students

The students who chose films different from their usual preferences ended up enjoying them. Through research, reflection questions, character studies, and presenting their opinions, they developed a deeper understanding of the films. Many students were pleasantly surprised by the films' impact, despite initial hesitations due to factors like black and white or old age. They appreciated the experience and some even had their perspectives on film changed. But what I did find is that the students who chose stuff or films that were kind of antithetical to what they would gravitate towards in their normal life, once they started doing the research and once they started figuring out the context related to their film, once they actually sat down and watched the film and then answered these reflection questions that I had for them, once I had them do character studies, and once, they needed to present me their own opinion, right? It would be totally fine if they hated the film, but they needed to be able to explain why while also being able to describe the plot and things like that and not just do a cut and paste off of the internet. What I found is that the kids who took the project seriously ended up, for the most part, absolutely loving the films that they watched because they were genuinely surprised that what they were watching was not what they were expecting. I don't want to watch this because it's in black and white. Guess what? Black and white movies can be very powerful. I don't want to watch this because it's too old. I don't want to watch this because it looks fake. All of this stuff, students, when they let their guards down, found themselves really, really enjoying these films that they had never heard of. And I was pleasantly surprised that most students ended up saying, even though this is not my type of film that I would normally seek out, I enjoyed watching it. I may never, or some of them said, I may never watch this again, but I'm glad that I had this experience, or this movie has now completely changed the way that I view film and the type of stories that can be told.