News Review and Commentary

FILMCLUB GIVES CHILDREN A NEW TASTE FOR OLD TREASURES

6/11/2008 7:18:00 AM

   

The Times 11 June

 In a noisy primary school classroom in East London, 15 very small film buffs are arguing about whether The Red Shoes is better than Duck Soup. Three of them feel that Michael Powell and Emeric Pressburger's ballet fantasy is the superior work, even though they were too scared to finish watching it. Most of the others preferred the Marx Brothers' 75-year-old knockabout “because it was so funny”. There is no contest as to the most popular film they have watched through FilmClub, a new nationwide scheme to give children free access to classic films. They all adore Grease. “They made me rewind it four or five times so they could dance to all the songs again,” said Karen Parker, who helps to run the branch of FilmClub at Lauriston Primary School in Hackney. That Duck Soup, The Red Shoes and Grease were made in 1933, 1948 and 1978 sails over the heads of the children, who are all aged between 7 and 10 and probably can't remember the first Harry Potter film coming out. Nor are they bothered that Duck Soup is in black and white or that Monsieur Hulot's Holiday, which they still talk about long after seeing it, has subtitles.

Times 

General | Primary

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