Courses
Students can see all of the current and past Film and Media Studies courses listed by semester by visiting Yale Course Search and searching for all courses with the FILM prefix. For current FMS critical studies courses, scroll to “Any Course Information Attribute” and choose either YC FILM Critical Studies, YC FILM Production, Or YC FILM World Cinema.
To provide a sense of the variety offered in a single past semester, two lists follow:
● A sample list of FMS critical studies and world film/media courses, drawn from just one single semester (Fall 2025), is included below. It is far from a complete representation of the possibilities within FMS.
Makeovers in Classical Hollywood Cinema, FILM 1800
Through the Lens of Memory: Other Perspectives on Dictatorships in Latin America and Iberia, FILM 2167
Skin and Surface: Fashion and Culture, FILM 2540
East/West European New Waves: Life and Revolution in the 1960s, FILM 2607
The Science and Culture of Memory FILM 2800
Artificial Life: (Re)Production and the Limits of Humanity FILM 2827
Gender and Sexuality in German Literature and Film FILM 2897
Digital War FILM 2980
Cinematic Ukraine: Culture, Identity, and Memory FILM 3007
Japanese Cinema and Its Others FILM 3047
Italian Film Ecologies: Yesterday, Today, and Tomorrow FILM 3057
Weird Greek Wave Cinema FILM 3417
The Nigerian ‘Video Novel’ and Nollywood FILM 3537
Jazz and African-American Historical Representations in American Films FILM 4140
Radio, FILM 4200
The Aesthetics of Adaptation FILM 4220
Noise FILM 4270
The Historical Documentary FILM 4470
Making Comics FILM 4670
Weimar Cinema FILM 4680
Production and Screenwriting Seminars/Studios
Students interested in developing their abilities at thinking through making film and media can select courses from the following list. Those hoping for approval to work on a cinema/media-making or screenwriting project for their senior project are advised to begin taking relevant courses during their first three years at Yale to ensure that they will be adequately prepared to undertake such a project in their final year.
Introductory Courses: One or several of these courses will prepare students for more advanced courses. Production courses in other departments such as Art, Music, or Theater Studies may also be relevant.
Modes of Thinking Through Mediamaking, FILM 1900–This foundational hands-on course is designed to generate conceptual and practical creative potentials within the process of developing, making, and critiquing films and videos.
Introduction to Writing and Directing, FILM 1610- Emphasis on the writing and production of short dramatic scenes.
Introduction to Non-Fiction Filmmaking: Personal Experience & Creative Practice, FILM 1520 - Drawing on diverse traditions from classical observational forms to hybrid, personal, and experimental approaches to non-fiction filmmaking, this course introduces students to the foundations of non-fiction filmmaking through critical viewing, theoretical discussion, and hands-on creative practice.
Introduction to Documentary, FILM 1620 -The art and craft of documentary filmmaking. Basic technological and creative tools for capturing and editing moving images.
Screenwriting, FILM 3500-Foundations of the craft introduced through the reading of professional scripts and the analysis of classic films. A series of classroom exercises culminates in intensive scene work.
Midlevel Courses: This dynamic category of courses offers FMS students a breadth of options. At least one, but ideally several courses from this category will prepare students to qualify for the Film/Media Production or Screenwriting Senior Project. Majors may also count some production courses available through other Yale departments (with DUS approval). Credit earned in the Yale summer program in Prague also counts toward the major requirements.
Cinematography: History, Theory, Practice FILM 2940 – Through readings, screenings, and practical exercises, this course introduces students to the artistic practice of cinematography in the context of its history from the birth of cinema to the present.
The Screenwriter’s Craft FILM 3300 -A rigorous writer’s workshop. Students conjure, write, rewrite, and study films.
The Craft of Graphic Narrative, FILM 3990 - This class explores how text and sequential images work together to tell stories. This class will be an equal mix of theory and practice, of reading comics with a critical eye and making your own comics.
Intermediate Film Writing and Directing FILM 3550 -Students write three-scene short films and learn the tools and techniques of staging, lighting, capturing, and editing the dramatic scene. Focus on using the tools of cinema to tell meaningful dramatic stories.
Intermediate Documentary Filmmaking FILM 3560 - Students explore the storytelling potential of the film medium by making documentaries as an art form.
Intermediate Screenwriting FILM 3950 - A workshop in writing short screenplays.
The Screenplay Revision Workshop FILM 2525 - A workshop in advanced revision for narrative storytelling. Students bring previously drafted short or feature-length scripts for an intensive process of structural and stylistic refinement.
Experimental Multimodal Videomaking and Exhibition FILM 4170 - In this course we make ten prompt driven one-minute video projects specifically designed to increase fluidity of thinking-through-videomaking.
Family Narratives/Cultural Shifts FILM 4330 - As students develop their own videos, this course looks at films that are redefining ideas around family and family narratives in relation to larger social movements.
Archive Aesthetics & Community Storytelling FILM 4340 - Conducted as a production workshop, the course explores the use of archives in constructing real and fictive narratives across a variety of disciplines, such as—participants create and develop autobiographies, biographies, or fiction-based projects.
Sound/Image Practice FILM 4600 - Through readings, short exercises, and the process of each student producing a short video, students will develop their conceptual and technical abilities through hands-on experiments with the dynamics of the film sound and picture relationship.
Making Comics FILM 4670 – An advanced class in the alchemy of combining words and pictures into the visual language of comics. We’ll touch on some history and theory of comics, but this is a hands-on writing/drawing class, with the focus on practice.
Course for Summer Interns FILM 4710 – Students who have interned with a film or media production company over the summer in an unpaid position may receive credit for that experience with advanced approval of the DUS. Approved students would enroll in a special course, which is in effect a section of Film 4710, Independent Study. The course meets several times during the Fall Semester and students are required to contribute a class presentation on their experience and produce a course paper.
Production Senior Seminars/Workshops
Students accepted to write a feature length screenplay must enroll in two semesters of Advanced Screenwriting (FILM 4870, FILM 4880, or the equivalent) in their senior year.
Students accepted to create a short non-fiction video must enroll in either two semesters of Documentary Film Workshop (FILM 4550, FILM 4560), two semesters of Film/Media Hybridity Lab (FILM 4800, Film 4810), or some combination of the two.
Students accepted to create a short fiction video must enroll in either two semesters of Advanced Film Writing and Directing (FILM 4830, FILM4840), two semesters of Film/Media Hybridity Lab (FILM 4800, Film 4810), or some combination of the two.
Students accepted to create an experimental, hybrid, non-theatrical or otherwise unconventional project such as a video anthology or an installation must enroll in two semesters of Film/Media Hybridity Lab (FILM 4800, FILM 4810).