This module is not currently running in 2026 to 2027.
What makes certain books more adaptable than others? This module explores how books are adapted and interpreted for the screen. You'll analyse how certain books lend themselves to multiple reshapings, such as Scott Fitzgerald’s The Great Gatsby. You’ll also analyse lesser-known works that have gone on to become Hollywood blockbusters, like the stories of Jorge Luis Borges, masterfully adapted by Christopher Nolan in Inception. Adaptations directed by internationally recognized filmmakers will be examined with a view to eliciting an understanding of their particular approach to, and filmic vision of, written texts. Through these analyses, we aim to understand the distinct cinematic visions and approaches of filmmakers from around the world toward literary adaptations. Through these discussions, you’ll explore theories of adaptation intermediality, and film criticism, as well as questions of class, identity, gender, power, migration, and race that underpin both the literary works and their filmic adaptations.
32 (lecture 16, Seminar 16)
Presentation worth 20%
Essay worth 80%
Reassessment: Single instrument
100% written assessment (2,500 words)
On successfully completing the module, students will be able to:
1) Evaluate the principal tools of film criticism and apply these tools in a systematic manner to a range of films in order to achieve a detailed critical understanding of the ways in which the selected films achieve their aesthetic aims.
2) Critically compare visual media alongside written media.
3) Analyse, from a critically informed perspective, why certain texts lend themselves to multiple interpretations, and demonstrate understanding of established critical methodologies and the ability to apply them appropriately.
4) Interrogate, in a critically informed and systematic manner, the power of the cinema to influence our appreciation of literary works.
5) Discuss both the potential and the limitations of current critical methodologies, especially in the field of adaptation studies.
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