Film professors at UC-Denver are working to develop a graduate program that will pioneer a new focus area for master’s of fine arts degrees.
The program would help students develop skills by working abroad, and would encourage conscientious filmmaking processes. This means students would be encouraged to make films that inspire social justice or cultural awareness.
The idea, lead by UCD’s College of Arts and Media Dean David Dynak, aims to further the College’s mission to nurture art that has social significance.
In doing so, the new program could potentially offer something different than other master’s programs in the country. The international approach, as well as the focus on social and environmental issues, could differentiate the program from other film programs.
Last April, the College of Arts and Media hosted a brainstorming session in which 15 filmmakers from all over the world discussed the creation of a possible master’s program for film students.
They discussed a hybrid curriculum in which classes would be taught online as well as in classrooms across the globe.
According to Daniel Koetting, Chair of the Department of Theatre, Film, and Video, the first and last summer semesters will be hosted in Denver, and the remaining two years will combine distance learning via the Internet and meetings at fluid locations.
The accessability will allow faculty from other nations to contribute their expertise, and will also help the program target students from other countries.
So far, faculty members are living and working on films in London, Rome, Iceland, and Tehran, among others.
Howie Movshovitz, director of film education at UCD, said that many of the faculty members are independent filmmakers who have accomplished very serious achievements.
“[These are] people who really give a damn,” Movshovitz said. “They understand that it’s about teaching people to see.”
The new international program will tie in with Dynak’s mission of fostering art that focuses on social or environmental issues.
According to Koetting, local filmmaker Daniel Junge’s film, “They Killed Sister Dorothy,” was instrumental in bringing justice to those that murdered a nun in the Amazon rainforest.
UCD faculty chose to create a program that would differ from the more traditional narrative film programs. Most film schools generate films that are geared toward entertainment through fictional stories.
“There is an interesting need that we can address,” said Movshovitz. “We want to do something no one else does.”
He said filmmaking is becoming decentralized, and that independent filmmakers want to develop a generation of students who think differently about how to make a film, as well as what films should be about.
The filmmakers who will teach the strategic residency program will be teaching cultural awareness and the importance of the collaborative crew.
Therefore, classes will be small, and new students will be admitted only once every few years.
Entry will be competitive, and recruitment may begin in the spring, with a target launch date set for summer of 2010.
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