timetable
   
Description This course examines the ways mediaeval themes have been presented in the cinema over the last century, by taking exemplary films from different countries and epochs. The purpose is to explore each on three levels: the mediaeval reality, the subsequent legendary or literary elaboration, and the twentieth-century film rendition, regarded equally as work of art, ideology and economic product. The selection of films studied may vary from year to year.
   
Basic Reading
  • Stuart Airlie, "Strange Eventful Histories: The Middle Ages in the Cinema", in The Medieval World, ed. Peter Linehan and Janet L. Nelson (London, 2001), cap. 10  
  • Kevin Harty (ed.), King Arthur on Film: New Essays on Arthurian Cinema (Jefferson, North Carolina, 1999)
  • Kevin Harty, The Reel Middle Ages … Films about Medieval Europe (Jefferson, North Carolina,1999)
   

Course Structure

Two one-hour meetings per week
   
Assessment

60% examination - 3-hour paper
40% coursework - 3 pieces of work one of which may be an oral assessment
   

Learning Outcomes
  • Knowledge of various mediaeval topics
  • Awareness of the way stories or themes can be transmuted by legendary or literary associations
  • Sensitivity to the demands and limitations of representation of historical topics in film
 
   
Restrictions None