Tuesday, April 23, 2002

Can a class that consists of watching popular movies do anything but entertain?

Today was the season finale of "The Age of Blockbuster," my honors class that meets on Tuesdays to watch a flick with the intent of discussing issues on Thursday. Of course, we never actually do any work, as our Thursday conversations consist of frat-bashing, phallic symbols, snuff, how Batman and Robin are hidden-closet homosexuals, Celebrity Boxing, the Simpsons, sexual harassment (and by "discussing" that issue, I mean that our professor sexually harasses the sorority girls), and more phallic symbols. Group Project day opened with the largely anticipated Diorama-rama! We watched clips of the Simpsons episode where Lisa and Allison compete in Diorama-rama, only to lose Ralph Wiggum, who's not the sharpest tool in the shed. The intro beautifully phased into the 5 dioramas that represented some of the movies we had seen. What an awesome display, and extra applause goes to the creative background music complementing each diorama!

Eventually we heard the knock on the door we had anticipated for several minutes... the Gumby's delivery man! Eighty dollaree-doos worth of pizza and pokey sticks were passed around until we could eat no more. Luckily I had a drink or I'd be struggling to swallow now. After two mildly entertaining video presentations, the final group concluded with Win Dana's Prizes, a parody of Win Ben Stein's Money. With several catagories to select from, each student was faced with a clip from "Caddyshack" with the goal of more fully interpreting the scene than Dana (our professor). Interpretations mainly followed our pattern of identifying phallic symbols, the struggle of immigrants, the domination of white society, and more phallic symbols. After the game, I picked up my sponge dinosaur, posed for a picture with the class I'll never forget, proceeded to sing a group effort of a Saved by the Bell skit, and left the room for the final time.

Is there another class as easy and entertaining as this one? I'll never look at "Lethal Weapon" the same way again. Or "Superman." Or "Thelma and Louise." Or "All the President's Men." Or...

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