Screening America
For Grades 7 through College
"Screening America" uses film and television to help teach English, English as a Second Language, and Social Studies. Before your visit, you will receive a program guide to help prepare students and integrate the selected screening with the class’ curriculum. A Museum educator introduces the film or television program and guides a post-screening discussion. "Screening America" programs are offered in conjunction with a guided tour of Behind the Screen.
Featured Films
The Immigrant (1917)
The Crowd (1928)
I Love Lucy, “Job Switching” (1952)
12 Angry Men (1957)
The Living Room Candidate (1952-2008)
In the Heat of the Night (1967)
Dear America: Letters Home from Vietnam (1987)
Bulworth (1998)
Shorts and Television Shows
Shorts and television episodes are designed to be coupled with a Behind the Screen guided tour, and are available to students in: grades 4-5, grades 6-8, grades 9-12, as well as college & university students.
Silent Comedy and the Immigrant Experience
The Immigrant (1917, 21 mins)
Silent film presented with live musical accompaniment. Charlie Chaplin wrote, directed, and starred in this poignant, hilarious comedy about an immigrant’s arrival in New York City. For English-language learners and those studying American history, viewing this classic encourages discussion about the use of humor and music in film—and the American immigrant experience.
Surcharge for live musical accompaniment: $50.00
Urban Life in the Twenties
The Crowd (1928, 104 mins)
Silent film presented with live musical accompaniment. A young office clerk who aspires to fame and fortune struggles to succeed in 1920s New York. This landmark silent drama, featuring vivid on-location photography, challenges students to think anew about their own futures and what today’s city holds for them.
Women at Work in the Fifties
I Love Lucy, “Job Switching” (1952, 25 mins)
Lucille Ball stars in one of the funniest sitcom episodes in television history, in which housewives and friends Lucy and Ethel go to work in a chocolate factory while their husbands (Ricky and Fred) take over the housework. This deceptively simple premise offers rich insight into the roles that middle-class American men and women were expected to play in the 1950s.
Feature-length Films
Feature length films can be coupled with a Behind the Screen guided tour, or a self-guided visit, and are available to students in grades 9-12 as well as college and university students, and certain selections are available for grades 6-8 as well. Given their historic context, feature length films are recommended for groups looking for a program with specific curricular alignments to American History topics.
Prejudice and the Jury System
12 Angry Men (1957, 93 mins)
This taut film, starring Henry Fonda and directed by Sidney Lumet, centers on the deliberations of twelve jurors who must decide whether or not to send a young man to the electric chair. The jurors’ impassioned discussions and conflicts prompt students to address still-current questions about truth, objectivity, peer pressure, and the American jury system.
Presidential Campaigns, Television, and the Internet
The Living Room Candidate: Presidential Campaign Commercials, 1952-2008 (45 mins)
Ever since television first emerged as a mass medium in the early 1950s, presidential candidates have tried to sell themselves on TV. By viewing and discussing a selection of advertisements from the 1950s through the 2008 election, students learn about the history of presidential campaign commercials.
The Struggle for Equality during the Civil Rights Movement
In the Heat of the Night (1967, 110 mins)
This pioneering racial drama (which won five Academy Awards, including Best Picture) prompts discussion of the history of civil rights in America and the portrayal of African Americans on film. Made during the height of the 1960s civil rights movement, it features Sidney Poitier as a homicide detective from Philadelphia who is enlisted by a bigoted sheriff to help solve a murder in a small Southern town.
Exploring the Documentary Form
Dear America: Letters Home from Vietnam (1987, 85 mins)
Letters written home by American servicemen and servicewomen in Vietnam—read by Robert De Niro, Sean Penn, Ellen Burstyn, and others—are interwoven with Vietnam War footage and songs by important artists of the time, including Bob Dylan and the Rolling Stones. This moving film raises questions for students about the function and power of documentaries.
Race, Class, and Corruption in American Politics
Bulworth (1998, 108 mins)
In this compelling satire, directed by and starring Warren Beatty, a suicidal U.S. senator, disillusioned by the loss of his ideals, begins speaking boldly about the shortcomings of the American political system. The film encourages students to reconsider the roles of race, class, and money in American life.
