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The Program in Film at the School for the Contemporary Arts is the largest and most comprehensive program for the study of the art of film in western Canada. The program combines a rigorous education in the artistic and technical aspects of film production with an immersion in the scholarly study of the aesthetics and history of the medium. Each year a select group of students are admitted who subsequently work together over the four years in an intensive program that prides itself on a spirit of collaboration while encouraging the expansive development of each individual student. The Film Program is primarily oriented toward nurturing a future generation of independent fiction and documentary filmmakers as well as media artists. From their very first courses students are immersed in 16mm film production.

Students are uniquely positioned in the film program to take advantage of the interdisciplinary offerings of the School for the Contemporary Arts as a whole. The programs in Dance, Visual Art, Theatre, Music, and Art and Culture provide exciting opportunities for inter- and cross-disciplinary exploration and cooperation. Students can also participate in screenwriting progams at the Praxis Centre for Screenwriting.

SFU Graduate Film Screening - May 3, 4 & 5 2012

SFU Graduate Film Screening - May 3, 4 & 5

This year’s SFU Graduate Film screening will be
held on May 3rd, 4th and 5th at 6:30 PM the School for the Contemporary Arts.
A website will be launching soon, listing all the films with trailers and screening times.
Djavad Mowafaghian Cinema, 3rd Floor  

Goldcorp Centre for the Arts,
Simon Fraser University,
149 W Hastings St. Vancouver, BC
www.sfu.ca/sca

Nineteen talented Fourth Year film students are working away at all
hours of the day and night, editing sound and picture for short films
that have been twelve months in the making. Four years of intensive
training are being put to the test as they create the films that could
potentially launch their careers. Every year, SFU’s student films are
selected for screening at festivals such as the Montreal World Film
Festival, the Toronto International Film Festival, the Vancouver
International Film Festival and the Whistler Film Festival.

Film professor Colin Browne explains that one of the reasons why SFU
film students make films of such a high calibre is because “our students
are well rounded, learning their craft along with courses in
film history and in other artistic disciplines. And importantly, they
begin making films in the first year–in 16mm–and they don’t stop. They
continue to make work in film and digital formats in every year of the
program. The more practice they have, the more accomplished they become,
and the higher the quality of their films. The number of films we
produce every year is what makes us different from many other programs.”

Preview some of the students’ trailers below!

The Rat by Graeme Achurch

Desert Dust by Chris Lennox-Aasen

MESS by Ryder White

Plating by Jon Thomas

Cinema Studies BA - Fall 2012

The BA in Cinema Studies has been approved by SFU's Senate and Board of Governors, and is currently awaiting final approval from the Ministry of Advanced Education. We anticipate that the program will be able to commence by September 2012 and students can plan on enrolling in lower-division courses like FPA 111 and FPA 136 this September.

This fall the Film Program in the School for the Contemporary Arts will begin to offer a BA in Cinema Studies. This program offers the most exciting and diverse curriculum of any offerings in cinema studies in British Columbia. In your first years you gain a solid foundation in the history of world cinema, from its earliest beginnings to the most diverse range of contemporary cinema. As your program progresses, you can choose from a wide range of elective courses not only in the School for the Contemporary Arts, but in all the departments at SFU affiliated with the BA in Cinema Studies: Communication, the School for Interactive Art and Technology, English, French, Gender and Women's Studies, Sociology and Anthropology, and more. The program is designed around core courses in world cinema and film theory, but leaves students a lot of flexibility to design a program tailored to their specific interests. Students will also able to take a class in production specifically designed for cinema studies majors, and opportunities abound to work closely with production students pursuing their BFA in Film, as well as with students in all the other areas of the School, including Visual Art, Art and Culture Studies, Theatre Performance and Production, Dance, and Music. The School for the Contemporary Arts offers all the advantages of a small, intimate art school -- lots of attention from your professors, close interaction with fellow students, the familiarity of a small program -- and all the advantages of a large university -- access to a vast array of courses, faculty engaged in high-level research, excellent and varied facilities, and more.