FM5106 Film Theory: Fundamentals and Futures

Academic year

2025 to 2026 Semester 1

Further information on which modules are specific to your programme.

Key module information

SCOTCAT credits

30

The Scottish Credit Accumulation and Transfer (SCOTCAT) system allows credits gained in Scotland to be transferred between institutions. The number of credits associated with a module gives an indication of the amount of learning effort required by the learner. European Credit Transfer System (ECTS) credits are half the value of SCOTCAT credits.

SCQF level

SCQF level 11

The Scottish Credit and Qualifications Framework (SCQF) provides an indication of the complexity of award qualifications and associated learning and operates on an ascending numeric scale from Levels 1-12 with SCQF Level 10 equating to a Scottish undergraduate Honours degree.

Planned timetable

TBC

This information is given as indicative. Timetable may change at short notice depending on room availability.

Module coordinator

Dr P Flaig

Dr P Flaig
This information is given as indicative. Staff involved in a module may change at short notice depending on availability and circumstances.

Module Staff

Dr Paul Flaig

This information is given as indicative. Staff involved in a module may change at short notice depending on availability and circumstances.

Module description

This module offers an advanced survey of the fundamental approaches and future pathways of film theory. It introduces foundational methods and concepts within this field while also charting developments of the last two decades as filmmakers and scholars have responded to technological shifts, cultural upheavals and conceptual turns. Between film theory’s varied histories and its nascent possibilities, each week tackles a theme or figure by placing canonical and recent texts in dialogue with a twenty-first century screen work. The module addresses both long-standing and emerging questions that define film studies. What is cinema and what might it become in the face of other screen media, from television to TikTok, streaming to 3D? How does film reveal or depict, simulate or elude historical reality, lived time or a sensed world? How might theorists relate the cinematic image or spectator to wider ideological formations, whether in terms of identity or sexuality, economy or nation?

Relationship to other modules

Co-requisites

YOU MUST ALSO TAKE FM5002 OR TAKE FM5003

Assessment pattern

Coursework= 100%

Re-assessment

Coursework= 100%

Learning and teaching methods and delivery

Weekly contact

1 2-hour seminar (x 11), 1 3-hour screening (x 11). The module provides advanced training in research that requires the development of skills necessary for self-supported study. It is also dependent on extensive reading and viewing outside of the class, which will then be discuss either in class or through the module's online forum. Workloads are calculated accordingly.

Scheduled learning hours

55

The number of compulsory student:staff contact hours over the period of the module.

Guided independent study hours

245

The number of hours that students are expected to invest in independent study over the period of the module.

Intended learning outcomes

  • engage with a key area of interest in the discipline of Film Studies
  • acquire a critical understanding of a range of film theories and the historical and contemporary contexts from which they have emerged and been received
  • gain a sense of the progression of film theory’s development from the 1920s to the present
  • develop competence in moving between theories and a range of screens works
  • improve research and writing skills, developed for both academic and non-academic audiences