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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.

One thing is for sure: most of them only see the mainstream movies that Hollywood releases every weekend. They don't seek out smaller indie films or foreign releases...but for the most part that's because they haven't been exposed to them. I've had great, even heartwarming, success showing them all kinds of movies-from foreign films like City of God and The Motorcycle Diaries to such documentaries as Dear Zachary and The Garden. They've been disarmed and surprised by their own enthusiastic response.

I find it discouraging that our society doesn't promote intellectual curiosity. As mass culture grows dumber by the hour the chances for intelligent entertainment to survive get slimmer. But my students have given me some glimmer of hope.

Leonard Maltin, movies, cinema, films, movie reviews, entertainment, books, Penguin Books