MOVIE: Die Welle (The Wave)

Debuting at the Sundance Film Festival in 2008 and several dozen others throughout the next year, the German film Die Welle - translated literally as The Wave - has been a hit with critics and audiences alike. The story is based on book of the same title by Todd Strasser, and occurs at a German high school where a teacher, attempting to engage his pupils in a week-long civics lesson on autocracies, ends up turning his class into a dictatorship that extends beyond the walls of the classroom and even the school itself. Both book and film were inspired by a Palo Alto, California, history teacher named Ron Jones who performed a similar social experiment at Cubberley High School in April of 1967.

Powerful both in the fact that it takes place in contemporary society and in the realistic dialogue between the students in and out of class, the film shows the viewer just how easily ideas can be manipulated and people can be coerced. Near the beginning of the movie, on the first day of the course, many of the students claim that a dictatorship could and would never be allowed to happen in modern Germany again. By the end of the story - all dressed alike with new "recruits" and gang-style greeting gesture - gathered together in the school auditorium, they get a good look at what they've become.

Sergio del Limonar

MOVIE: Entre Les Murs (The Class)

As a teacher, I am sometimes frustrated with the portrayal of classroom life in movies. Entre Les Murs (literally "Between the Walls") is probably the first film I've seen where all the interactions, dialogue, and situations are accurately represented.

"The Class," as it is know in English, is a French production directed by Laurent Cantet and the winner of the Palme d'Or at the 2008 Cannes Film Festival. Set at a diverse inner city public high school in Paris, the story follows an academic year in French teacher François Marin's classroom. Played by novelist and actor François Bégaudeau, he is a caring but challenging teacher, who tries to be sympathetic to the tough lives of his students while, at the same time, pushing them to learn and achieve. The students, many who do not consider themselves "French" and therefore see no merit in learning the formalities of the language, often challenge him back and, as we all do, François occasionally reaches a breaking point.

What I liked about this movie, aside from the realism of classroom life, was how it shows the sometimes daily punishment for little pay many educators put up with for and from the kids they want to help. Another remarkable thing about the film is that, although it is scripted, the "students" are not trained actors and the movie feels almost more like a documentary than anything else. The faculty meetings also could not be more accurately executed.

In true "French film" style the story wanders around a bit and there are obviously subtitles so reading is required, especially with the amount of slang used by some of the characters, but the experience is worth it, in a bittersweet way.

Sergio del Limonar

BOOK: Prep

Remember moving far away from the comforts of home to a part of the country you knew nothing about, socially, to go to high school? Remember dormitory living at 15 years old, the ins and outs or formal dinners, and how to tell the differences between the different types of "rich" amongst your peers? Me neither...

But I still found Curtis Sittenfeld's 2005 novel, Prep, about an ambitious girl from South Bend, Indiana, from a middle class family who's dad runs a mattress factory, who gets accepted to a prestigious boarding school in Massachusetts on (gasp) scholarship. The book is divided by parts of the academic year beginning with the heroine, Lee's, Freshman Fall semester and follows her through her time at the institution.

What impressed me most about Ms. Sittenfeld's writing (yes, "Ms.") is how accurately she wrote the internal dialog and thought process of a high school student. Hanging around them all day long, I can vouch that she was spot on. High School can be an interesting and challenging time for a kid, especially one attempting to both just survive and simultaneously discover who they are. Sittenfeld nails both, finding ample time to sprinkle in plenty of humor that will make anyone, whether still in high school or years removed laugh out loud at how some things never change.

Sergio del Limónar