THE MYRIN VIRTUAL LIBRARY

• Credo Reference
  • Online access to several Film reference works including: Chambers Film Fact Finder; the Encyclopedic Dictionary of Women in Early American Films: 1895-1930; and Pop Culture! series for different countries. Searches on film titles and terms in this database will also bring up results in Art, History, Sociology and Media related books.
• IMDB: Internet Movie Database [free online]
  • The best place on the Internet for synopses, cast and crew lists, links to reviews, production information, quotes, etc. Note that this site contains user-created content that is changeable, and is not a substitute for verifying the information on your own, or for the material in print in the library that's written by experts and carefully edited.
• Encyclopedia of the Documentary Film [In Print: Reference 070.18 EN19 Vols. 1-3]
  • Published in 2006, this 3 volume encyclopedia provides information on documentary films and filmmakers from around the world
• The Encyclopedia of Novels Into Film [In Print: Reference 791.436 T432 2005)
  • This resource focuses on film adaptations from literature.
• The Encyclopedia of Superheroes on Film and Television [In Print: 791.43652 M896]
  • A work focusing on the comic book-film connection.
• Encyclopedia of Chinese Film [In Print: Reference 791.430951 Z61E]
  • Published in 1998.
• The Film Encyclopedia [In Print: Reference 791.4303 K159]
  • Published in 1994
• Images in the Dark: An Encyclopedia of Gay and Lesbian Film and Video [In Print: Reference 791.43653 M966]
  • Resource specific to gay and lesbian film and related topics.

Use the Library Catalog to search for books on a particular Film Studies related topic, starting with a general "Words or Phrase" search to see what you can find. Make sure to note which location the book is found in. Film Books in Myrin are located on the 3rd Floor, generally in the 791's.

If you are not having much luck with the keyword search, you can use a "Subject" search by choosing that tag from the drop down menu on the main search page to hone in on a specific topic. This can be tricky, but here are some examples of what you can use (the links will take you directly into the catalog with the search results for these subject terms). Note that you will also, in some cases, find actual DVDs and Videos that we have in the collection that are related to these terms. Try your own, too!:

• Animated Films
• Apocalypse in motion pictures
• Art and motion pictures
• Documentary Films
• Feminism and motion pictures
• Film adaptations
• Homosexuality in motion pictures
• Justice, Administration of, in motion pictures
• Men in motion pictures
• Minorities in motion pictures
• Motion pictures -- Social aspects
• Motion picture audiences -- History
• Motion picture industry
• Motion pictures and history
• Mothers in motion pictures
• Politics in motion pictures
• Racism in motion pictures
• Samurai films
• Sex role in motion pictures
• Vampire films
• Violence in motion pictures
• Women in motion pictures

To search by Time Period or Location, Using the Subject Headings, try things like this:

• Motion pictures -- China
• Motion pictures -- France
• Motion pictures -- France -- History
• Motion pictures, German
• Motion pictures -- History -- 19th century

For reviews and film criticism:

• Film criticism
• Film criticism -- Philosophy
• Film criticism -- United States -- History
• Motion pictures -- Aesthetics
• Motion pictures -- Reviews

For film making and filming techniques, try:

• Cinematography
• Motion picture acting
• Motion pictures -- Production and direction

Browsing

You can certainly browse online, but sometimes going up to the stacks can yield some surprises. Film books are all found in the 791 section on the third floor. Once you're up there, you'll notice that the books are grouped together thematically, such as books about women and film, or books about masculinity and film. It's a good idea to browse the catalog first to get some ideas for what books that interest you, and then look around next to them.

You can use the Catalog's POWER SEARCH to limit your search to just DVDs or just Videocasettes. Scroll down on the page and use the "TYPE" dropdown menu to choose either format. Unfortunately, you cannot search both formats at the same time, but do two searches if you don't find the movie you're looking for in the type.

Journal Articles: for serious film criticism and scholarly research

Perhaps the most important resource Film Studies students need are scholarly (and often peer-reviewed) journal articles. These can be difficult to find, especially if you rely on the open web. Instead, start in some of these databases to find film-related journal articles. If you find a record for something that isn't full text, you'll need to use InterLibrary Loan to request it.

• Academic OneFile
  • The best place to start to look for scholarly journal articles and popular magazine articles on film studies-related topics. Not everything is full text so you will need to InterLibrary Loan what you can't get here. Full-text Film Studies-related Journals included in this database are:
    • Afterimage (1994-present)
    • Camera Obscura (1999-2004; indexed to current year)
    • Cineaction (2001-Current)
    • Cineaste (1992-Current)
    • Film Criticism (1997-Current)
    • Film History (2000-Current)
    • Literature-Film Quarterly (2005-Current)
    • Post Script (2002-Current)
• JSTOR
  • Our current collection of JSTOR journals does not include very many film journals. However, it is still worth searching in here to see what is available, as it is all Full-Text and all scholarly, and the articles in here date from the early 20th century through the present time.
• Project Muse
  • Cinema Journal (1999-Current)
  • Film & History (2004-Current)
  • Framework: TheJournal of Cinema and Media (2004-Current)
• Film-Literature Index [in print: Reference 791.43016 F587]
  • This is an index (meaning there are no-full text articles located here) to international film and television/video literature in periodicals. We have this index for 1973-2000. You will have to use  InterLibrary Loan to get most of the articles you will find referenced here.

Finding Movie Reviews

• Use the "Magazines" and "News" tabs in Academic OneFile.
  • Resources such as Time, Newsweek, U.S. News and World Report, The New York Times, several newswires, and many other more specialized magazines that review non-mainstream cinema are available full-text in this database. For movies that were released from the late 1980s on, this is a good source.
• Lexis-Nexis
  • This database contains the full text of thousands of newspapers, popular magazines and trade journals going back to the 1980s. A great resource for movie reviews and current information about movies, movie productions and the like.
• Movie Review Query Engine
  • A free website that compiles reviews of recent movies. Make sure to be discerning in what you pick from here: many of the reviews come from blogs and web pages rather than established news outlets.
• New York Times Film Reviews [In Print: Reference 791.437 N42]
  • Reprints of all New York Times Film Reviews from 1913-2000 (more recent reviews will be available in either Academic OneFile or Lexis Nexis]. This is indispensable for getting reviews of films prior to the mid 1980s.
• Readers Guide. [in Print: Reference 050 R22 -- located near the videos]
  • This is an INDEX (meaning there is no full text available here) to articles in many magazines including Harper's, the Independent, McClure's, the Nation) from 1900 through the present. This is another important resource for finding reviews of films prior to the mid-1980s. You will likely have to use InterLibrary Loan to get the full text of the articles.

Academic Journals

• Bright Lights Film Journal
  • A popular-academic hybrid of movie analysis, history, and commentary, looking at classic and commercial, independent, exploitation, and international film from a wide range of vantage points from the aesthetic to the political. 
• Jumpcut
  • A journal that looks at media in its social and political context.
• Framework
  • An international journal "dedicated to radical and informative analyses of the complexities, histories and intersects of today’s film and media."
• Scope
  • Scope is a fully peer-reviewed online journal edited by staff and students in the Institute of Film & Television Studies at the University of Nottingham. It provides a forum for discussion of all aspects of film history, theory and criticism.
• Screening the Past
  • An international, refereed, electronic journal of screen history
• Senses of Cinema
  • An online journal devoted to the serious and eclectic discussion of cinema

Movie Footage

• MIC: Moving Image Collections
  • This site lets you discover, locate and in some cases view moving images from around the world.

Box Office and Script Information

• Film Box Office Database
• Drew's Script Database

You must cite your sources!

Here's a guide to using the MLA style. Note that you must provide citations for images and you also need to provide citations for the films themselves, in some instances --  see here for Berkeley's guide to citing film and other media resources.

Here's a guide to using the Chicago style, which uses footnotes.

Both the MLA style guide and the Chicago style guide are on reserve at the Circulation desk in Myrin Library.

• Secret Cinema (screening locations throughout Philadelphia)
• The Betzwood Archive and Film Festival (Blue Bell, PA)
• The Colonial Theatre (Phoenixville, PA)
• Philadelphia Film Society and Festival
• Bryn Mawr Film Institute
• Scribe Video Center

Updated February 2009