PittCat is the main searching tool for all of the materials owned by the University Library System (ULS), including articles, books, ebooks, journal articles, ejournals, audio and video, digital images, government documents, microfilm and movies.

If you're trying to choose a research topic, or find materials, below are some search terms you may find useful. Use these in PIttCat by using the Browse menu option, followed by the term. For example, "film" will search for all books with that subject.

To find books in the ULS on film studies generally, use the following Library of Congress subject heading:

                 MOTION PICTURES
 

To obtain a listing of dictionaries and encyclopedias on film in the library's reference collection, enter the following Library of Congress subject headings:

                 MOTION PICTURES DICTIONARIES
             
                 MOTION PICTURES ENCYCLOPEDIAS



To find records of the library's holdings of general catalogs providing entries with basic information about individual films, enter the following Library of Congress subject heading:

                 MOTION PICTURES CATALOGS
 

To locate any catalogs listing the films of a particular nation or genre in the library, enter more specific subject headings:

Examples:
                 MOTION PICTURES GREAT BRITAIN CATALOGS
               
                 HORROR FILMS CATALOGS
               
                 SCIENCE FICTION FILMS CATALOGS
               
                 WESTERN FILMS CATALOGS

 

To locate general books on the history of film, use the following Library of Congress subject heading:

                 MOTION PICTURES HISTORY
 

To identify books on the film history of a specific nation, enter more specific subject headings:

Examples:
                 MOTION PICTURES JAPAN HISTORY
               
                 MOTION PICTURES GERMANY HISTORY
 

To find books on specific topics in film or on specific film genres, look under their Library of Congress subject headings:

Examples:
                CINEMATOGRAPHY
              
                CINEMATOGRAPHY SPECIAL EFFECTS
               
                ANIMATION CINEMATOGRAPHY
               
                ANIMATED FILMS
               
                FILM NOIR
               
                MELODRAMA IN MOTION PICTURES
               
                HORROR FILMS
               
                SCIENCE FICTION FILMS
               
                AFRICAN AMERICANS IN MOTION PICTURES
               
                WOMEN IN MOTION PICTURES

 

Some films and film series have become so popular or so significant that they have become the subjects of both popular and scholarly books. To locate any of these in the library's collection, enter the film titles as subject headings:

Examples:
                WIZARD OF OZ (MOTION PICTURE: 1939)
               
                GONE WITH THE WIND (MOTION PICTURE)
               
                CITIZEN KANE (MOTION PICTURE)
               
                CASABLANCA (MOTION PICTURE)
               
                TITANIC (MOTION PICTURE: 1997)
               
                MATRIX (MOTION PICTURE)
               
                LORD OF THE RINGS (MOTION PICTURE)
               
                AVATAR (MOTION PICTURE: 2009)

 

If you would like to find books by a particular film critic, filmmaker, producer, cinematographer, or actor,  enter their name as an author:

Examples:
                KAEL, PAULINE
               
                KAUFFMANN, STANLEY
               
                SAYLES, JOHN
               
                EISENSTEIN, SERGEI
               
                SELZNICK, DAVID
               
                KINSKI, KLAUS

 

If you want to locate books about a particular film critic, filmmaker, producer, cinematographer, or actor, enter their name as a subject heading:

Examples:
                LEE, SPIKE
               
                RIEFENSTAHL, LENI
               
                KUROSAWA, AKIRA
               
                ALMODÓVAR, PEDRO
               
                OVITZ, MICHAEL
               
                BERGMAN, INGRID

 

Criticism of the work of a particular individual will also be found under the subdivision CRITICISM AND INTERPRETATION following their name used as a subject heading:

Examples:
                SCORSESE, MARTIN CRITICISM AND INTERPRETATION
               
                FASSBINDER, RAINER WERNER CRITICISM AND INTERPRETATION
               
                JORDAN, NEIL CRITICISM AND INTERPRETATION

 

To locate general bibliographies on film in the library, enter the following general subject heading:

                MOTION PICTURES BIBLIOGRAPHY



For any bibliographies on the cinema of a particular nation in the library, scroll down to the subdivision BIBLIOGRAPHY following a more specific subject heading:

Examples:
                MOTION PICTURES AUSTRALIA BIBLIOGRAPHY
               
                MOTION PICTURES ITALY BIBLIOGRAPHY

Look under specific subject headings and then scroll down to the subdivision BIBLIOGRAPHY to locate any available bibliographies on a specific individual, film genre or topic in the library:

Examples:
                TRUFFAUT, FRANÇOIS BIBLIOGRAPHY
              
                HITCHCOCK, ALFRED BIBLIOGRAPHY
               
                DISNEY, WALT BIBLIOGRAPHY
               
                CHAPLIN, CHARLIE BIBLIOGRAPHY
               
                STEWART JAMES BIBLIOGRAPHY
               
                HORROR FILMS BIBLIOGRAPHY
               
                WOMEN IN MOTION PICTURES BIBLIOGRAPHY