A weekend mini course at CMU open to any full-time undergraduate or graduate student at Pitt. The course introduces students from all academic majors, both undergraduate and graduate, to the socio-political significance and artistic merits of film. Through screenings of acclaimed, international features and documentaries, through class discussions, and through workshops with award-winning filmmakers, students gain a basic foundation for film analysis. Through viewing the films and learning from the filmmakers' firsthand accounts, the students will hone their critical thinking skills and learn to read the mainstream media with a more discerning eye. Each student will translate the films' themes, featured conflicts, directors' perspectives, class discussions and their own cultural backgrounds and personal experiences into written reactions to the screenings and a final written analysis as part of the pass/fail component of the course. The CMU course number is 99-421A4. Instructions on how to cross-register can be found at http://www.cmu.edu/hub/registration/undergraduates/cross/incoming.html.