University of Hull: Department of Film Studies (Humanities)
MA in British Cinema
This distinctive new MA programme will be the first Masters degree in the UK to
focus specifically on British cinema, responding to the growth of interest in the
national cinema that has been reflected in teaching, research and publication over
the last twenty years. It aims to offer wide coverage of British film history and ideas
(often highly critical) about British film. It will achieve this through focusing on a range
of historical periods and selected subject areas (e.g. the studio system, gender
representation, adaptations of literature) in which British cinema has exhibited
distinctive features.
The MA will draw upon the research strengths of its staff, whose work on British
cinema in recent years has included: co-editorship of an innovative series of
monographs on British Film Makers for Manchester University Press, individual
monographs on directors such as Jack Clayton and Alan Clarke; putting on
conferences and research seminars related to British cinema; contribution to and
editorship of key critical anthologies and encyclopaedias; chapters in books and
articles in refereed journals as well as conference papers and extensive contributions
to the British Film Institute’s website on British cinema and directors, screenonline; tv,
radio and stage appearances and dvd commentaries. All of these have helped build
Hull’s reputation as one of the key institutions for the study of British cinema and
television.
One distinctive feature of the MA is its inclusion of television drama as a vital aspect
of British film culture; another is its examination of local connections with British film,
through the invitation of guest speakers, the use of local archival material and the
exploration within particular modules of the important contribution made by Hull
people to the history of British cinema and television (see Film Studies departmental
website for more information - http://www.hull.ac.uk/humanities/film_studies/).
In line with the Arts and Humanities Research Council’s growing emphasis on
research training in MA programmes, the MA in British Cinema will also feature
several modules devoted to the development of research skills and presentation
skills that will be good preparation for any further postgraduate research, as well as
highly useful transferable skills.
Teaching will be mainly via 2 hour seminars involving discussion and debate, based
on specially assigned weekly preparation. You will be expected to do a significant
amount of independent viewing and reading ahead of seminars. Along with seminars,
there will also be the opportunity on selected modules to work on longer pieces of
work on topics of your own choice; attend papers by staff and external speakers;
present your own research to your peers; take advantage of one-on-one guidance for
the preparation and writing of essays; develop your research techniques, including
archival research.
Main teaching staff:
Professor Neil Sinyard
Dr Iris Kleinecke
Dr Dave Rolinson
Dr Melanie Williams
Visiting Professor Brian McFarlane
Full time MA structure (1 year)
Year 1, 1st semester modules
 Projecting Britain: Ealing Studios (core module)
 Women and British Cinema (core module)
 British Screenwriters: Graham Greene (optional module)
(N.B. In place of Film Studies optional modules, students will also be able to choose
level 7options from other departments, subject to availability.)
Year 1, 2nd semester modules
 British Cinema: Research Methods and Approaches (core module)
 Seminar Paper (core module)
 Issues and Themes in Contemporary British Cinema: 1980-present (optional
module)
(N.B. In place of Film Studies optional modules, students will also be able to choose
level 7options from other departments, subject to availability.)

Year 1, 3rd semester (Summer vacation) module
Dissertation (core module)
Part time MA structure (2 years)


Year 1, 1st semester modules
Projecting Britain: Ealing Studios (core module)
Women and British Cinema (core module)

Year 1, 2nd semester modules
British Cinema: Research Methods and Approaches (core module)
Year 2, 1st semester modules
 British Screenwriters: Graham Greene (optional module)
(N.B. In place of Film Studies optional modules, students will also be able to choose
level 7options from other departments, subject to availability.)
Year 2, 2nd semester modules
 Seminar Paper (core module)
 Issues and Themes in Contemporary British Cinema: 1980-present (optional
module)
(N.B. In place of Film Studies optional modules, students will also be able to choose
level 7options from other departments, subject to availability.)

Year 2, 3rd semester (Summer vacation) module
Dissertation (core module)
Please note: this module list is provisional and may be amended, or modules withdrawn and replaced
with suitable alternatives. However, the choice will be no less wide and the coverage of British cinema
no less expansive.
Projecting Britain: Ealing Studios
(Module leader: Dr Dave Rolinson)
Aims and objectives
This module aims to introduce crucial issues in the study of the studio system,
through which the module will also develop students’ understanding of key concepts
in the study of British cinema. Students will acquire a broad knowledge of the history
of Ealing Studios, one of British cinema’s most critically-studied studios, through
close study of texts and practitioners. Students will consider the extent to which ideas
of ‘Ealing’ reinforce or problematise core ideas in the study of British cinema, for
instance concepts of national cinema, genre, and authorship (given that the
collaborative nature of Ealing, and the idea of studio as authorial imprint, complicates
notions of the individual ‘author’). The module will explore the ways in which the
studio - according to a plaque on the site - aimed at ‘projecting Britain and the British
character’. The module will explore overt attempts to depict Britishness (for instance,
wartime propaganda), but will also use socio-historical and cultural analysis to
challenge the critical belief that the studio’s output reinforced ‘national’ characteristics
of restraint and post-war consensus.
Suggested content
Studio as focal point for author-based study (complicated by producers such as
Michael Balcon, writers such as T. E. B. Clarke and directors such as Alberto
Cavalcanti, Robert Hamer and Alexander Mackendrick); studio as focal point for
genre-based study (the ‘Ealing comedy’, the ‘war film’, the ‘social problem film’); the
utility of socio-historical approaches; theoretical approaches to core texts; the
studio’s chronological development (‘Early’ Ealing, wartime, the ‘Ealing comedy’,
variance and decline). Although choices may vary year-on-year, texts studied may
include: Went the Day Well? (1942), Dead of Night (1945), It Always Rains on
Sunday (1947), Kind Hearts and Coronets (1949), Whisky Galore! (1949), The Blue
Lamp (1950), The Man in the White Suit (1951), The Cruel Sea (1953), The Titfield
Thunderbolt (1953), The Ladykillers (1955), Nowhere to Go (1958).
Assessment
A 5000 word essay.
Suggested reading
Barr, Charles, Ealing Studios (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1998 - Third
Edition).
Barr, Charles (ed.), All Our Yesterdays: 90 Years of British Cinema (London: British
Film Institute, 1986).
Harper, Sue and Porter, Vincent, British Cinema of the 1950s: The Decline of
Deference (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2003).
Kemp, Philip, Lethal Innocence: The Cinema of Alexander Mackendrick (London:
Methuen, 1991).
Landy, Marcia, British Genres: Cinema and Society, 1930-1960 (Princeton: Princeton
University Press, 1991).
Murphy, Robert, British Cinema and the Second World War (New York: Continuum,
2000).
Murphy, Robert (ed.), The British Cinema Book (London: British Film Institute, 2001 Second Edition).
Newton, Michael, Kind Hearts and Coronets (London: British Film Institute, 2003).
Richards, Jeffrey and Aldgate, Anthony, Best of British: Cinema and Society, 19301970 (Oxford: Blackwell, 1983).
Women and British Cinema
(Module leader: Dr Melanie Williams)
Aims and objectives
This module provides an overview of over 70 years of British film, using the topic of
female representation as its focal point. It aims to introduce students to the rich and
varied on-screen representations of women throughout British cinema history, from
the 1920s to the present day and to investigate key issues in the study of British
cinema such as genre, stardom, authorship (especially the issue of gendered
authorship), audience response, social and cultural history.
Suggested content
Introduction: feminist film studies and British cinema as an object of study
1920s - The Farmer’s Wife (Hitchcock, 1928)
1930s - Gracie Fields and Jessie Matthews as opposing models of British femininity
1940s - Gainsborough melodrama and key female stars of the period
David Lean and women - a case study
1950s - female directorial and authorial agency - Wendy Toye and Muriel Box
Female audience response: looking at Woman in a Dressing Gown (Lee Thompson,
1957)
1960s - From the New Wave to Swinging London
Women in horror film and the new woman’s picture: male genre and female genre?
1990s - the heritage film and the post-modern chick flick
Assessment
A 5000 word essay
Suggested reading
Bruce Babington (ed.), British Stars and Stardom (MUP, 2001)
Charles Barr (ed.), All Our Yesterdays (BFI, 1986)
Pam Cook, Fashioning the Nation : Costume and Identity in British Cinema (BFI,
1997)
Pam Cook, Screening the Past (Routledge, 2005)
Christine Geraghty, British Cinema in the Fifties (Routledge, 2001)
Sue Harper, Picturing the Past: The Rise and Fall of the British Costume Film (BFI,
1994)
Sue Harper, Women and British Cinema (Continuum, 2000)
Andrew Higson (ed.), Dissolving Views (Continuum, 1996)
Annette Kuhn, Family Secrets (Verso, 1995)
Marcia Landy, British Genres (Princeton UP, 1991)
Brian McFarlane (ed.), The Cinema of Britain and Ireland (Wallflower, 2005)
Robert Murphy (ed.), The British Cinema Book (BFI, 2001)
Sarah Street, British National Cinema (Routledge, 1997)
Sue Thornham, Passionate Detachments: An Introduction to Feminist Film Theory
(Arnold, 1997)
Sue Thornham (ed.), Feminist Film Theory: A Reader (Edinburgh UP, 1999)
British Screenwriters: Graham Greene
(Module leader: Professor Neil Sinyard)
Aims and objectives
The module’s aims are to explore the importance of the writer in British cinema and
investigate issues of adaptation, particularly through a case study of the film career of
Graham Greene. Sometimes to its detriment, British cinema has often been thought
of as a ‘literary cinema’ and the implications of this will be investigated through
exploration of three dimensions of Greene’s film career: a) his early career as a film
critic, particularly his controversial comments on British cinema (e.g. his derision of
Korda, his scepticism over Hitchcock, his championing of Thorold Dickinson and
Carol Reed); b) his screen adaptations of his own work, particularly two
acknowledged classics, The Fallen Idol and The Third Man ;and c) adaptations of his
work by English-based directors, such as Cavalcanti, Annakin and Duffell, which are
generally more artistically successful than the Greene adaptations of prestigious
Hollywood directors. It is hoped to invite a director to talk about his experience of
directing Greene’s work.
Suggested content
The writer and British cinema; Graham Greene’s film criticism and the state of 1930s
British cinema; Greene as screenwriter and his collaboration with Carol Reed;
adapting Greene for the screen and the problems with, and approaches, to film
adaptations of literature: Greene adaptations and British film genre; re-making
Greene.
Texts studied may vary from year to year but should include: Went the Day
Well?(1942), Brighton Rock(1947), The Fallen Idol(1948), The Third Man(1949),
Across the Bridge (1957), Our Man in Havana(1960), England Made Me (1972), The
End of the Affair(1999)
Assessment
A 5000 word essay.
Suggested reading
Judith Adamson
Graham Greene and Cinema (1984)
Ken Annakin
So You Wanna Be a Director?(2001)
Charles Drazin
In Search of The Third Man(1999)
Quentin Falk
Travels in Greeneland (2000: 3rd edition)
Graham Greene……The Pleasure Dome (1972)
Graham Greene
The Third Man; The Fallen Idol(1950)
David Parkinson
Mornings in the Dark: An Anthology of Graham Greene’s Film
Writing(1994)
Gene D.Phillips
Graham Greene: the Films of his Fiction (1974)
Neil Sinyard
Graham Greene: A Literary Life (2003)
Cedric Watts
A Preface to Graham Greene (1997)
British Cinema: Research Methods and Approaches
(Module leader: Dr Dave Rolinson)
Aims and objectives
This module introduces students to some of the basic skills required in conducting
research in Film Studies and related disciplines. These skills include practical
research advice (such as arranging and conducting archival visits and practitioner
interviews, using IT and other practical resources, and managing research materials)
and methodological issues such as the applicability of theory and existing critical
approaches to Film Studies (as well as some coverage of the educational study of
research itself). Students are encouraged to reflect upon their previous experiences
of preparing assessed work, both individually and in class discussion, and are guided
by the reflective advice of tutors regarding their own research. Students learn through
conducting specific research assignments, and are provided with support in pursuing
their own selected research areas. Where appropriate, students may also be advised
on publishing research and on career paths including teaching, with basic and
introductory coverage of relevant skills.
Suggested content
Some of the module will be determined by student research interests, and so the
exact nature of the areas of British cinema covered will vary year-on-year. However,
there will be a continued focus on the applicability of critical and theoretical writing on
British cinema. Moreover, the fixed assignments are intended to contribute to an
existing departmental research specialism. For example, it is envisaged that the
module’s initial focus will be on key texts and authors in the BBC’s Play for Today
single play strand and its relevance for notions of British cinema, which is currently
an area of departmental research: one of the assignments will be an essay for the
department’s existing Play for Today web resource. Through these areas of content,
the module will facilitate discussion of, and guidance in, several areas of the research
process including (although not limited to) the following: selection and preparation of
research areas; structure and planning; note-taking and methods of organising
material; bibliographical and IT competence including presentation and referencing;
arranging, preparing for and conducting research interviews; finding, using and
making the most of archives; consolidating, building upon and querying existing
critical orthodoxy; preparing proposals and manuscripts, and identifying markets, for
academic publication.
Assessment
2 x 2000-word essays (67%)
1 x 1500-word research logbook (33%)
Suggested reading
To be confirmed - depends upon focus of module in any given year.
Seminar Paper
(Module Leader: Dr Melanie Williams)
Aims and objectives
This module acts as a conduit to independent study after more guided work in
semester 1, thus paving the way for the dissertation in semester 3. It introduces
students to an important aspect of postgraduate study, the cogent and clear
presentation of one’s ideas in public, which is also an invaluable transferable skill. It
gives students the experience of writing and delivering a seminar paper formally as if
at an academic conference or symposium, and then submitting it in written form as if
for the conference proceedings.
Working with a supervisor, students will research a topic relating to some aspect of
British film or television and construct a paper based on that work for presentation to
their peers and tutors on the course in the second half of the semester. To assist
them in their work, they will also attend a session on presentation skills and several
seminar papers (given by staff and/or outside speakers) as examples of good
practice of how to deliver seminar papers, structure them, etc. Each session will be
on a specific topic but may also include some reflections by the presenters on the
research process.
Suggested content
Introduction: What is the purpose of the research paper?
Presentation skills
Seminar papers from staff and outside speakers on a variety of British cinema and
television topics
Seminar papers from students
Also, individual supervisory sessions throughout the semester
Assessment
5000 word seminar paper, submitted in written form (90%)
Oral presentation of seminar paper (10%)
Suggested reading
Reading would be dictated by the individual student’s choice of research topic but
background material would include:
Justine Ashby and Andrew Higson (eds.), British Cinema, Past and Present
(Routledge, 2000)
Charles Barr (ed.), All Our Yesterdays (BFI, 1986)
Andrew Higson (ed.), Dissolving Views (Continuum, 1996)
Marcia Landy, British Genres (Princeton UP, 1991)
Brian McFarlane (ed.), The Cinema of Britain and Ireland (Wallflower, 2005)
Robert Murphy (ed.), The British Cinema Book (BFI, 2001)
Sarah Street, British National Cinema (Routledge, 1997)
Issues and Themes in Contemporary British Cinema: 1980present
(Module Leader: Dr Dave Rolinson)
Aims and objectives
This module aims to explore contemporary British cinema in terms of the themes and
stylistic approaches of individual films, directors and movements but also in terms of
developments in film criticism and film theory, thereby developing students’
understanding of key concepts in the study of British cinema. These issues will
include convergence (the increasing blurring of boundaries between British film and
television in terms of industry and, more contentiously, aesthetics); ideas of national
cinema (against a contemporary climate in which developments in financing and the
wider culture root the national in internationalist discourses) and an exploration of
film’s engagement with contemporary themes and issues. The module returns to key
ideas from across the MA - for instance, authorship and genre - to root them in a
more modern critical framework.
Suggested content
Studies of recent developments in criticism and theory as applied to British cinema
(and how these are informed by, subscribe to or depart from previous responses to
British cinema in other periods and contexts); socio-historical and cultural
approaches to British cinema’s engagement with themes and issues; updating and
revising key issues from previous periods of study (including ideas of authorship,
gender and genre) and key theoretical approaches, rooted in contemporary
developments (for instance, how developments across the culture and across the
financing and technology of film have led critics to re-engage with ideas of national
cinema), consideration of ‘movements’ such as heritage and anti-heritage cinema,
and the changing relationship between film and television which is a primary area of
contemporary film scholarship. Although choices may vary year-on-year, the
directors whose work is studied will include several of the following: Carine Adler,
Danny Boyle, Nick Broomfield, Alan Clarke, Terence Davies, Stephen Frears, Derek
Jarman, Mike Leigh, Ken Loach, John Mackenzie, Shane Meadows, Nicolas Roeg
and Michael Winterbottom.
Assessment
A 5000 word essay.
Suggested reading
Ashby, Justine and Andrew Higson (editors), British Cinema, Past and Present
(London: Routledge, 2000).
Fuller, Graham (editor), Loach on Loach (London: Faber, 1998).
Hill, John and Martin McLoone (editors), Big Picture, Small Screen: The Relations
Between Film and Television (Luton: University of Luton Press, 1996).
Hill, John and Pamela Church Gibson (editors), The Oxford Guide to Film Studies
(Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1998).
Hill, John, British Cinema in the 1980s: Issues and Themes (Oxford: Clarendon
Press, 1999).
Murphy, Robert (editor), British Cinema of the 90s (London: British Film Institute,
2000).
Rolinson, Dave, Alan Clarke (Manchester: Manchester University Press, 2005).
Sargeant, Amy, British Cinema: A Critical History (London: British Film Institute, 2005).
Sinyard, Neil, The Films of Nicolas Roeg (London: Letts, 1991).
Dissertation
(Module Leader: Professor Neil Sinyard)
Aims and objectives
Independent study and the ability to write at length on a topic of the student’s own
choice are important features of any MA programme, and the dissertation module
fulfils these criteria. As well as being transferable skills, the skills involved in writing a
successful MA dissertation also act as a valuable stepping stone for possible further
postgraduate research at MPhil and PhD level. This module requires students to
write a dissertation on a topic related to British cinema and/or television, with regular
structured guidance from a supervisor. Supervisors for the dissertation will be
allocated by the end of the second semester on the basis of appropriateness to the
chosen topic, and will act as facilitators and advisors for students’ research from the
initial stages of selecting a topic through to the preparation of the final piece of work.
Suggested content
Private study supplemented by formal individual supervision sessions: approx. 5 x
1hr. Supervisors also available for more informal consultation throughout research
and writing period.
Assessment
15,000 - 20,000 word dissertation
Suggested reading
Dependent upon individual student’s choice of topic.