Argumentative essay
Evaluation: The most important requirement for this essay is that you have an arguable thesis. I will explain in class what this is. The second most important requirement is that you include very close, detailed analysis of one or two scenes in the film you are writing about. The third most important requirement is that your conclusion be lively and not a mere repetition of all that has come before in the essay. No paper without these elements will be eligible for a grade of A.
Hint: some of the essay prompts below contain a series of questions, but these are just to get you started in thinking about the topic. In your essay, you should avoid just answering all of these questions in a row, but rather, you should develop your own original argument out of some aspect of this prompt. You might focus on one of the questions, or develop your own questions/ideas for pursuing the theme, but your goal should be to create one smooth thesis statement that guides your essay, not simply a series of consecutive answers to the questions posed here.
1. Reading the Soundtrack. In Stagecoach (1939), how the soundtrack shapes its meanings (hint: remember in class that we once watched a scene from Stagecoach with the soundtrack and then without it, and we noticed that the soundtrack shifted the scene’s meanings in various significant ways? That is the kind of analysis I am asking you to do for this topic, 1.09.20 mark of the film)
2. Women in Film Noir. Gilda (1946) as your primary text, make an argument about the gender politics of film noir (ie. is the genre misogynist and hostile to women or does it contain depictions of female power that have feminist potential, or something in between these two poles? Of course, the phrase “gender politics” might also extend to arguments about masculinity in film noir). Rather than just discussing the topic in a broad way, I recommend that you focus this topic on a particular element of your film (such as costumes, delivery of lines, handling of props, love scenes, entrances and exits, etc).
