2012 La Trobe French Subject: “France in Film”

Sofia Coppola’s Marie Antoinette will be
studied in week 3 of France in Film

Offered for the first time in 2012, “France in Film: The Invention of France 1789-1919” is an innovative subject, available for either History or French credit.

Devised by Raphaël Trantoul and Ian Coller with both French-speaking and non-French-speaking students in mind, the subject’s lectures will be delivered in English, while tutorials will be split according to language (French students’ tutorials will be conducted in French, History students’ tutorials in English).

Running in semester 1, the syllabus will cover the history of France from the French Revolution to the First World War and will encompass such films as Sofia Coppola’s Marie Antoinette, Danton, The Other Dumas and Jean Renoir’s French Cancan.

Enquires regarding this subject should be directed to Ian Coller at i.coller@latrobe.edu.au. Click “read more” for the official subject description and poster.

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“France in Film: The Invention of France 1789-1919” introduces students to French history through the medium of cinema, extending from the French Revolution to the consequences of the First World War.

Addressing a variety of filmic representations of French history, produced inside and outside France, the module challenges students to think about the ways in which we visualize and stage the past; how national memory is remade through the “historical” film; and how different cinematic techniques open up new ways of approaching history.

Throughout the subject, students will both deepen and challenge their ideas about the “France” that is projected through history, by investigating the fault lines of race, class and gender in the nineteenth century; exploring the nature of the French colonial project and the experience of empire; and analysing the cultural practices of “Frenchness” that helped to shape a Republican consensus in modern France, including the practice of cinema itself.