When novelist and film critic David Gilmour saw his son, Jesse Gilmour, begin to struggle in the classroom, he implemented an unusual strategy: he let his son drop out of school if Jesse would watch three movies a week with him. He talks about their story in his new memoir, The Film Club.
Comments [56]
1. Naked Pray
2. Dumb and Dumber
3. Bugsy Malone
I'm suprised Brian and no one else questions whether or not this is irresponsible. I'm in my 20s, I hated highschool. I'm a incredulous that this was such a positive thing. I value finding out what subjects you are interested in, I value struggling to define your identity among your peers more highly than finding "pleasure." I received a visual arts degree in college, I love film too, but I would gotten bored on this regimen. Jesse sounds like he always been allowed to "respectfully" disagree with his father. This is ideal, but what about disagreeing with your peers, what about handling disrespectful disagreement? I don't think he's ever had to do this.
The way he talks about "insanity" shows this. He is harldy specific and he keeps repeating the word and refrencing a gas mask scene instead of making an constructive argument.
Had this story been about an immigrant father and son combination, or a poor family, would people applauded this arrangement? Struggling when you're young has it benefits, especially when you find out what you want to do later in life. You know how to work hard for and to focus on what you want in spite of your environment.
I thought the father's comment that "being around beauty is good for the soul" was wonderful.
I used a project like this to start a conversation with 5 disaffected boys aged 12-14. We saw
Twelve Angry Men
Shane
Fahrenheit 451
It was part of a larger discussion of heroism. The main challenge for boys is to figure out how to become men, and very few have any guidance (or even role models). Addressing any other subject is likely to fall on deaf ears until what is really on their minds has been acknowledged.
Fanny and Alexander
Ju Dou (difficult to find a good print)
The Story of the Weeping Camel
I am sure that the young man is quite intelligent. However, his lack of "pleasure" in high school (for whom is high school pleasurable, anyway?) probably has more to do with growing up with a professor for a father than with some unusual intelligence as the father suggests. His father may have inadvertently trained him to be an intellectual which is not, unfortunately, what most high schools do.
Blue Velvet (madness)
The Pillow Book (birth, life, love, death, redemption, it has them all)
Birth of a Nation (a truer story of US history and race relations doesn't exist; it does not sugar coat what all american know to be true and could do a lot to forward the conversation about race if we could have an honest conversation about this movie)
Housekeeping
Fairy Tale: A True Story
The Amazing Mr Blunden
1) A Clockwork Orange
2) Rebel Without a Cause
3) The Hidden Fortress
"Lawrence of Arabia"
"My Dinner With Andre"
Toss up: "Mishima: A Life in Four Chapters" or "Olympia"
Claude Lanzmann's SHOAH
Almost anything by Pasolini
Ditto Andrei Tarkovsky, probably Stalker or ANdrei Rublov
The Possession of Joel Delaney!
To Kill a Mockingbird
The Breakfast Club
Life is Beautiful or Whale Rider
Also, Night of the Hunter.
This is like homeschooling, sans Christian fundamentalist kooky parents!
everyone must watch "the conversation". a classic and mostly forgotten.
The Sixth Sense
The People Under the Stairs
The Devil's Backbone
Monty Python & the Holy Grail
Metropolis
The seventh seal
Oh Brian, how could you let those comments about insanity (in reference to "Blue Velvet," which I happen to think is absolute junk, along with all the rest of Lynch's movies, but that's not the relevant point) go by w/o comment? I know this is one of your fluff shows (not my favorite kind), but come on, when is society going to START attacking the stereotypes, prejudices, and misperceptions about insanity? It saddens me to be pushed to comment. I'm not generally a commenter, and I don't often think you miss something: you are my favorite radio talk-show host (and I listen to tons of talk radio).
My Girl
A Little Romance
Something Wicked This Way Comes
angels with dirty faces
true grit
the secret garden(1949)
I wish we could do this *in* school. But, sadly, most parents wouldn't let this happen, and even if they did, the BOE sure wouldn't.
sigh
The Truman Show
To Kill a Mockingbird
Psycho
Salaam Bombay!
Schindler's List
Crash
David,
Did this change the way you criticize films or did this help you see other points of view?
Harold and Maude!
searching for bobby fischer
the time bandits
stand by me
3 of many teen choices:
Suspiria
Blade Runner
16 Candles
missisippi burning
chariots of fire
shindlers list
the boy with green hair
whisle down the wind
road to perdition
I'd like to offer the reverse of "showing significant films to one's son:"
My teenage son "required" that I see the following films with him:
"The Breakfast Club"
"Full Metal Jacket"
"The Princess Bride"
The graduate,
Beautiful mind,
The pursue of happiness.
seven samurai
monty python & the holy grail
wizard of oz
Jackie Brown
Juliet of the Spirits
Aquirre, the Wrath of God
My teenage son already loves Kill Bill and Pulp Fiction, Kurosawa-the samurai films, Godfather, The Big Lebowski
Doesn't like the Graham Greene/Joseph Cotton zither movie (forgot the name) and many others we tried to make him watch
My teenage daughter loves the Marx Brothers and Some Like it HOt
1. Ross McElwee's Sherman's March (introspection, how to tell a story)
2. Casablanca (how to tell a great story, the Hollywood way)
3. Gimme Shelter (great music, important historical allegory)
not coming to age but understanding human texture:
Joyeux Noel (2005)
for coming to age:
Jeremy (1973)
La Gifle -the slap (1974)
Don't forget Ingmar Bergman's Shame--a brilliant anti-war movie
au revoir les enfants,
rabbit proof fence,
into the west,
chariots of fire
schindlers list
missippi burning
Reefer Madness (as a demonstration of propaganda; WWII propaganda cartoons as well)
Doctor Strangelove
Network
"Forbidden Games" by Rene Clement
post-WWII children in France coping w/death
Shane
To Kill a Mockingbird
A Man For All Seasons
The Sound of Music
Anywhere But Here
The Money Pitt
and A Fish Called Wanda
1) Lion in Winter (O'Toole, Hepburn)
2) Third Man
3) Children of the Revolution
king of hearts
sullivan's travels
an american in paris
For a younger child: The Red Balloon
for others: Gone With the Wind and My Side of the Mountain
High Noon
Halloween, Blue Velvet, Funny Games
My three best for teens:
Pather Panchali
The Seven Samurai
The Wages of Fear
The Wages of Fear
Breathless
The Bishop's Wife
Dracula Dead and Loving It
Original Frankenstein (1930)s
Notes on a Scandal
Nights of Caberia
Captains Courageous
7 Samurai
the trilogy..
lucasfilm ltd...
1. The Whale Rider
2. In America
3. Ciderhouse Rules
Imitation of Life, 1959 version
my 3 films:
Torch Song Trilogy
Solaris
The Return (Russian)
Oh, the other David Gilmour...
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