Ah Yes, "Film Class"...
Where aging hipsters, reeking of Dial soap, dismember films and dissect them into their component pieces in the name of "teaching". Dissapointed by their own personal failure to get into film, and the unbearable pressure of the social/tenured elite of the college scene, they blithley infect young minds and rob them of any possibility of individual thought. The thought of a film being "more than the sum of its parts" is a concept more foreign to them than Chaos Theory and twice as intimidating. If it cannot be broken off from the whole and jeered at over 5.00 coffees in the local cafe ( thats pronounced "cah- FEY" ) then it simply isnt worth their time. The despression and sarcasm get worse as you spiral down the collegiate food chain. Community college film teachers are usually just minutes away from trying to kill them selves by sticking their head in an electric oven.
Little do they realize that they are just a microcosm. A small circle of sheep pretending to be men in french berets and their cute little wool coats with the patches on the elbow. They would smoke a pipe, but thats not trendy anymore.
On their more sensitive days they wear the Irish fishermans sweater, every single one of which has mysteriously been purchased "
in a quaint village in the heaths, during our last jaunt across the pond...". They will describe this with a wistful quality and put on the "
Man out of time" fascade so common to those given to be overly dramatic and "artisticly sensitive". They may even pause briefly for the benefit of the women in the audience.
SURELY THIS MAN MUST BE RIGHT! No man could possibly want to get himself into that position so everything they say
MUST be TRUE!
"
Ah, the sweet suffering!"
These are the people they warned us about my first week in "Film Studies". They who think they are right and impart the "knowledge " to any and all sycophants and dull witted students with checkbooks, who will listen.
Conform to my will and you will pass! These little hitlers have done more to harm the film world than any other cause and they need to be exised like a cancer.
My film teacher taught me one very important thing: "
All of the greats had something going for them. They were not part of the crowd. Dare to be great." He was an excellent teacher who taught us to think for ourselves and to find value in the totality of the film, not just its single aspects.
Yes, Film Class...Once we got past the "Intellectual Posers" and the "Angst Ridden Failures", It was a fun ride...
But it will be a sorry day in hell when I let someone else tell me what I am supposed to like, dislike, or shun because its "not up to their standards". The choice is distilled down to this:
I can be a sheep in the meadow or a goat on a hill. The sheep are well fed, but cant survive on their own, get shaved often and get killed when someone desires mutton. The goat isnt as well fed, is wily, and makes up his own damned mind about where he goes and why. It may not be overly grassy, but its his and all the adventure that goes with it.
With that said, I'm gonna go graze on the Hill.
SJ
