Critical Film Essay

Order Description
Interrogate the film Chaplin (Attenborough, 1992) in terms of its approach to film historiography. You should analyze the methodologies and assumptions that the filmmaker employs in terms of
constructing a narrative and relying upon empiricism and interpretation. The essay should be informed by ideas/theories presented in the essay in the readings.

“Introduction” (from Chapman, Glancy, and Harper’s The New Film History: Sources, Methods, Approaches)
“The Place of Rhetoric in ‘New’ Film Historiography: The Discourse of Corrective Revisionism” (Jeffrey F. Klenotic)
“Film History: Or History Expropriated.” (Michèle Lagny)
“History Can Work for You, You Know How to Use It” (Richard Abel)
“Out of this World: Theory, Fact, and Film History” (Stephen Bottomore)

“Film History: The Narrow Discourse” (Robert C. Allen)
“Aesthetic Film History” (from Allen and Gomery’s Film History: Theory and Practice)
“Film History and Film Histories” (Gerald Mast)
“Toward a ‘True’ History of Cinema: Film History as Narration” (Talens and Zunzunegui)