Films Featuring Arguments

December 29, 2004 3:01 PM

Can anyone suggest polemical films, documentary or fictional, that would be good in a college composition course on writing arguments? [MI]

I teach advanced comp at a community college. The focus of my class is argumentative writing, but around mid-semester, I give them a break from reading, and we talk about film rhetoric for a few class sessions. In the past, I've had good luck with Errol Morris's Thin Blue Line and Tim Robbins' Dead Man Walking , both of which have been useful as examples of film arguments that reasonably articulate the opposing side of the issue. In other words, Michael Moore is of no use to me.

I'm keeping the Morris - I'm not sick of it yet, and it produces good discussion and essays - but I cannot watch Dead Man Walking one more time, and I'd like something that is not so capital L-Liberal for my students from conservative Colorado Springs (not that I want to pander to their worldview - I just don't want to rub their noses in mine. Too much.). I was thinking about pairing Morris with Super Size Me, but I didn't like the movie that much, and I'd like to keep images of vomiting and prostate exams to a minimum. I would love any suggestions. I'm trying to update my syllabus, and I just found out I have to teach an ancient to medieval lit course in 3 weeks, the subject matter of which I haven't touched since undergrad, so I'm out of brain space for the moment.

posted by bibliowench to Media & Arts (21 answers total)

What issue do The Thin Blue Line and Dead Man Walking present "opposing sides" of? Seriously, I'm mystified.

As for the ancient-to-medieval-lit course: My suggestion is to teach it in reverse chronological order. You'd be surprised how well that works.
posted by Sidhedevil at 3:09 PM on December 29, 2004

On reflection: do you mean that both films present a complexity of viewpoints on an issue? Because I may have misread your question completely.

An "argumentative" documentary I like a lot is Blue Vinyl.
posted by Sidhedevil at 3:11 PM on December 29, 2004

Battle of Algiers.
posted by sled at 3:13 PM on December 29, 2004

Capturing the Friedmans would be interesting, particularly as an exercise in authorial decision (given that most of the evidence actually points in one direction, why was the filmmaker so even-handed? Should he have been?).

I know you said that you're trying to stay away from capital-L liberalism, but Going Upriver is very well-done, and it's a period in history that my freshman composition students know hardly anything about. Comparisons to the current situation in Iraq would also make for some interesting discussions.
posted by BackwardsCity at 3:35 PM on December 29, 2004

would something like MASH or Catch-22 work? or Grapes of Wrath or Sullivan's Travels?
posted by amberglow at 3:37 PM on December 29, 2004

or A Face in the Crowd?
posted by amberglow at 3:37 PM on December 29, 2004

One that comes to mind is Brothers Keeper which isn't particularly liberal except that there is the allegation that the brothers -- who lived together and shared a bed -- may have been in some way sexually involved with one another. There's a great "aha" moment when one of the local townspeople who looks like he'd be a pretty conservative guy basically said "I don't care if they were sleeping with each other, that's their business but I don't think he killed his brother." or something to that effect.
posted by jessamyn at 3:42 PM on December 29, 2004

Some idle notions, some much more appropriate than others:

Missing
Invasion of the Body Snatchers (50's or 70's version)
Network
Johnny Got His Gun
M (especially if you compare the differences between Lang's cut and the one the Nazis wanted)
Gentleman's Agreement
A Dry White Season
Paths of Glory
Seven Days in May
Inherit the Wind
A Clockwork Orange
Dr. Strangelove

As for documentaries, how about Paradise Lost?
posted by Sticherbeast at 3:54 PM on December 29, 2004

"Blue Vinyl" is a good candidate (plus one of my good buddies has a cameo), but it's hard to argue that it's not pretty "capital-L" liberal.

Regarding Thin Blue Line, I think just the "Rashomon"-style approach of re-enacting different scenarios at least makes a gesture towards a "balanced" approach.

Finally, about the lit course--while Sidhedevil's approach is intriguing, I haven't tried that, specifically, but I have taught a course that ran through European literature from mythology through through modern times, and I found Montaigne's essays to be a really productive lens on the transition from the Middle Ages to the Renaissance.

Not only does he directly respond to a lot of the "classical" thinkers you're likely to cover, but he's an almost schizophrenic expression of the intellectual and religious tensions of the times. ("Of the Education of Children"--impressively humanist and forward-looking for the period. "Apology for Raymond Sebond"...not so much. But still deeply grounded in the orthodoxy and philosophical reality of his era, and deeply informative.)

If you do go for the Essays, though, make sure not to get one of those translations full of "thees" and "raies of sunshyne". Plus, the originals are long--find a good, well-edited version in modern translation, and you're golden.
posted by LairBob at 4:00 PM on December 29, 2004

The Laramie Project? Based on interviews, it is a play-turned-film that attempts to understand the Mathew Shepard murder from a number of the involved individuals' perspectives. Although the words belong to real people, the playwright's editorial choices and presentation certainly can be considered written argument.
posted by nakedcodemonkey at 4:02 PM on December 29, 2004

Twelve angry men? (the original)
posted by vacapinta at 4:14 PM on December 29, 2004

Response by poster: Sidhedevil: Dead Man Walking takes care to portray the anguish and anger of the victims' parents; it's one of the most uncomfortable parts of the film. We discuss the rhetorical strategies of incorporating counterarguments: while the film is firmly anti-death penalty, its argument would be weaker if it ignored or downplayed the opposing side. In class, we talk about how a Lifetime movie, for example, on the same subject would be less complicated and less effective. With the Morris film, I ask my students to talk about how Morris presents a clear argument for Randall Adams' innocence while presenting both sides ("Rashomon" style, thank you LairBob) and keeping his physical presence absent. He plays a lot of tricks with lighting, editing and music which support Adams's side, but the overall effect of the film is, I think, to convince the audience that they've looked at both sides and come to the only rational conclusion on their own. As I said, it's great for discussions and essays.

Thank you all for the great suggestions so far.
posted by bibliowench at 4:47 PM on December 29, 2004

I second Network. That would be perfect.

JFK would work if all the opposing viewpoints weren't given by thugs and shady figures who were obviously in on it. But JFK is propaganda, so maybe you can point poisoning the well as one aspect of propaganda.

Any of Kubrick's films work even though no one actually stands up and makes an argument. Full Metal Jacket or Paths of Glory would be the easiest to illustrate. Maybe not Dr. Strangelove, all the characters are carcitures. Master and Commander with the arguments between Aubry and Maturin.
posted by raaka at 5:40 PM on December 29, 2004

Second Battle of Algiers.
posted by rafter at 5:57 PM on December 29, 2004

We saw Twelve Angry Men in high school. It's brilliant. Perfect for what you described. One juror fighting eleven others to block a false conviction. One by one you watch doubt enter the mind of each juror, and one by one they turn, from the amenable to the stubborn. Great ending. Great movie.
posted by airguitar at 6:21 PM on December 29, 2004

Thanks, bibliowench. A lovely explanation.

Deadline is a really good documentary about the issues that inspired Illinois Governor Ryan to declare a moratorium on the death penalty.
posted by Sidhedevil at 6:29 PM on December 29, 2004

Control Room?
posted by ch3ch2oh at 8:09 PM on December 29, 2004

Not easy to get ahold of, but after seeing Raw Deal: A Question of Consent, I've never seen a documentary that so nakedly and painfully caused me to confront my own beliefs.

I saw it at a screening where the director was present, and when he took questions afterwards, a man stood up and asked, "How could you have made a film so biased in favor of a woman who was clearly not raped?" Several questions later, a woman stood up and asked, "How could you have made a film so prejudiced against a clear victim of rape?" (These are of course paraphrases. Each questioner seemed honestly perplexed, not trying to make a political point, and honestly convinced that she had / he had not witnessed an act of rape onscreen.

For his part, the director said he wavered "a thousand times" during the cutting of the film between thinking the act was clearly rape, and thinking it was clearly not. He wouldn't tell us which he'd settled on at that moment.
posted by grrarrgh00 at 8:37 PM on December 29, 2004

Surprised no one's suggested it yet: Triumph of the Will: one of the most powerful arguments, reprehensible though it is, ever committed to film. I saw this in high school and was knocked out.

I teach documentary, and find that Wiseman's High School elicits a good response; I'd imagine any of his films would work pretty well, though I'd avoid Titicut Follies because it's just so harrowing. (Also, if you go with Wiseman, beware his copyright hound dogs - he's notorious for this. Email me if you want to know more about this.)
posted by Dr. Wu at 8:38 PM on December 29, 2004

It might be hard to find a copy of this, but "The Weather Underground" is an incredibly powerful movie, and would be especially interesting to write arguments about terrorism, and punishment. http://www.upstatefilms.org/weather/
posted by geryon at 11:57 PM on December 29, 2004

Inherit the Wind would be interesting if you really research the history of the Scopes trial and see how incredibly different it is from what is presented in the play.
posted by dagnyscott at 7:33 AM on December 30, 2004