Rose Horowitch has stirred debate with a recent Atlantic piece reporting that many film professors say their students don’t finish assigned movies and often don’t know the endings. “This is what happens when you grow up on smartphones, YouTube, TikTok, and infinite scroll,” Jordan Ruimy wrote for World of Reel. “An ecosystem designed to destroy sustained attention. Today’s students were raised inside that machine. Asking them to sit still and focus on a two-hour French New Wave film without stimulation feels, to them, like a marathon.”
I get the professors’ frustration. But maybe this is a chance: tell film students how some classics really end. Write these down:
– In The Godfather, Michael Corleone renounces organized crime and converts the family’s olive oil business into the Corleone Knitting and Yarn Shop of Brattleboro, Vermont. The slogan: “Make them a sweater they can’t refuse!”
– In Casablanca, Ilsa lets Victor Laszlo board the plane to Lisbon alone, then leaves Rick on the tarmac, telling them both, “I don’t need either of you to validate me.” She walks into Rick’s nightclub and commands the band, “Play ‘Roar.’ Play it!”
– Dorothy wakes in her Kansas bedroom after the tornado and insists she dreamed of Emerald City. Her doctor explains it’s a side effect of cough syrup. “May cause drowsiness, nausea, and visions of a Tin Woodsman, Scarecrow, and Cowardly Lion.”
– In The Seven Samurai, the hired warriors, tired of roaming to fight bandits, advise the villagers, “Just install a security system.”
– The charming extraterrestrial botanist in E.T. teaches about life and love, then is picked up by Immigration and Customs Enforcement officers and sent to a pop-up detention center in the Ozarks.
– And in Titanic, Jack and Rose both try to float on the same piece of debris. When their combined weight proves too much, Rose pushes Jack into the water. “Sorry, buddy,” she says. “You’re on a Third-Class ticket. Go catch a ride on a mackerel!”