WRIT 102: First Year Writing II
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Books from the Catalog
Browse the following subject links from the library catalog.
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Links to books about Motion Pictures in more specific terms.Scroll through links to start a "narrower" search.
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Links to online and bound journals and magazinesSubject term used: Motion Pictures Periodicals.
Reviews vs. Criticism?
Film REVIEWS are assessments of the aesthetic, entertainment, social and cultural merits and significance of a current film or video. Reviews tend to be short to medium length articles, often written by a single staff writer for a particular publication. In most cases, the chief aim of a review is to tell the reader whether the film is worth going to see (or buying on DVD).
- Film reviews can be found in indexes used for popular press and/or newspapers, as well as aggregator sites such as MetaCritic and MRQE.
Film CRITICISM or ANALYSIS is scholarly or focused critical writing about particular films--both current and historical--can be found in an amazingly wide variety of sources, including film journals, and publications devoted to theater, history, literature, women's studies, ethnic studies, and other disciplines. Critical/analytic film articles tend to be more academic and substantive than reviews. These articles often discuss particular films in broad social, political, and historical context. Many times the focus of these articles is on a fairly specific aspect of a film, a director's work, or a film genre.
- Film criticism can be found using the same indexes used for other scholarly content (One Search, MLA International Bibliography, International Index to the Performing Arts).
Source: Film Reviews and Film Criticism: an Introduction (Media Resources Center, Univ. of California-Berkeley)
Scholarly and Popular Publications (great for browsing topic ideas)
Scholarly Journals
Reliable Non-Scholarly Magazines to Browse
New Yorker in print at UM Libraries (New Yorker website)
Harper’s in print at UM Libraries (Harper's website)
Economist in print at UM Libraries (Economist website)
Wilson Quarterly in print at UM Libraries (Wilson Quarterly website)
New Republic in print at UM Libraries (New Republic website)
TV Shows Available on DVD in the library (search in catalog)
The Simpsons
Curb Your Enthusiasm
Da Ali G Show
Mad Men
The Monkees
Saturday Night Live
True Blood
The Tudors
Twin Peaks
The Beverly Hillbillies
The Sopranos (VHS)
Suggested Databases
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Academic Search Premier This link opens in a new window
A full text database spanning academic disciplines with coverage of popular press and scholarly publications, including peer-reviewed journals.
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Alt HealthWatch This link opens in a new windowFocuses on the many perspectives of complementary, holistic and integrated approaches to health care and wellness.
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BrowZine This link opens in a new window
Visual platform that enables users to browse the University Libraries' full-text scholarly journal subscriptions by subject area.
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Communication Source This link opens in a new windowProvides the most robust, quality research solution in areas related to communication and mass media.
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CQ Researcher This link opens in a new window
Contains original, comprehensive reports and analysis on issues in the news. CQ Researcher is part of CQ Collections.
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Google Scholar This link opens in a new windowProvides a search of scholarly literature across many disciplines and sources, including articles, theses, books, and abstracts. In Google Scholar, when UM Libraries has article access, you will see a link to Full text. If a resource is not free or linked to UM Libraries click on More.
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Performing Arts Periodicals Database This link opens in a new windowIndexed articles, plus detailed abstracts and full text from 1864 to current, covering film, theatre and dance.
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Kanopy Streaming VideosKanopy is an on-demand streaming video services for libraries that provides you an easy way to watch movies and documentaries whenever you want, on the convenience of your own device.
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Nexis Uni This link opens in a new windowFull text coverage of general news, business, legal, government and other topics Good source for broadcast transcripts of interviews. Select as Source type.
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Literature Online This link opens in a new windowA fully searchable library of more than 350,000 works of English and American poetry, drama and prose, full-text literature journals, and other key criticism and reference resources.
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Music Periodicals Database This link opens in a new windowMusic journal resource with over 900,000 indexed articles, plus detailed abstracts and full text from 1874 to the present, covering the scholarly to the popular.
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Newspaper Source This link opens in a new windowProvides cover-to-cover full text for more than 40 U.S. and international newspapers.
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SocINDEX with Full Text This link opens in a new windowOffers comprehensive coverage of sociology, encompassing all sub-disciplines and closely related areas of study.
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SPORTDiscus This link opens in a new windowComprehensive source of full text for sports & sports medicine journals.
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Statista This link opens in a new window
Statista is one of the leading statistics companies on the internet. With a team of over 200 statisticians, database experts, analysts, and editors, Statista provides users with an innovative and intuitive tool for researching quantitative data, statistics and related information.
This database includes an AI powered tool. For more information see the Statista Research AI information page.
Helpful Film Studies Sites
Useful Web Resources
Academic Websites
Non-Academic Websites
The Authentic History Center (primary sources on pop culture)
Online Exhibits from the National Archives
Times Topics from the New York Times (Each topic page collects all the news, reference and archival information, photos, graphics, audio and video files published on topics since 1981.)
- Last Updated: Nov 18, 2025 3:35 PM
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