Capturing public education at its roots with a deliberately primitive lens, multitalented filmmaker Phil Gries makes us flies on the wall of students ranging from kindergarten to 4th grade through daily interactions with their teachers and other educators in an inner city school in Harlem.
Buy Harlem School 1970Harlem School 1970 is an unique ‘direct cinema’ document with the use of narration and interviews, which makes the actions much more intimate. In just 50 minutes you see and overhear usual activities: children singing songs, playing games, learning different languages, having lunch/recess, and doing schoolwork.
With young children there is going to be rough housing, misbehavior, fighting, and yelling. And you see how frustrated the teachers get with kids and how sometimes bored the kids themselves seem to be. Everyone can relate to this. We all have been through this, and I’m sure the conflicts are just as rough in schools now like it obviously was back then. But it’s interesting to see how much has changed with public education, from then to now. Personally, I think it was a little easier back then when it was old school, without the use of technology and other distractions that kids are way too into these days, so watching Harlem School gave that me sense of nostalgia, despite not being a child in the 70’s.
If there is one issue I had, it is the audio which made some the chatter between students and teachers and between students with each other pretty awkward, but it didn’t take me out of the film. I was overall very enlightened with what Gries was doing. I think the essence of documentaries like these to is take it all in stride because you’ll come away with a new type of understanding of the world we live in. This one truly does that.
Kino’s stacked two-disc set includes commentary by Gries and filmmaker Barry Strongin; introduction by Gries; three documentaries: Reflections of a Harlem School Teacher, Harlem School Memories: Fifty Years Later, and Reunion with Iris Maxwell; gallery of stills with commentary by Gries; interviews with Gries: a conversation with Ron Simon, Ginger New York, Give and Take, Maysles Documentary Seminar at CCNY, Maysles Center Screening, and Paley Center Screening TV Confidential; and restoration demo.
