MovieChat Forums > État de siège (1973) Discussion > Film Education in the 1980s and '90s

Film Education in the 1980s and '90s

posted 15 years ago by seankaye-smith
5 replies | jump to latest

From the 1970s until the late 1990s, before DVDs took over, the British Film Institute produced Film Studies materials for use in schools and colleges (they still do but in a different way). Amongst many other things, there were approximately 30 individual film study packs for a wide variety of films, eg. 'Klute', 'Dirty Harry', 'Gregory's Girl', 'Star Wars', 'The Taking of Pelham 123', and so on, and remarkably 'State of Siege' was one of the films; I still have the slide set (yes, slides) and notes, and the video I bought of the film to use with them. I note that the film still hasn't been released on DVD and the cheapest copy of the video on Amazon tonight was £28.
I guess my two points are, as others have said: when is this superb film going to be available on DVD? And, equally worrying, whatever happened to Media Studies? We used to study 'State of Siege', nowadays it's 'Big Brother' and 'Britain's Got Talent'.

[–] Eumenides_0 15 years ago

I find it amazing that this movie was studied in school once. It just goes to show how education has declined in the last decades.

This world is a comedy to those that think, a tragedy to those that feel.

[–] liutenantsalt 9 years ago

I find it amazing that this movie was studied in school once. It just goes to show how education has declined in the last decades.

If anything, the teaching of this hypocritical and lopsided bit of totalitarianism- and terrorism-fetishizing propaganda is a prime example of why public education systems are such garbage.

[–] balthazar_bee 9 years ago

Well, it is quite a strong film, and using a film as a teaching tool amounts to more than turning it on and saying, "Learn this."

[–] adamwarlock 9 years ago

Afraid to understand other points of view, liutenantsalt? Based on a real American operative who did teach torture and supported death squads in Latin America. Facts. The communist rebels are guilty of atrocities too but in reaction to their repressive governments. Centrist descent got people nowhere, the communists were the ones who took action so they got the recruits. I bet the CIA wishes they had to deal with these guys now instead of Islamic fundamentalists.

Expansion to your ego.

[–] eolloe 10 years ago

Why Klute?