Visual literacy is an essential skill for the 21st century and studying film can be an eye-opening way to look at the world around you differently, helping prepare you for citizenship, life-long learning and a variety of careers.
Film students choose to study film analysis, film production or both through a series of cross-listed course offerings between the English and Motion Picture/Television departments. Our faculty challenge students to become active, engaged spectators of film for a variety of academic and professional purposes including criticism, theory and filmmaking while also enhancing appreciation for cinema as an aesthetic art medium.
Determine Your Path
The communication and problem-solving skills learned through the study of Film are foundational to diverse career fields including filmmaking, media production, advertising, politics, teaching, public relations, marketing and writing.
Whether you want to study film analysis or film production or if you are planning to transfer to a four-year baccalaureate-granting institution, COD offers:
- Dedicated instructors with years of film experience.
- Instruction in top-notch facilities and on cutting-edge equipment.
- Flexible course schedules with online, hybrid and face-to-face classes.
- Affordable programs that get you on the fast track to success without breaking the bank.
English/Film Transfer Pathway, Associate in Arts
The English Transfer Pathway, Associate in Arts enables students to choose their own path of study including Creative Writing, Film, Literature and Writing Studies and graduate with an Associate in Applied Science degree. This track helps provides a seamless transfer to a baccalaureate-granting institution.
The world is awash in images. As a 21st century citizen, learning how to read images critically is an essential skill. Students who study film will engage with the complex meanings contained within images that make up narrative, documentary and experimental films. Learning to read these images will help students personally, professionally and academically.
Get Started Today
The first step in getting started in Film is to apply for admission.
Academic and Career Pathways give you a roadmap to achieving your career goals. Follow a pathway based on your degree that outlines which classes you need to take and when so you graduate on time or move on to the next phase in your career.
By studying Film at College of DuPage, students will:
Develop Critical Thinking Skills
- Examine the role of images in our everyday lives.
- Analyze how images are constructed to carry meaning.
- Read images for complex rhetorical purposes.
Gain Cultural and Historical Comprehension
- Describe American and international film movements that both reflect and shape social relationships.
- Place cinematic movements in the context of technological change around the world.
- Explain cinema's role in disseminating ideas and beliefs worldwide.
Express and Exchange Ideas
- Use film study to examine varied aspects of human experience.
- Interpret and respond to arguments made about cinema by critics and thinkers of diverse backgrounds.
- Create written, visual and aural arguments that participate in the discussion about cinema.
Examine Human Behavior and Build Societal Knowledge
- Examine a diverse collection of films that represent a variety of cinematic experiences.
- Interpret various films for their commentary on the human condition.
- Reflect on the ability of cinema both to document and shape society.
Brian Brems
- MA: English/Film as Literature, Northern Illinois University
- BA: English, Northern Illinois University
Professor Brian Brems publishes regularly in academic collections and journals, and is coeditor of Refocus: The Films of Paul Schrader (University of Edinburgh Press, 2020). In addition, he publishes regularly in online film magazines and websites, including Bright Wall/Dark Room, Vague Visages, and Film Inquiry. He has also contributed to Film School Rejects, Little White Lies, and Senses of Cinema. He teaches film courses in the English department including Intro to Film Art (1135), Film History (1145), Film as Literature (1154), Film Directors and Authorship (2234), Film Genres (2235), World Cinema (2236), Documentary Cinema (2237), and Longform Television (2238).
Sandy Fries
- M.A. Columbia University and NBC Television Fellow at Columbia University
- B.A. Clark University, Phi Beta Kappa, Honors
Professor Sandy Fries won the Writers Guild of America award for writing "one of the 101 best TV series in the history of television, Star Trek: The Next Generation. Fries was a writer and Story Editor for many Star Trek projects for Paramount Studios. He also wrote for NBC's Quantum Leap, the animated Spiderman for Marvel Studios and many other TV shows. Professor Fries received an Emmy nomination for his writing, is a member of the Writers Guild of America and votes for the Emmy Awards. Sandy wrote a book about screenwriting and careers called Secrets Your Textbook Will Not Tell You: About Movies, TV and Life. Prof. Fries has been a full-time teacher at College of DuPage for 16 years. He also continues freelance writing. Sandy regularly teaches Intro to Film ENGLI and MPTV 1135, and Reporting and Writing for Multimedia MCOMM 1105 and Intro to Mass Communication MCOMM 1100.
Michelle E. Moore
- Ph.D. and M.A. State University of New York (SUNY) at Binghamton
- B.A.: Dickinson College
Dr. Michelle E. Moore is the coeditor of the collection Refocus: The Films of Paul Schrader (Edinburgh University Press, 2020) and the author of Chicago and the Making of American Modernism: Cather, Hemingway, Faulkner, and Fitzgerald in Conflict (Bloomsbury Academic 2019). She has published chapters on the director Todd Solondz and articles on William Faulkner's "lost" vampire screenplay Dreadful Hollow in Literature/Film Quarterly and The Faulkner Journal. She gives papers regularly at national and international conferences on Modernism and Film. Her current research interests include the intersections of modern literature, film and architecture as well as online writing instruction and course design. She regularly teaches Introduction to Film and Film as Literature.
Jacinta Yanders
- PhD: The Ohio State University
- MA: Indiana State University
- BA: Ball State University
Dr. Jacinta Yanders (aka Dr. J) has a vast array of research interests, including but not limited to, Media Studies, Young Adult Literature, and Composition Studies. Her most recent research projects focus on analyzing the production and reception of television remakes as well as ongoing gestures toward diversity and inclusion within various facets of contemporary film and television. Dr. J regularly attends and presents her work at the Society for Cinema and Media Studies Annual Conference, and she serves on the steering committee of the conference's Critical Media Pedagogy special interest group. Additionally, she also is a member of the planning committee for the Fan Studies Network North America Conference.
College of DuPage has several English transfer opportunities in place with four-year colleges and universities to save you time, money and make the transfer process easier.
Many of these agreements with other colleges and universities have specific course requirements and a pre-determined course plan that needs to be followed to be eligible to transfer. Contact a program faculty member or academic advisor to learn more as course requirements vary by institution.
Career Information
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English courses at College of DuPage are beneficial in aiding our understanding of texts as well as connecting the historical context of different time periods to our society today. Even in the courses I'm currently taking at ISU, I still utilize the analytical skills I acquired at COD.
Brianna LiddellCOD Alumnus and Illinois State University student Majoring in English Education
