Film Studies in Schools

Do you guys think we should actually bring film studies into the school curriculum, right alongside things like music, art, and literature? I honestly feel like cinema is a fundamental part of our shared culture, rather than just being the mindless distraction most people seem to think it is. What's your take?

Yeah, but only if it were an elective

Honestly, I feel—and this is just my take—that film studies should probably be a mandatory subject rather than art class 🙂

wearygardener13 said:honestly, I think film should be a mandatory subject instead of fine arts🙂

No 🙂
I mean, it should definitely be on par with fine arts, but really only if both are treated as practical, hands-on subjects👍
That would include things like music and creative writing too.
Maybe we could just let students choose their electives based on what they actually enjoy👍
The theory would obviously be taught alongside the actual practice🙂

I wasn't talking about those elementary school art and music classes where you actually get to pick up a brush or sing your heart out, but rather the high school version where they just lecture you on architecture, famous painters, sculptors, and composers... I can't speak for every school district out there, but in my experience, there was zero hands-on work involved, just endless theory (though they might show you a few paintings or play some classic tracks, we certainly weren't actually creating anything ourselves).

For sure—you could even count it as a form of fine art (I mean, they're basically just moving pictures)!

I honestly feel like everyone should be required to watch one classic film every single week, don't you think?

Hannah Watson
Look, regardless of how you slice it—if I had my way, I’d push for hands-on practice 😉
. When it comes to the gap >, I’m always going to side with actually doing the work 🙏
. Especially when we're talking about creative expression 😁
.

...great topic—I'm honestly just glad someone finally brought this up 🙂
...I am all for introducing film studies, though obviously not as a replacement for art classes, but alongside them. That said, I’m hoping for a slightly different approach—one that bridges the gap between theory and practice. For me, "practice" would mean watching and analyzing films—a sort of "passive practice"—rather than the "active practice" of actually making movies, like filming or editing. Trying to organize full-scale production workshops in American public schools would be a nightmare, mostly because of budget constraints... but seriously, don't you think it's vital to teach kids how to actually *watch* a movie? It should be treated just like learning to interpret visual art, even if it feels like our schools are still failing miserably at that right now...
...but I won't go on a rant here; there will be plenty of time to dive into the details if people are interested 🙂

Honestly, all of this sounds wonderful in principle, but when you’re fifteen years old and you've just spent the entire day grinding through gym class, you really don't have the mental energy to sit through art class for another six or seven hours... 😬 Unless you happen to be obsessed with cinema, music, or sketching, it's just hard to care.

Most high schools usually offer some kind of electives, like art history or film studies... at least we had those options back then.

All I really remember from school is how my teachers used to absolutely trash movies... especially when it came to book adaptations

I honestly think we should be introducing some basic fundamentals...

I mean, shouldn't American be part of the curriculum for movie studies? Back in my elementary school days, our teacher used to show us all sorts of movies as part of our required reading assignments. We’d dive into documentaries, and we even looked at those old-school, archaic script formats—you know, the ones with two columns, one for the visuals and one for the audio. We covered all that stuff way back in grade school...

@emergence
...we were all huge art nerds back in high school... other subjects just didn't hit the same, so skipping them always felt like the more logical move, right?😉

@Lawrence Booth2/">@@Lawrence Booth2
...what you're saying about using movies to "summarize" literature—I think that's actually a separate issue entirely. It's not that my English teachers (aside from those rare, anti-movie witches 😁) had anything against adapting the classics—even if they didn't particularly enjoy the adaptations themselves—but rather they hated the fact that high schoolers wanted to swap reading for watching. To them, it was the same thing. I mean, who’s going to slog through Anna Karenina when you can just watch it? But that's the mistake. They're two fundamentally different mediums, each deserving its own treatment and offering a totally different experience...

@quietdriver3/">@@quietdriver3
...in theory, you're absolutely right—English class should have covered film too. In practice, though? My teacher didn't know the first thing about cinema, so why should we bother learning it? What's the point? Besides, we weren't even watching movies because, let's face it, we didn't have a VCR 😉
...which brings up a real question: if film studies were actually introduced as its own subject, would things be any different?

I mean, I see plenty of other subjects that probably need more attention in schools than film class. Like, financial literacy? Definitely. But if we're already teaching art and music, then film should totally be part of the mix too. I guess my only worry is that it’d just turn into some boring lecture about Eisenstein and Griffith, and kids would just hate it. Maybe they could even get to make their own movies at Netflix or something. They could watch like 102 different movies on film literacy plus all those avant-garde flicks so they actually know what they're talking about in a debate.

And honestly, everyone would probably pass with flying colors if their reviews always started with stuff like—you know—great camera work, good acting, cool music, or awesome special effects...

Lawrence Booth2 said:all I remember from school is how the teachers used to just bash movies...

Yeah, that’s just that old-school way of looking at things; the idea that a movie is always somehow worse than the book it's based on. I guess it might take a while before that mindset finally fades away from people's heads.

Amanda Lopez50 said:they're arguing against the idea that high schoolers prefer watching a movie over reading a book—basically claiming it's all the same thing (I mean, who’s actually going to sit down with Anna Karenina when you can just watch the adaptation?), but they're missing the point. These are two fundamentally different mediums. They deserve totally different approaches, and honestly, they leave you with a completely different vibe...

but then again, people absolutely loved watching those terrible adaptations based on books 😬

Amanda Lopez50 said:...so, naturally, you have to wonder: if film studies became its own standalone subject, would things actually change?

I guess I wouldn't make it a separate class, personally. Like, music and art classes have those hands-on parts where kids get to actually sing or draw, right? But with film, let's be real—most schools just don't have the budget for all that equipment. And honestly, stuff like speech or scriptwriting is already kind of baked into the American English curriculum anyway. Maybe it would just be better to reorganize what's already there and sprinkle a bit more movie stuff into the existing lessons.

quietdriver3 said:I don't think we need them as separate subjects. Music and Art already have enough active participation built in—like singing or drawing.

We did music back in fourth grade—mostly just singing—then it was all theory after that. As for art? I spent my time doodling flowers in the margins of my notebook. So much "active participation" there.

I'm all for it.

I mean, we were basically singing our hearts out until the very end, right up until the moment the Titanic actually went down.

...I’d actually go the complete opposite way—I think we should introduce film culture as its own distinct subject, at least in high schools. Right now, art class is basically just endless theory—I mean, how many teenagers are actually sitting there painting in class these days? It’s rarely about creative expression anymore; it’s mostly just memorizing facts. If we did that, it wouldn't even be that different from studying film, except they're two totally separate mediums that deserve their own approach—even if the same teacher ends up covering both (which is likely, since I doubt anyone is going to create a whole new teaching certification just for this—did I get that right? I'm not entirely sure...)