HS teacher in trouble for showing Dolan’s Cadillac to 10th grade students.

[Iwritecode]

http://shine.yahoo.com/parenting/stu...191458471.html

Not sure if there’s another thread this could be put into so I made it a stand-alone. I figured it might provoke some discussion about a few different things.

I guess the biggest question is whether or not the teacher was wrong in showing an “R” rated movie in class. I’ve never seen the movie (though I did enjoy the short story) but it apparently it’s not the violence and language that caused the problem. One student told his parents that it was filled with anti-Asian slurs. Maybe someone that has actually seen it can comment?

It doesn’t say but I wonder if permission slips were passed out before the movie was shown? I’ve had to sign a few for my kids that listed movies that they would be viewing.

I’m also curious which Edgar Allan Poe story they were supposed to compare this movie to. It doesn’t mention it in the story. I’m assuming “The Cask of Amontillado”?

[Bev Vincent]

Yes, it's strongly influenced by A Cask of Amontillado. It's a wretched movie, though.

[mattgreenbean]

Yes, it's strongly influenced by A Cask of Amontillado. It's a wretched movie, though.

Agreed, I can't remember if there were any slurs because I was too focused on the movie trying to be better than the story and just sucking. I was pretty bummed watching it because it was my introduction to King. I read it on a road trip my family was taking when I was a kid.

[Bev Vincent]

Here's my review from Cemetery Dance magazine:

Dolan’s Cadillac went straight to DVD, which didn’t surprise me after I saw the movie. It has one of the most deadpan voiceover narratives I’ve ever heard. As Robinson, Wes Bentley’s flat affect defines the film’s tone, which means it’s dull and dreary.

Christian Slater plays Dolan, the gangster who becomes the target of Robinson’s obsession after Robinson’s wife (Emmanuelle Vaugier) sees Dolan committing a crime. Vaugier is the best part of the movie, and she’s mostly gone after the first twenty minutes. Slater ranges between shrill and diabolical, lacking nuance or subtlety—not that the script provides him with much opportunity for either.

To turn the short story into a feature, screenwriter Richard Dooling (Kingdom Hospital) explains much that is implied by the original material. Unfortunately, some things are better left unexplained, because the movie points out how much luck was involved in Robinson’s scheme. His plan relies on Dolan taking his weekly trip between Las Vegas and L.A. on the Sunday of a long weekend, for example. When he joins a road crew, he’s assigned to the exact two tasks he needs to master—how to run the pavement cutter and the backhoe.

Dolan is a stereotypical cartoon villain. It wouldn’t have been surprising to hear him cursing Batman or letting gold coins slither through his fingers as he cackled over his ill-gotten gains. Dooling makes the dubious decision to model Dolan after Randall Flagg. Some of Robinson’s voiceover is word-for-word Tom Cullen’s description of Flagg from The Stand. Dolan is too campy to be serious evil. Randall Flagg would have eaten him for breakfast. When confronted with a way to expand his revenue that involves something even sleazier than smuggling women, he flinches, as if there might be a real heart buried beneath that chest of his—a chest conveniently bared when he rends his shirt after Robinson’s trap is sprung.

The movie is filled with plot holes. Isn’t a corpse planted in someone’s bed guaranteed to draw police attention? What are the victims supposed to do, throw it in the dumpster after being terrorized? Would a couple in protective custody still try to conceive a child? Is a car bomb the best way to kill people who haven’t left their apartment in months? And why would a man with a backhoe fill a massive hole with a shovel, except to stretch out the action to allow for dialog between Dolan and Robinson, which was, admittedly, the one of the best parts of the movie.

Dooling acknowledges some of the problems in a scene at a rest stop where Dolan and his thug beat up Robinson. “Why are we leaving him alive?” the thug asks—as might the audience. Dolan goes back into the filthy bathroom to explain his rationale to Robinson—and everyone watching.

The film has a few nice touches. The hotel where Dolan stays is called the Montressor, a nod to “The Cask of Amontillado.” Mrs. Robinson plays with a toy bulldozer early in the film, a bit of foreshadowing, and Robinson’s discussion of immigrant labor segues nicely to the back of the truck to show how little things have changed since the days of the laying of the railway. The woman in Dolan’s bed with the tattooed back recalls a similar scene in Kingdom Hospital (featuring Evangeline Lilly before Lost). I smiled when Robinson says, “I’m ready to bury the past.” I even laughed out loud when the pistol recoil knocked him on his ass and started a small avalanche, though I rolled my eyes at the pistol-barrel POV the moment before.
The cinematography is nice, especially the expansive shots of the desert. Some of the staging is less impressive. Robinson’s makeup as he descends into depression is bad—he resembles a zombie and I wouldn’t let him near small children looking that way. The road construction scene is so obviously staged that I wondered what exactly the workers were supposed to be doing. I liked the shots of Robinson putting the paving blocks in place, though, an allusion to the brick wall used to entomb Fortunato in the Poe story.

It took me three sittings to get through this film, and it’s only 85 minutes long. However, it was better than the Children of the Corn remake that aired on SyFy. I turned that one off after fifteen minutes and never went back to it.

[Mattrick]

If we're allowed to read/watch Of Mice and Men which and other similar works that capture periods when racial slurs were commonplace and more terrible things such as witch burning and slavery were commonplace...I don't see what's wrong with showing something like Dolan's Cadillac...but I also don't see the education purpose behind it. Seems strange if it's just the content it would because it's fiction which would lead me to believe this: fiction involving violence, racisms and awful things is bad but honest depiction of those same things that actually happened is good.....

[Still Servant]

I do have a story to share about watching inappropriate movies in school.

I went to a Catholic high school. In my sophomore year, we had a particularly bad Spanish teacher. He would bring in movies like Disclosure and Friday and play it for the class. The films were in English and had nothing to do with the class. He just wanted to pass the time and most of the time would just zone out like he was getting over a hangover or something.

The funny thing is that since my name begins with a "B" I was closest to the door. So it was my job to watch the door to see if somebody was coming in order to alert the class. I was never even allowed to watch the TV. Every time I turned to watch the movie, he would yell at me, "MR. BALDELLI, DO YOU WANT A JUG!"

JUG stood for "justice under God". It was basically a detention. We shouldn't have been watching those films, but I never even got to watch them anyway.

[Merlin1958]

Just FYI, but a few years ago I was required to submit to "Hyperbaric Chamber" treatments for a wound. They were administered in a "CHS" (Catholic Health Services) facility. Now I am not a Catholic, but the rest of my immediate family is. When getting the treatments you are allowed/encouraged to bring video's to watch as you sit/lie in the chamber. They would not let me watch "Blazing Saddles" or "Young Frankenstien" though I have yet to understand exactly why!! Just a tidbit to chew on I suppose.

[needfulthings]

Then you should have read the books!

[Mattrick]

I do have a story to share about watching inappropriate movies in school.

I went to a Catholic high school. In my sophomore year, we had a particularly bad Spanish teacher. He would bring in movies like Disclosure and Friday and play it for the class. The films were in English and had nothing to do with the class. He just wanted to pass the time and most of the time would just zone out like he was getting over a hangover or something.

The funny thing is that since my name begins with a "B" I was closest to the door. So it was my job to watch the door to see if somebody was coming in order to alert the class. I was never even allowed to watch the TV. Every time I turned to watch the movie, he would yell at me, "MR. BALDELLI, DO YOU WANT A JUG!"

JUG stood for "justice under God". It was basically a detention. We shouldn't have been watching those films, but I never even got to watch them anyway.

That's when you scream in the hallways MR AWFUL SPANISH TEACHER IS FUCKING THE DOG and see the administration come running: beastiality is a sin!

[Jean]

If we're allowed to read/watch Of Mice and Men which and other similar works that capture periods when racial slurs were commonplace and more terrible things such as witch burning and slavery were commonplace...I don't see what's wrong with showing something like Dolan's Cadillac...but I also don't see the education purpose behind it. <...>

I can see it perfectly. It is a story that raises all kinds of moral and philosophy issues that are no less importatnt to discuss in class than literary values of a sonnet. What is vengeance, when does it turn sour, what is or isn't justtified, where is the limit of personal rights, when exactly does right turn to wrong etc. When King was actually writing, not delivering dubious literary product, he was great at all that.

[Jon]

In High School, in the mid 80's, we, in hickville Indiana were read aloud Huck Finn. There were no issues raised after it was explained that it was the language of the day.

[fernandito]

I watched Full Metal Jacket during my sophomore year, I turned out fine.

twitch.