The part of the movie where Ms. Edmonds takes Jess on a field trip really threw me off. Why Jess? Why alone? and so random... it felt really inappropriate to me and I couldn't help but wonder if the teacher had ulterior motives. Thoughts?
shareThe movie didn't deviate much from the book, which was written and set in the 1970s, other than Ms. Edmunds explaining to Jess that she was originally planning to take her nephews on the trip but her sister changed her plans. (Perhaps we can infer that she had tickets she didn't want wasted.)
I went to elementary school in the 1960s, high school and college in the 1970s, went to graduate school and started working in the public school system in the 1980s, and retired in 2008, the year after the movie came out. Practices and norms changed over the years. Back in the '60s and '70s and even into the '80s, few people gave a second thought to a teacher paying a little extra individual attention to a needy student in his or her own free time. Teachers potentially having ulterior motives (such as molestation) have only relatively recently become a major concern.
I'm not disagreeing with the OP questioning the appropriateness of the situation. Let's just call it an anachronism without which the story may not have been able to take the course it did.
A number of BtT fanfiction writers including myself collaborated on a role-playing alternative storyline which addresses some of these the issues at:
http://aterabithiarpg.proboards.com/index.cgi?board=completedthreads&a mp;a mp;action=display&thread=323&page=1
In this storyline, titled "Reversals of Fate", Jess and Ms. Edmunds get into a car crash on the way to the museum and both end up in the hospital in comas. Since Jess has no identification but is believed to be the boy in the accident, the police come to the Aarons home and tell his parents they think Jess was the boy in the crash. Hoping that Jess is actually safely in Terabithia with Leslie, Jack Aarons and Bill Burke go looking for them and end up saving Leslie's life when she falls in the creek. As the storyline evolves, the question of what Jess and Ms. Edmunds were doing driving alone together gets a closer look. (Unfortunately, the project fizzled to a halt just as we had Ms. Edmunds getting out of the hospital and getting a notice from the Lark Creek Board of Education that they are investigating the circumstances of the accident and her liability for Jess's injuries.) But you may find it interesting anyway.
Ms. Edmunds explaining to Jess that she was originally planning to take her nephews on the trip but her sister changed her plans. (Perhaps we can infer that she had tickets she didn't want wasted.)
She took her to the Smithsonian art museum and that museum is free so one can't infer that she didn't want to waste tickets. Not to mention that you really couldn't buy tickets online or by phone anyway so she would've only been able to get tickets at the door.
In the book (set in the 1970s) she took Jess to the Smithsonian which is indeed free admission. In this movie it's unspecified as to what museum in what city she takes him to and therefore what kind of ticketing arrangements it had.
shareInappropriate? Are you serious? Is that how paranoid and cynical things are these days?
I have no problem with teachers encouraging students who are not getting ANY encouragement at home (like Jess).
When I was in 5th grade which was only about 7 years before this movie came out, my teacher chose me and only one other student to go on a field trip to a local Air Force museum. I didn't know it at the time, but it turned out she arranged the trip because she felt we weren't excelling the way the other students were. I think in this movie the teacher chose to bring Jess to a museum because she felt he needed to see art so he can fully understand how it can help him escape his reality, since she noticed he had problems with being bullied by other students. I don't feel it was inappropriate. A. Because she brought him to a public place, and a place where learning is involved and B. this appears to be a very small town where everyone knows each other and the teachers have more contact with all of their students as opposed to a bigger school where the teachers might not even speak one on one with a student more than a couple of times.
shareexactly this!
shareIt's not uncommon for younger teachers, such as herself, to still consider themselves "one of the kids", and as such, develop friendships... or even deeper feelings.
To me, she had a crush on him, and wanted some one on one time. I'm surprised that people are making excuses for her on this forum. She is an adult and a trained professional, she knows not to be going on dates with students.
To me she followed the typical pedophile profile... target a boy with little friends and a complicated home front. What a sicko.
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Who says the movie was set in modern times?
I saw no sign of a smart phone or any sort of mobile phone for that matter.
Their bus looked extremely old.
The tv looked old fashioned....
That makes me think that the movie was set earlier than the 80s(when mobiles began to be sold).
A current day movie where there is no sort of mobile used, even by an extra, tvs arent flat screen and buses look old is extremely weird imo.
I completely agree.
Except for the electronic devices the kids in the classroom are using the first time the classroom is shown, the teacher talking about "downloading essays off of the internet" and the 'old fashioned' tv playing Hannah Montana, there is NO WAY this movie was set in modern times
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I can't help but thinking you're projecting. The book was written in the 70's, when times were different. The teacher taking the fieldtrip with Jess was an integral part of the plot. Regardless of what era in which the movie was set, this is the reason that Jess was not there when his friend drowned. This is why he feels so guilty. There is no circumventing this plot point.
It's just the implication of these actions being in a more modern setting where teacher molestations are headline news that makes this scene so off-putting. I really don't think you've read the book.
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Wow, how willfully ignorant of you, not to mention flat-out wrong.
Because you don't have the context, and you won't research the answer to your own question, that's about the end of how far we can take you. On the off chance you're not a troll, good luck.
Who says the movie was set in modern times?
Teacher choose him specifically because she saw his artwork, his sketch book kind of paintings, So she wanted to take someone who can actually understand the stuff...!!!
shareExactly! Likely she knew something about his home life, and wanted to provide an experience she knew he might not have, but could appreciate. Sometimes being a teacher means a little more than just the classroom.
Even if the timeline was updated in the movie, the book was written in more innocent times, and in a more innocent place.
As I said earlier, nowadays teachers who get involved in their students' lives and give them a little extra attention off the school grounds do so at their own peril, and get thrown under the bus by the school district if there is even an allegation of impropriety. Depending on the situation, the teachers union may well throw the teacher under the bus as well.
Some teachers still assume that risk and go above and beyond the call of duty. I can see a young, idealistic and perhaps naive teacher like Miss Edmunds doing that in any era, although in this day and age an administrator or an older, mentoring teacher might pull her aside and caution her against it if the administrator or older teacher were aware beforehand. Hardly an invalid point, and I'm speaking after retiring from over two decades in the public school system.
I agree-I felt the same way. Even in the 70's (where this movie is supposedly set, although the characters certainly didn't dress like the 70's), it would have been considered odd or inappropriate for a teacher to take a student alone on a field trip. At least, the teacher would have contacted the parents herself and gotten permission, rather than relying on the student's say-so.
Jess was shown to be smitten with the new teacher when he first saw her, and there was something about helping her carry her things into school, and she was attractive. These elements, plus the fact that modern audiences are more suspicious of these things should have made the filmmakers write the script a little differently--why make things uncomfortable that aren't meant to be?
I saw it as her reaching out to a kid that she thought had great potential but was stuck in a crappy situation. I had a rough childhood, and adults sometimes did nice things for me. It felt like she wanted to show him that there was more outside their town.
shareI was thinking the same...she calls him at home but doesn't talk to the parents? Also tons of female teachers getting it on with students in the news, and it naturally had me going kinda weird...also Zoey Deschanel was hot...
But times were more innocent back then when this book was written, obviously.
But times were more innocent back then when this book was written, obviously.
in addition to noticing his artistic capabilities, he helped her carrying the boxes which "made her day" so she wanted to pay him back without making other pupils jealous.
i mostly will not be able to answer your reply, since marissa mayer hacked my email, no notification
There were a few things that would have been different when the book was written that the film didn't update - and this is one of them. The only thing I would raise an eyebrow at is that it looks like the teacher called Jess personally and asked him to come along. You'd think she would have asked his parents first and then him. I assume that his parents knew where he was but it still seems a little odd.