pmuehlen Review of High School

High School (1968)

Wiseman manages to tell an overall truth by cinematic distortions

[10/10 · 27 October 2023]

In this brilliant film, requiring double the footage of his other films, Wiseman uses distorting film techniques (eg extreme closeups) to tell a universal truth about high school in the mid twentieth century. The English class, in which Mrs. London teaches Simon and Garfunkel's Dangling conversation, was introductory motivation to a planned discussion of T. S. Eliot's Wasteland. The students, all exceptional achievers, looked down on their texts, not disengaged, as Wiseman wanted you to believe, but concentrating on subject. The janitor sweeping up at the end of this scene is Wiseman's own take.