Liar, Liar, Pants on Fire

The film The Invention of Lying ultimately argues that lies are necessary and even perhaps good, that they enrich our lives in meaningful ways, that they bring us happiness and peace. Bruce Muzik in his TEDx Talk "The BIG Secret Nobody Wants to Tell" argues the opposite. He posits that we are all liars but challenges us to own up to our lies, to expose ourselves for who we really are to the world, and that only through this process of pure honesty can we find peace and happiness and a sense of "aliveness."

Consider your own opinions about the truth and about lies. What role does each play in your life, in our world? Are lies necessary to our existence? Can we ever be truly "authentic" as liars? What would our world look like without lies? Would you want to live in that world?

As you consider these questions, conduct an experiment to test your beliefs on this issue. Try to go one full day (24 hours) without telling a single lie or practicing deceit in any way. Or, if you prefer, keep track of the falsehoods you tell, however big or small, and analyze your motives. Why do you lie?

Use the results of your experiment to support your answers to the question above.

Anti-Intellectualism: The Death of America?

Future Leaders of the World

It's no secret that Americans are getting dumber by the decade. Not only is the intelligence of the average American waning, Americans celebrate their own stupidity. As a nation whose average college-educated citizens can only read at a fifth grade level, we are continually finding new ways to dumb down just about everything. In fact, even as standardized tests are intentionally made easier so Americans can appear smarter to each other and the rest of the world, average test scores are still declining. Some argue that right-wing conservatives have a calculated agenda against education, commonly referred to as anti-intellectualism. The theory goes that the rich and powerful, because of their desire to remain rich and powerful, have a vested interest in keeping the rest of the country ignorant and powerless.

Consider Paul Krugman's argument in last Thursday's New York Times, for example. He argues that there is a war on education. One facebooker responded to Krugman this way:

          There's a vested interest in keeping America dumb. It strengthens the class divide, which I assume
          the majority of those on the more economically gluttonous would prefer. It makes the majority of
          average Americans more easily persuaded to vote against their own best interests. And if I recall
          correctly, a large percentage of the armed services comes from poor, disadvantaged and otherwise
          under-serviced segments of society. Couching even part of this invitation to willful ignorance - even
          active disdain of smart or educated people - in *religion* concerns the bejeezus out of me.

You might disagree with Krugman's argument. But what if he and millions of other Americans who believe there is an anti-intellectualism conspiracy afoot are right? 

More and more often teachers labeled as "hard" or "tough graders" are being censured by apathetic and falsely entitled students who think they should "get" (as opposed to earning)  A's or at least passing grades simply for showing up to class and turning "something" in for homework assignments. Students are more likely to view college as a place you "buy" a degree than as a place where learning takes place as their critical and creative thinking skills are honed for the purpose of inventing new ideas and creating new knowledge. When many students claim that the most superficial analyses are just "reading too much into it," whatever "it" may be at the time, how will we ever raise a nation of thinkers?

While education is, for the most part, intrinsically linked to social class and individual economic success, our political leaders are slashing education budgets and student financial aid. Meanwhile, the cost of a college education has risen almost 500% over the last 30 years while the national rate of inflation for other goods and services has only been 115% since that time (Inflation Data). Thirty years ago, the average American citizen could expect to earn a degree s/he could afford without incurring mounting debt and that degree all but guaranteed that individual a job that earned a salary that would support a middle class existence. Now, tuition soars higher every year, more and more students must take out loans as financial aid is cut, and that degree gives its owner no guarantee of a job at all much less one that would sustain a middle class lifestyle.

Who's fault is all this?

If our nation is going to derail its current trajectory toward the world Mike Judge depicts in his scathing satire Idiocracy, everyone of us must commit ourselves to our own, individual educations, whether that is in a college or books we check out from the local library or free online lectures from TED, MIT Open Courseware, Academic Earth, and others where the world's most intelligent minds share their knowledge for free. A renewed passion for intellectualism might be the only thing that will save our country from this bleak fate.

What is your attitude about education and the future of our country? If the Joe Bauers (aka Not Sure) of this world remained steeped in apathy and ignorance, what will become of us? What will become of your children, of their children and their children's children?

A Question of Fidelity

Some people believe that in order for a film adaptation to be “good,” it must be faithful to the original work. Some filmmakers adhere to this philosophy. Kenneth Branagh, whose film adaptations of several of Shakespeare’s play have aimed for a strict adherence to the original work, is an excellent example. However, many experts strongly disagree. William Goldman says, “There has never in the history of the world been a movie that’s really been like the book.” Deborah Cartmell and Imelda Whelehan make a similar argument in The Cambridge Companion to Literature on Screen: “Explicit in all these works is a desire to free our notion of film adaptations from this dependency on literature so that adaptations are not derided as sycophantic, derivative, and therefore inferior to their literary counterparts.” In fact, most people will typically argue that “the book is better” when discussing film adaptations.

In considering this debate more analytically, now with a better understanding of the artistic differences between these mediums and the limitations of each, which camp are you in? Should film adaptations strictly adhere to the original work, or should the director have the artistic freedom to reimagine the story to create a completely new, unique narrative?

 To help you decide, consider the following questions:

· Should fidelity to the original work be the foremost concern of a film adaptation?
· Should fidelity to the original work even be a concern at all?
· Is an accurate depiction of an original story whether fiction or nonfiction more important than the artistic and interpretive retelling of that story?
· Does translating a story from one medium into another necessitate change to the story itself?
· How much of a story’s integrity can be maintained when retelling it in a new medium?

Finally, consider Spike Jonze’s film Adaptation. What camp do you think Jonze is in? How does his film comment on the complexities of film adaptation? What connection does he argue between the process of film adaptation and evolution, and how does this support his views on adapting other works into films?

 

The Will Ferrell Experiment

In The Art of Watching Films, Dennis Petrie and Joseph Boggs claim that “One of the most difficult prejudices to overcome is that which leads us to dismiss certain categories of films,” and we certainly can acknowledge the veracity of at least half of that claim. We make decisions about what we like and dislike oftentimes based on limited experiences, and we then allow ourselves to be guided almost entirely by those snap judgments. One person catches twenty minutes of an old black and white film as an adolescent and then categorically rejects black and white films from his future movie choices. Another is forced to endure an annual television viewing of The Sound of Music with her family and, having heard “Do-Re-Mi” a few hundred too many times, refuses to ever see a musical again. We make similar judgments about actors, directors, and styles of film. But are we really ensuring that we don’t waste time watching movies we know we’ll hate, or are we limiting our opportunities to experience different worldviews, potentially great art, or even just some great entertainment? When we limit ourselves based on the film prejudices we’ve developed throughout our lives, what are we missing out on?
 

Once upon a time, I hated Will Ferrell. Well, “hate” is a strong word, but I certainly did not appreciate his style of humor. "He's stupid," I thought. (Real mature attitude there, teach.) I refused to watch any movie he played a major role in. Then one day, I decided to give him another chance. I was bored and had time to kill. I couldn’t find anything that grabbed my attention at the video store, so I rent a copy of Elf.

That was nine years ago, and to this day, Elf remains part of my annual Christmas movie marathon. In fact, I usually watch it at least twice every holiday season. After that, I was open to viewing more Will Ferrell films, and Stranger Than Fiction joined my list of all-time favorite movies as well. What if I had continued to let my prejudice dictate my movie choices? I would have missed out on some of my favorite entertainment, not to mention a profoundly intellectual and philosophical insight into two of my favorite mediums of entertainment—film and literature. Now when I catch myself dismissing a movie because of a particular actor, I refer to my Will Ferrell experiment as a reminder that my original assumptions may not be correct. In fact, I have to tell myself this every time I see that Rene Zellwegger is in a film. (She's sooooo annoying!) I haven't given up on her, but she has failed to win me over yet.

Consider your own film prejudices. Before watching Stranger Than Fiction, what did you expect from the film? What did you expect the experience of watching the film would be like? How well did you expect to enjoy the movie? Did your preconceived beliefs about the film change after watching it? Why or why not?

Like literature, music, or any other art form, some movies are created with the primary purpose of entertainment while others are meant to be more artistic and profound. But every film has the potential to be both entertaining and enlightening if we are willing to suspend our personal prejudices and approach it analytically. Some people believe that analysis voids our ability to enjoy a book, a song, or even a movie, but the opposite is actually true. Analysis deepens our appreciation and allows us to sharpen our judgments. With this understanding, contrast your personal opinion with your analysis of Stranger Than Fiction. In what ways is your personal opinion of the movie different from your "professional" opinion of it? In other words, how well did the film measure up to your individual standards vs. how well it stood up under artistic scrutiny?

Not Another Award-Winning Movie?

Describe your initial reaction to the trailer. Did you like it? Dislike it? Agree? Disagree? Was it funny? A waste of your time? Would you repost it on facebook because it was so incredibly awesome?

Now analyze your response to the parody. If you like it, why? If you felt it was a complete waste of your time, why? If you found it funny, what made it so?

Finally, what elements of the trailer resonate truths that are congruent with your own beliefs about the film industry? The “Award-Winning Movie Trailer” operates under the assumption that the “best” films all follow the same predictable storytelling patterns, that creating an award-winning movie is really more about following a formula. (Keep this in mind later when we watch Adaptation.) It satirizes academy award-winning movies in a similar way as movies like Scary Movie, Not another Teen Movie, and Dance Flick satirize their more serious counterparts by mocking the formula. What formulas do you see at work in the types of films you choose to watch? Do they follow the pattern outlined in this video? Do you prefer films that stick to tried and true patterns or those that stretch the boundaries of audience expectation?