A documentary film is supposed to try, at least, to deal with realities - at least that is the way the genre conventionally has promoted itself. Otherwise it slips over the line into propaganda. Seems like the film Waiting for Superman has crossed the boundary - that is why we need a border fence! In NYRB this week Diane Ravitch, not a movie critic but a former enthusiast for right wing schemes for 'reforming' public education of the sort the movie peddles, has a go at the film. Let's just say, that she doesn't think it is a reality based effort. I have, in the past, posted on right wing educational proposals: the entirely mediocre record that charter schools have amassed, the anti-democratic nature of centralized control proposals and the generally wrongheaded nature of the clamor for "standards"; no need to repeat myself here.
Wednesday, October 27, 2010
Waiting for Kryptonite
A documentary film is supposed to try, at least, to deal with realities - at least that is the way the genre conventionally has promoted itself. Otherwise it slips over the line into propaganda. Seems like the film Waiting for Superman has crossed the boundary - that is why we need a border fence! In NYRB this week Diane Ravitch, not a movie critic but a former enthusiast for right wing schemes for 'reforming' public education of the sort the movie peddles, has a go at the film. Let's just say, that she doesn't think it is a reality based effort. I have, in the past, posted on right wing educational proposals: the entirely mediocre record that charter schools have amassed, the anti-democratic nature of centralized control proposals and the generally wrongheaded nature of the clamor for "standards"; no need to repeat myself here.
