Well, obviously, to become rich and famous. And sexy. Studying film, particularly at a grad school level, makes you about 30-40% sexier, according to the Associated Press. Which is pretty impressive, given that film students spend about 75% of their time in darkened rooms, shut out from the healthy light of day, staring at a screen on which flicker the pretend adventures of a variety of people pretending to be other people. I understand that this is also the pastime of many mental patients.
Sarcastic? Moi?
No, just kind of annoyed, which is my perpetual state of existence, so I don’t really notice it anymore. But my annoyance turned to righteous indignation when I rolled across this excerpt from an interview with Chris Dumas, a film scholar who has written a book about Brian DePalma. Now, I will dismiss the concept of a scholarly book on Brian DePalma, which is obviously impossible, and focus upon what Dumas said about a film studies degree only being useful for picking up people after you get off of work at Wal Mart. He is a film scholar himself, and in the interview this is excerpted from he’s obviously being far more sarcastic than the excerpt reads. Still, it bugs me to hear a film scholar denigrate the acolytes of his own discipline. It’s essentially saying ‘I succeeded, but you won’t. All you can really hope for is a job at Wal Mart.’ But Dumas’s attitude is one that I’ve heard far too often.
Why study film? How often have I heard that? I have even been the recipient of the ‘well, it’s a not a REAL academic discipline, is it?’ comment, which predictably ended in bloodshed. But let’s dismiss that right now. Film studies is a real academic discipline, with theory and rules and a breadth of scholarship that changes with each passing day. I’m not going to try and define it for those who want to question its academic validity; if you’re that closed-minded, we have nothing to discuss. The issue I’m worried about is the ‘service industry, what’re you going to do for a living’ mentality.
Education, in anything, should never be reduced to the mere ‘here’s what you’ll do for the rest of your life’ prospect. Why? Because the world does not work like that. If we all did only what was guaranteed to make us money, no one would be an painter, a writer, or a filmmaker. Nowadays, getting any kind of a degree does not guarantee you a job. There’s no straight line to a career; I certainly never wanted to be one of those people who hit 40 and realize that I did a job I hated for 20 years. There is still a sense that if you went to college or graduate school for something that is not immediately applicable to a specific vocation, you wasted your money and your time. I take offense at that. Obviously I didn’t feel like I was wasting my time, so why the hell should anyone get to tell me that I was?
Most – not all, but most – film scholars are not disappointed filmmakers, actors, or screenwriters. Most film students do not long for a place behind the camera. If you’re doing a film studies degree, you are likely doing it because you love film, all films, every film. You want to learn more about approaches to scholarship, about how to approach a film from a point of view beyond the ‘I liked it/I didn’t like it’; which is apparently all a lot of people think we do. Perhaps you want to be a film critic, or a professor, or a blog writer. Or perhaps – my God, is such a thing possible?! – you’re doing it because you want to learn. You want to be educated in a discipline you find compelling.
To return: why study film? Well, why did you (I) (we) study film? Here, from my own experience, is what I think. Because we love it. We love it so much that we want to know and understand everything about it, to investigate it inside and out. We want to understand how a shift in lighting, a line of dialogue, a note of music can change a scene. We want to build meaning out of it; not just the meaning of the plot, but the meaning that lies below the plot, that lies with every choice the director, the actor, the cinematographer and the script writer made. What’s more, we want to build multiple meanings, multiple understandings of the same work of art. We want to understand how cinema affects our lives, our culture. It is the art form of the 20th Century, whatever Man Ray wants to say, and like any art it does mean something beyond its entertainment value.
Which is not to kick entertainment value. I might be in the minority in this, but I find the more I study a film, the better it becomes. I spent an entire semester pouring over The Lady Vanishes, one of my favorite Hitchcock films. I could probably quote that entire film from front to back. Did it ruin it? Can I never watch it again? Not in the least. The time I spent only made it richer, deeper. For such a frothy entertainment, it has brilliance in every frame, and I loved the film (and Hitchcock) all the more for it.
That’s why I study film, that’s why I did a degree. I don’t believe that you HAVE to do a degree to be an expert in cinema, or to enjoy it and talk about it intelligently. It’s one option, and certainly helpful for those who want a structured approach. Film school gave me a chance to approach cinema in a way I had not considered; it opened avenues of study that I never would have come across on my own. I had a great time; I loved my professors and my classmates. I found like-minded people with whom I could discuss Godard, Zizek and Ed Wood in the same breath. Oh, and without film school, I never would have seen Death Bed: The Bed that Eats. So there’s that.
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Twitter: samfragoso
May 7, 2012 3:45 pm
To be candid, I’m reading this article at a rather odd time in my life: one where I must decide which college I’d like to attend. Which is journey that ties directly into your writings.
Like you (and I’m only a junior in high school) I’ve heard endless conversation on how “film studies” is a wast of time, not truly academic, and can’t quite be applied anywhere.
It’s frustrating as both a lover of cinema, and a lover of writing. I’m not positive which road I may travel in college – whether that be journalism, cinema studies, broadcasting, ect – but I know that (like you) I have no desire to wake up when I’m 40 and hate my profession.
Now, I’m not naive. At the end of the day one must make ends meet. The conceit of writing about the movies for a living sounds great, but it’s not entirely feasible – and finding someone to compensate you for your work is even more of an arduous challenge.
Anyway, great piece. I’m glad you had a nice experience with film studies – best of luck to whatever you do.
I’m just gonna throw a grenade here and see what happens. I studied Fine Art and it was compulsory to study an Art history course each semester. My own personal interest in film combined with a practical understanding of art and a theoretical grounding in art history is, I believe, better than a film degree as film is art, therefore, its history, predates the lumière bros, melies and Edison…
Well, I’m good with all of that, except the ‘better’ part. Film is as much a narrative art as it is a visual one, so why not claim that having a grounding in literature is ‘better’? It’s an aural art too; how about a grounding in music? I approached cinema initially from the perspective of an English literature major, so most of my theoretical approaches come from literary theory first. A lot of the theory used in film studies is philosophical in background as well. Point being that the study of film is its own academic discipline, built out of the independent work of a lot of other disciplines but (and here’s the important part) an art form of its own, with its own rules. Regardless of its kinship with literature, plastic arts, philosophy, history, etc. etc., it has formed its own theoretical approaches. Film needs to be understood as film, not as something that can be encapsulated in another discipline.
>> theoretical approaches
What are these approaches?
>>Film needs to be understood as film
Can you explain this further, please?
I loved this piece. It speaks to why I decided to devote my time to blogging about movies. It’s all about the love of the game. I wouldn’t bother spending so much time watching and dissecting movies if I didn’t love movies.
Still, I wish I didn’t have to be so broke doing it.
What Dave said! Loved this, but I bet you already knew that.
Twitter: Limette9
May 8, 2012 5:13 am
“I wish I didn’t have to be so broke doing it.”
I could have that said!
Loved this article too – I still have about two years to decide what I want to study, so I’m very interested in reading about stuff like that.
This is excellent and it drives at something that’s always bugged me- the idea of a degree, ANY degree, being “useless”. Obtaining a degree is about proving that you can apply knowledge, regardless of the field. And there is loads of inherent value in knowledge (again, regardless of the field).
My degree was in political science. I was raised by an english major. My brother was a double major in history and Russian. I’m very familiar with the “worthless degree” argument and it’s patently absurd.
English, Cinema Studies and Creative Writing, right here. I completely agree with you; there are no useless degrees.
Twitter: manilovefilms
May 8, 2012 10:02 am
Your heart is in the right place and you speak a lot of truths, but don’t you think there’s some truth to what he’s saying, at least in how it applies to the majority of film school students? Sure, there’s no sweeping statement that we can make about college and degrees that would be 100% accurate, but by and large, I would assume that most who attend film school have, at the least, an intent on working within the business somewhere down the line. He’s saying that that’s probably not going to happen for many (most) of them. Is that not true? Sure, he exaggerates the point (Wal-Mart) and doesn’t touch the other merits of the degree, but in terms of practical professional application, there are indeed only so many jobs.
I find his offhand Shawshank comment to much more insulting.
Shit, at least go with Death Bed or Sahara or something…
Point taken. The comment irked me mostly because it reminded me of the (far too many) people who deride studying film as though it’s a useless degree. I admit that I did not have a particular desire to work in the business; if I did, I would have likely gone for a MFA rather than an MA. Others do, although most of the people I went to school with seemed to want to be profs. But let’s talk about it; very few people with MFAs are going to wind up as Martin Scorsese. The point, I think, is to do what you’re interested in. The derision is not something that helps, especially coming from someone who, it appears, makes his living doing precisely what he says others will fail at.
Twitter: agracru
May 8, 2012 10:43 am
The spirit of what Dumas says makes sense; the way he says it is kind of stupid. One might not study film with the expectation of becoming a film scholar as a means of paying the bills; one might study film because film is a passion of theirs.
I do not work full-time in the film industry in any capacity. What I do at Go See Talk and A Constant Visual Feast is done on my own time and compensates me in no way whatsoever. But I do it because I enjoy doing it, and I’m fine working at the job I work– which is a perfectly good, enjoyable job– because apart from its better merits it also gives me the ability to do what I love to do in my personal time (which isn’t just limited to watching movies and writing about them).
I think that’s something a lot of people don’t get about working. Very few people end up working in the field they’re most passionate about, much less in the field they “trained” for in college. For most of us, a job is just a job; it’s value, something that funds our lives. There’s nothing wrong with that either, and people like Dumas will never understand that.
Twitter: pturner1010
May 8, 2012 12:16 pm
You’ve actually put some teeny tiny tears in my eyes. I’m one of those people that walks around taking the piss out of myself for being a film graduate and media lecturer. I take the piss before anyone else gets the chance! I feel my degree was pretty worthless in that they say I should have done journalism if I wanted to be a critic and I should have gone straight into the industry if I wanted to work on sets. But I loved doing the degree. I loved writing my dissertation on American Horror of the 1970s. I loved it so much I’m now a year into trying to get my PHD in film studies. That’s going to take me 5 years and everyday I think what the f**k am I doing with my life? Where the hell is this going to get me? But you’ve just reminded me very clearly why I do this. Because I love it… thanks Lauren!
YAY! I made someone cry! That’s my goal with each and every editorial I write.
No, really, I’m glad you liked it.
I’d never ask you ‘why study film?’ Instead I’d be ‘You study film? How cool!!’ I took a film class in college and that’s one of the most enjoyable classes I’ve ever taken. I never would’ve seen ‘Nanook of the North’ or ‘Dr Strangelove’!
Lovely post, Lauren, thank you!