(View entire post here)
I like chocolate, but I don't want to eat it all the time. That's how I feel about movies, too: I like variety. I dote on silent films and obscure movies of the 1930s but I also enjoyed the new Star Trek. I usually don't go for crude comedies but The Hangover made me laugh out loud. I don't see any contradiction in all of this; after all, variety is the spice of life.
For more than a decade I've taught a class at the University of Southern California's School of Cinematic Arts, and it's definitely been a learning experience for me. I have 360 students, only a fraction of whom are film majors; the rest come from all parts of the campus. I have football players, math and English and Economics majors, forming what I would consider a diverse audience of 20-somethings. We screen new movies every week and have one or more guests who worked on the film for a question and answer session. It may be the director, producer, or writer, or possibly the costume designer, composer, cinematographer, or one of the actors.
I learn the most during our discussion periods, where I've observed that my occasional tendency to rant about the younger generation is ill-advised. These young people aren't monolithic: some are liberal, some conservative. Some are curious while others are bored or jaded. Some of them are downright old-fashioned in their thinking.
