H56.1159 Lecture 4 Credits
Course level: Sophomore level and up
Students must also register for one recitation.
(Please note that the topics for this course change every semester.)
Andy Warhol is perhaps best known for his artwork, but he remains one of America's most prolific filmmakers, making literally hundreds of films, few of which have been seen by the public. Warhol's anti-cinema challenged Hollywood conventions of "good" filmmaking, asking viewers to rethink narrative, the star system, and their patience (his early films often ran several hours long). This course traces Warhol's influence through two contemporary filmmmakers, Todd Haynes and Gus Van Sant, whose iconoclastic films revisit many of the same concerns. Their films, like Warhol's, often depict lurid subject matter -- sex and drug cultures -- through a form of cool detachment. Central to our examination will be issues of stardom, appropriation of other texts, and authorship -- whether it's Warhol's artist-as-machine, or Haynes' cinematic borrowings, or Van Sant's Warhol-esque shot-by-shot remake of Hitchcock's Psycho. Some films to be screened include Empire, Blow Job, Superstar, My Own Private Idaho, Far From Heaven, Elephant.
