Zoom-In is a thesis showcase presented by the MA Film and Media Studies Class of 2022. The fifth annual Zoom-In took place on March 11–12 at the Lenfest Center for the Arts. This year, the event included individual presentations, discussion panels, Q+As, and supplemental screenings. The program continued to investigate classical problems of our field (documentary, theory, exhibition), as well as issues arising from today’s emerging new media. Damon Young, Associate Professor at UC Berkeley's Department of Film and Media, serves as Keynote speaker.

Friday, March 11

4:00 PM–5:00 PM                Welcome and Opening Remarks

5:00 PM–5:40 PM 
Discussion Panel 1: “Horror, Trans and Cinematic Uncanny: Theories and Practice of Affective Spectatorship”

Ryan Hupp, “‘It’s All Recorded’: Sound Technology and the Cinematic Uncanny”
Sam Miller, “Werewomen, Transwolves: The Exhumed Trans* Qualities of Horror Cinema”
Xiaoyang Pan, “Review of Neuroscientific Methodologies in Researching the Narrative Film”

Moderator: Carlos Gutierrez Aza

5:40 PM–5:50 PM: Group Q&A (~10 min)

(10 minute break)

6:00 PM–6:15 PM
Individual Presentation 1:
Yulong Hu, “The Earth as a Film Set, The Cloud as a Screening Room: Understanding
Surveillant Problematics in Society Through Dragonfly Eyes (2017)”

6:15 PM–6:20 PM: Individual Q&A (~5 min)

6:25 PM–6:50 PM
Discussion Panel 2: “Rethinking the ‘80s: Alternative Tastes and Avant-gardes of
1980s American Cinema”
Annie Berman, “Deciphering the Riddle, Deciphering the Self: Queer and Feminist Approaches to ‘Pedagogical Cinema’”
Benjamin Crabtree, “Choice-A-Rama: Rereading Gimmickry in 1980s Cinema”
Moderator: Julia Delgadillo

6:50 PM–7:00 PM: Group Q&A (~10 min)

7:30PM – Silent Madness (1984) in 3D
First-ever 3D Screening at Lenfest Center for the Arts!
(90 minutes)

Saturday, March 12

12:00 PM                        Day 2 Welcome and Opening Remarks

12:10 PM–12:50 PM
Discussion Panel 3: "Resisting National Myth and Allegory"
Julia Delgadillo - “Fairytale and Folklore: The Lucha Libre Film as a National Allegory”
Soo An Kang, “Adolescent Representation in South Korean Cinema”
Qingxu Li, “The Unsmooth Transition: The 1990s Chinese Disillusioned Film and its Cross-cultural Resonances”
Soumya Vats, “Mandate for Nationalism: Streaming, Opposition and Censorship in Contemporary India through Mira Nair’s A Suitable Boy”
Moderator: Xiaoyang Pan

12:50 PM–12:55 PM: Group Q&A (~10 min)
1:00 PM KEYNOTE FROM PROF. DAMON YOUNG, UC BERKELEY
(via Zoom) and Q&A

(Coffee and mingling break)

2:30 PM–2:45 PM
Individual Presentation 2:
Ailin Zhou, “Metropolis in Shanghai, Shanghai as a Metropolis: The Reception of Foreign Films and the Formation of Chinese Modernity”

2:45 PM–2:50 PM: Individual Q&A (~5 min)

2:55 PM–3:10 PM: 
Individual Presentation 3:
Lin Zhang, “Pluralizing Fissures: The Haunting Maoist Specter in 21st Century Chinese
Cinemas”

3:10 PM–3:15 PM: Individual Q&A (~5 min)

(10 minute break) 

3:30 PM–4:10 PM
Discussion Panel 4: “Seeing the Invisible: Movement, Sutured Time, and the Meaning of the Mutable Pictures”
Maya Kotomori, “Faux: The Histrionics of Deepmeaning”
Akash Shetye, “To Cut Across Time: An Inquiry into Non-Simultaneous Crosscutting”
Dennis Sun, “Rethinking Bergson and Deleuze's Theories of Movement–The Material Ontology of Analog and Digital Moving Images, and the Disciplines in Creation of Digital Artworks”
Moderator: Yilun Li

4:10 PM–4:20 PM: Group Q&A (~10 min)

(10 minute break)

4:30 PM–5:10 PM
Discussion Panel 5: "Interactivity, Immersion, and Identity: Consumption and Transformation of New Media"
Jung Aa Ahn, “Power of Immersion: Netflix’s The School Nurse Files”
Carlos Gutierrez Aza, “Do It For The Culture: The Hypervisibility of Identities and the Commodification of Culture in Mainstream Cinema”
Isabella Rosete, “Writing Our Lives, Living Intertextuality: The Roles of Screen(ed) Memories, Mass Fluidity, and the Culture of Nostalgia in Gen Z’s Online Identity Formation”
Moderator: Soumya Vats 

5:10 PM–5:20 PM: Group Q&A (~10 min)

5:30 PM                   Closing Remarks (Reception off-site to follow)