Figure 1. High Life, Directed by Claire Denis 2018.
Figure 2. Blade Runner 2049 Denis Villeneuve 2017.

ARC3708H F
Instructor: Brian Boigon
Meeting Section: LEC0101
Wednesday 9:00AM - 12:00PM 

Science Fiction Architecture and the Cinema explores the underpinnings of how some of the most seminal scenes in the sci-fi genre were designed and catapulted into the bit-stream .From 2001: A Space Odyssey, jump cutting to Blade Runner 2049, High Life, and then teleported into Dune, Foundation, 65, Chaos Walking and sprinkled over with the fairy dust over Asteroid City. Students will be over-exposed to the digital/analogue/push media ways in which over 101 films constructed the future.

The elective is divided into 3 parts:

1. Readings on the Philosophy of Illusion and Non-ordinary Reality
2. Design Editing and Architecture 3. Science Fiction Cinema Case Studies
3. Science Fiction Cinema Case Studies

1. Readings on the Philosophy of Illusion and Non-ordinary Reality
This section of the elective will offer a reading of philosophy texts that address the issues of design, identity and space in film and literature. Philosophical texts will be taken from Classical, Continental, Feminist, Psychoanalytical and Neuroscientific sources. Authors include: Julia Kristeva, Donna Haraway, Friedrich Nietzsche, Adam Philips, Noel Burch, Gertrude Stein. Judith Butler.

2. Design Editing and Architecture
This section of the elective will investigate the theoretical aspects of science fiction/dramatic editing and how a scene is given a temporal space by the way it is constructed. Lectures on readings and guest speakers from the film field will explain the various means in which design editing is the force behind making fictional spaces believable. Design Editors include: Thelma Schoonmaker, Jon Kane, Sally Menke, Kelly Matsumoto

3. Science Fiction Cinema Case Studies
This section of the elective will investigate classic scenes in which the architecture of science fiction cinema has been advanced. Scene selection will be based on specific ways a film can create a complete environment and how that has been brought to life. Case Studies will be conducted by students based on the previous two sections on “Philosophy” and “Design Editing”. Films Directors will include: Michael Bay, Kathryn Bigelow, Stanley Kubrick, Michelle MacLaren and Claire Denis.

Science Fiction Architecture will include lectures and presentations based on required readings followed by class discussion. Students will be produce and present group and individual assignments.

“Sometimes reality is too complex
for oral communication. But legend
embodies it in a form which enables
it to spread all over the world."
Jean-Luc Goddard, Alphaville