The newly unveiled Film Studies department at Brandeis has been in the news quite a bit recently. Several high-publicity events have been going on at the Wasserman Cinematheque and elsewhere. Rather than promote the Film Studies department, these events reveal the main point and purpose of the Film Studies department: high-profile glitz and glamor and the worship of fame.This does not mean all of the guests have been without any merit. Many have been serious filmmakers, such as Werner Herzog. Some have been actors or actresses in more questionable taste, like Kate Beckinsale. But all are presented as though Brandeis is uniquely fortunate to be blessed with the presence of these glitterati. There are perhaps valuable things one can learn from a Q-and-A with a director like Werner Herzog.

More intellectually dubious is the value of seeing a movie before other people can; the official Brandeis Web page for the Film Studies department boasts of having had access to an "exclusive . sneak preview. " of an upcoming film. This is exciting, perhaps, but fit more for the pages of Variety magazine than the official site of a serious academic institution.

It gets worse. The Web page also lists actors whom Brandeis has hosted. All are described as "2008 Best Actor/Actress Contenders." This, again, is not something a University should be in the business of bragging about. Brandeis' star connection is provided by Scott Feinberg, a recent Brandeis alumnus and blogger for the Los Angeles Times entertainment Web site. He works with the department to arrange the appearances of stars like Kate Beckinsale and Alan Alda. His job for the L.A. Times is to immerse himself in the world of Hollywood gossip, amid studios' vicious and extravagantly expensive campaigns to win Oscars, and find out who is deemed a "contender."

As Feinberg says on his blog, Oscar contendership is the only factor determining who will appear. "The Oscar wars are waged out here [on the East Coast] too," he writes, calling the recent appearances by Oscar contenders his "neat contribution" to this war and, presumably, to us. He assumes we care about the race for the Oscars and meeting the beautiful people in this race. We don't: This has nothing to do with the serious academic study of film. An editorial from last week's issue of this paper assured readers that screenings "were organized . [to] benefit the studios and the school." An academic institution should have no interest in benefiting Hollywood studios, particularly as it gives free publicity to Oscar candidates. Film Studies Department Chair Alice Kelikian "thinks it [is] no exaggeration to claim that we have the best cinematic programming of any academic institution in the United States." This could be true only if one takes "best" to mean "having the most famous people."

There have been a number of classes about film scattered throughout many University departments. There still are, except now they can be accumulated into a major as well as a minor. This is the only change makers of this major made. Kelikian said the point of making the course of study a major was to "enrich our liberal arts curriculum" with a major that is a "humanities-driven course of study [that] stresses analysis of film style and content, film history and the relationships between cinema and culture." There is precisely one course listed in the Film Studies department proper for next semester, and it is a class about motion picture editing that is technology-based and seems to fit into a "humanities-driven course of study" about as well as a class about book-binding would fit into an English major. Other classes in the School of the Humanities are crosslisted with film, but the content of these is undoubtedly more scholarly than what most people would encounter at the most popular Film Studies events. The Film Studies department has clearly indicated its priority is bringing "talent," as they say in Los Angeles, to Brandeis.

The movies analyzed in Film Studies classes will have little in common with the kinds of people who appear at highly publicized Film Studies department events. Important directors like Werner Herzog and Errol Morris have personally come to Brandeis, but students were largely unaware of their visits until after the fact. They are, as the Justice reports, repeatedly invited because of their close personal connection with Professor Kelikian. All of campus received an e-mail about the visit of Alan Alda and Kate Beckinsale. All of the tickets were distributed quickly, and it was a success for everybody, except for those who care about serious discussions of film. Again, many of the artists who come to Brandeis are accomplished and artistically important individuals, but I think something is deeply wrong with this system if we confuse interviewing actors and directors with the professed goals of the Film Studies department.