This hybrid theory/practice course will introduce students to the variety of modes, genres, and protocols that define the scope of practices that are broadly cinematic, expanding students' appreciation for the practical techniques, specialized language, and unique aesthetics of film. Drawing on an array of historical and contemporary examples as well as the critical and theoretical literature that informs film studies, the course will examine the basic elements of cinematic form and the many expressive strategies potentially available to a filmmaker including image construction and manipulation, editing, composition, sound, production design, narrative structure, and performance. These texts will allow us to broach a number of topics central to film aesthetics, including framing and perspective, long takes, techniques of montage, cinematic rhythm, and image-sound relations. Students will immerse themselves in a number of aesthetic questions that will challenge them to think critically and creatively about the properties of film. What are the fundamental structures at the basis of cinema? What role do these structures play in the spectator’s cognitive and affective engagement with the medium? What distinguishes film from other modes of artistic expression, and other media formats? Students will produce a series of short moving-image projects employing 16mm cinematography, sound recording, video production, and editing that will put these concepts into practice..