Teaching world history: from StudentsFriend.com
Gandhi
Jason and the Argonauts
Cleopatra
To Live

     "Film has certain advantages over the written word. It can communicate the look of people, places, and events in ways that even the best written descriptions cannot. Also, film creates an emotional intensity and immediacy that captures audiences in ways that writers can only envy....

     On the other hand, the emotional power of film is, from the historian's perspective, not always a good thing. Film is inherently manipulative...what we see on the screen must be analyzed, discussed and challenged...

-from The Methods and Skills of History by Conal Furay and Michael J. Salevouris

1492: Conquest of Paradise

Movies

recommended by Student's Friend

Joan of Arc
The Mission
Fog of War
A Tale of Two Cities

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Young Bess

Lesson plans are available for each of the following films.


Cleopatra

The Egyptian queen alters Roman history by capturing the hearts of Julius Caesar and Mark Antony, but she ultimately fails to preserve Egypt's independence from the Empire. This classic film is remarkably consistent with the known history of Egypt's last pharaoh. Academy Award nomination for Best Picture, winner for Best Cinematography.  Lesson Plan

Starring Claudette Colbert, Director: Cecil B. DeMille

1934, b&w, 100 min, unrated, shop Amazon.com



The Fog of War

Robert McNamara, Secretary of Defense in the Kennedy and Johnson administrations, raises unsettling questions about the politics of war as he knew it in mid-20th Century America.  Academy Award for Best Documentary.

Lessons to accompany the film are available from Brown University's  Choices program.

Starring Robert S. McNamara, Director: Errol Morris

2004, color, 107 min., rated PG-13, shop Amazon.com



1492: Conquest of Paradise

After incomparably beautiful portrayals of Columbus's voyage to the New World and early encounters with Native Americans, the film slows down. Great scene in which a native chief asks Columbus why Spaniards want to come to America.

Source analysis activity.

Starring: Gerard Depardieu, Director: Ridley Scott

1992, color, 142 min., PG, shop Amazon.com



Gandhi

Through personal courage, a compelling message, perseverance, and resolutely peaceful means, Gandhi leads India to independence from Great Britain.  Beautifully done, but a long film.  Academy Award for Best Picture.

Lesson Plan.

Starring: Ben Kingsley, Director: Richard Attenborough

1982, color, 188 min., PG. shop Amazon.com


Jason and the Argonauts

The ancient Greeks told their myths as epic poetry or theater; now we have movies.  In this story, Jason and his crew of Greek heroes sail to the end of the Earth in quest of the mythical Golden Fleece. Now a cult-film classic, the pre-digital special effects are a hoot.

Lesson Plan.

Starring: Todd Armstrong, Director: Don Chaffey

1963, color, 104 min., G, shop Amazon.com



Joan of Arc

In a story too improbable to be fiction, an illiterate peasant girl dons armor and leads medieval French armies to victories that save France from British domination.

Lesson Plan.

Starring: Leelee Sobieski, Director: Christian Duguay

1999, color, 140 min., unrated, shop Amazon.com



The Mission

In this episode drawn from the Spanish conquest of the Americas, a brutal soldier undergoes a change of heart and joins Jesuit missionaries in resisting the Native American slave trade in the jungles of Brazil. Academy Award nomination for Best Picture, winner for Best Cinematography.

Lesson Plan.

Starring: Robert DiNiro, Jeremy Irons, Director: Roland Joffe

2003, color, 125 min., PG, shop Amazon.com



A Tale of Two Cities

Charles Dickens' tale of love and redemption is set amidst the turmoil of the French Revolution and the Reign of Terror. This is the classic film of the classic novel.  Colman is unforgettable as the ne'er-do-well lawyer who cheats fate.  

Academy Award nomination for Best Picture.

Lesson Plan.

Starring: Ronald Colman, Director: Jack Conway

1935, b&w, 128 min., unrated, shop Amazon.com



To Live

Guided by strong wife and mother, a Chinese family survives four decades of revolution, communism, and personal loss in the years after World War II.  Infused with humanity, the film was banned in China upon its release.  Subtitles.

Lesson plan.

Starring: Ge You, Gong LI, Director: Zhang Yimou

1994, color, 130 min., unrated, shop Amazon.com



Young Bess

Princess Bess overcomes an extremely dysfunctional childhood to become England's Queen Elizabeth I, one of history's greatest rulers. Charles Laughton is memorable as her dad, Henry VIII.  Simmons and Granger were real-life husband and wife.

Starring: Jean Simmons, Stewart Granger

Lesson plan.  Source analysis activity.

Director: George Sidney,

1953, color, 112 minutes, unrated, shop Amazon.com


. . .

Other films worth considering include Zulu Dawn (British imperialism in Africa), All Quiet on the Western Front and Gallipoli (World War I), Schindler's List (The Holocaust and World War II), The Day the Earth Stood Still and Thirteen Days (Cold War and nuclear arms race), and Hotel Rwanda (genocide in Africa).


© 2001-2018 Michael G. Maxwell, Maxwell Learning LLC