TV/Movies Megathread

[Valmy]

I guess that Caddyshack is one of those movies that Americans rave all over them and the rest of the world collectively shrug their shoulders, right? 

Animal House being another one.

Porky's and Up the Creek were huge when I was a kid, though.

To be fair that was back in the ancient times when Hollywood still made movies to please the American audience instead of the whole fucking world like today. Now they have to make sure the Chinese will see it first.

[HVC]

I guess that Caddyshack is one of those movies that Americans rave all over them and the rest of the world collectively shrug their shoulders, right? 

Animal House being another one.

Porky's and Up the Creek were huge when I was a kid, though.

Porky's is Canadian! Great movie

[celedhring]

I guess that Caddyshack is one of those movies that Americans rave all over them and the rest of the world collectively shrug their shoulders, right? 

Animal House being another one.

Porky's and Up the Creek were huge when I was a kid, though.

To be fair that was back in the ancient times when Hollywood still made movies to please the American audience instead of the whole fucking world like today. Now they have to make sure the Chinese will see it first.

The whole hi-school/college fetish in American comedies was really something, though. I guess it speaks of the role they play in socialization in America.

[Valmy]

Caddyshack takes place at a country club though

[HVC]

Caddyshack takes place at a country club though

The high school of rich old white dudes?

[Oexmelin]

The whole hi-school/college fetish in American comedies was really something, though. I guess it speaks of the role they play in socialization in America.

It's now creating some disappointment in college kids, that their own experiences are so much less about socialization and so much more about professionnalisation.

[garbon]

The whole hi-school/college fetish in American comedies was really something, though. I guess it speaks of the role they play in socialization in America.

It's now creating some disappointment in college kids, that their own experiences are so much less about socialization and so much more about professionnalisation.

Now? Is there something wrong with the current generation of college students that it is proving more problematic for them?

[Oexmelin]

No. It's the corporatization of the university, the expectations of parents, and the requirements of the job market that has changed. It's no longer the university their parents remember going to, and their parents' stories, on which they formed their expectations of college life, are now less relevant. Note that movies about the college experience also seem to have faded away.

[crazy canuck]

The whole hi-school/college fetish in American comedies was really something, though. I guess it speaks of the role they play in socialization in America.

It's now creating some disappointment in college kids, that their own experiences are so much less about socialization and so much more about professionnalisation.

Its something we consciously addressed with our boys as they made their way toward University.  I like to think that the fact we stressed the social aspects of University (both the fun events and the intellectual interaction which takes place both with their peers and their professors) has contributed to their enjoyment of the experience which in turn, perhaps ironically, translates into very good grades.

[Valmy]

Well a lot of it has to do with the fact that we have lots of "non-traditional" students like I was from 2009-2014. I was there on a mission.


So I guess I ruined it for everybody. Sorry.

[garbon]

No. It's the corporatization of the university, the expectations of parents, and the requirements of the job market that has changed. It's no longer the university their parents remember going to, and their parents' stories, on which they formed their expectations of college life, are now less relevant. Note that movies about the college experience also seem to have faded away.

But none of that is different from when I was a student a decade ago.

[The Minsky Moment]

I guess that Caddyshack is one of those movies that Americans rave all over them and the rest of the world collectively shrug their shoulders, right? 

Animal House being another one.

Fair enough.  But put the Blues Brothers on that list and you're dead to me.

[Valmy]

I think Oex is referencing a much more bygone era, College in the 1970s or something.

[dps]

No. It’s the corporatization of the university, the expectations of parents, and the requirements of the job market that has changed. It’s no longer the university their parents remember going to, and their parents’ stories, on which they formed their expectations of college life, are now less relevant. Note that movies about the college experience also seem to have faded away.

Are you saying that many students no longer see going to college as an opportunity to party for 4 or so years?

[Oexmelin]

But none of that is different from when I was a student a decade ago.

So when you have kids in college, you can tell them that, and thereby shape their expectations of college accordingly.

Parents of kids in college these days are in their mid 40s to mid 50s. They were not college age in the 1970s or 1980s, but they grew up consuming these sorts of movies. As far as I can tell, their experience of college was certainly not Animal Farm, but you could still see remnants of it, and live through at least some equivalence of similar experiences of socialization. As time went by, the discrepancy widened (and the specific college makes a difference, too - some schools always had a reputation for being party schools.). In ten, twenty years, college kids will no longer have these expectations, and their parents will probably not have the same romantic notions about college.

What I do know now, is that many students report disappointment in that their college experience was much more isolating than what their parents had led them to believe.