Salvete, collegae carissimi! Like me, I assume you’ve recently arrived at the end of a productive semester. Like me, I imagine that you’ve been thrown somewhat off-kilter by the frosty deluge which has cancelled our classes and damned us to Sisyphean shoveling. And like me, you might be considering this an apt time for an activity to ease our students through this awkward transition from one term to the next.
Honestly, whether the term should end with fair weather or a blizzard or a plague of frogs, I set aside a couple of days for the showing of a film which will enable my students to better understand a recently-discussed, or soon-to-be-discussed, cultural topic and to evaluate how our contemporary art is connected to the literature of the ancient world. This is, of course, what we Latin teachers would consider an essential skill; of the Standards for Classical Language Learning, Standard 4.2 suggests that “students compare and contrast their own world with that of the Greco-Roman world.” But, before I present a few examples of my own activities, allow me to offer a few caveats and recommendations on using films to help students achieve this goal.
“Is spending a couple of days watching a movie going to hamper your progress through the curriculum?” “Did you forget your lesson-plans at home?” “Are you trying to distract the children with bright lights so that you can collect your thoughts for a moment?” Make certain that you can respond to such questions with a firm minime. By planning ahead, you can easily be sure that the time spent on the film-activity will not cut into the time you need to thoroughly explain indirect statements before the next test. Provide your students with the assignment which they will be expected to complete before you begin viewing the film, and walk them through that to which they should be attentive. It is helpful to also provide them with a typed list of the key characters, with a short description of each, so that, when citing specific episodes from the film, they don’t constantly refer to “that kid with the shirt.” Ask yourself, “Have most of my students already seen this movie?” If the answer would be “yes,” don’t show it, no matter how pertinent it might seem. Students should be getting a unique and enriching experience in the classroom that they would not normally obtain if they sat on the couch at home. You are that unique and enriching experience when you unravel the mysteries of the Latin language to them in a manner that no inanimate textbook could, and when you lead them to expand their knowledge of ancient culture beyond what most of them might accomplish if left to their own devices. Lastly, is your class going to be able to engage in some thoughtful analysis after watching this film? If not – if the movie only really serves to provide some solid visuals of what Roman soldiers wore or how a chariot-race was staged – perhaps you should just show some clips at an opportune moment. It is for this very reason that I almost never show films that directly address our subject (e.g., Clash of the Titans, Spartacus, et cetera), as nearly every film depicting Greco-Roman civilization has been, at best, jejune and, at worst, hot garbage. I concede there are exceptions; obviously, Hercules in New York was a true masterpiece. But – sweet baby Zeus! – it seems guaranteed that, if a new movie comes out depicting a Greek myth or the Roman army or the like, it’s going to largely consist of oily dudes screaming aphorisms before engaging in slo-mo swordplay.
I have attached below writing assignments that I have paired with two films which we have viewed in class – O Brother, Where Art Thou? (2000) and Moonrise Kingdom (2012). I anticipate that many of you have already created a similar activity around O Brother, the Coen Brothers’ adaptation of the Odyssey, reimagining the tale in Depression-era Mississippi. By identifying how the Coens have transmuted Homer’s epic into a relatively modern setting, the students start thinking more generally about how to craft a successful adaptation. We do this in Latin II before we explore, as a culture unit, Ovid’s Metamorphoses (which Ecce Romani II discusses after Chapter 45), and before I give them, now that they can take the Coens’ work as their model, a special-project option to film their own modern adaptations of three tales from that poem.
My third-year Latin students watched Moonrise Kingdom as we were delving into Catullus’ poetry in Chapter 2 of Latin for the New Millennium (Level 3). In a brief essay, my students were asked to compare the concept of love which Catullus presents in Carmen 5 with that presented by Wes Anderson through his young protagonists, Suzy and Sam, in the film. Along with the actual worksheet, I’ve provided a couple randomly-selected responses from my students, so that you can see what connections they might have noticed. Suzy’s rebellion against her parents, and Sam’s resignation from the Khaki Scouts, certainly reminded many of Catullus encouraging Lesbia to pay no heed to those stern old folks. They also did not miss echoes of Catullus’ urgent “vivamus” and “amemus” in the two young lovers’ adventures in the wilderness, quasi-legal marriage, and parlous flight in the midst of a hurricane.
L2H O Brother WS
L3H Moonrise Essay
Moonrise Samples
