The movies that I show in my classes

Movies are a teacher’s friend. They give you a reprieve from lecturing. They shrink the amount of time that you have to invest in lesson planning. They provide visuals for students to help them better understand what you’ve been trying to teach. They act as helpful summaries of previous material. I could say more.

I want to write a few short posts explaining why I’ve chosen the movies that I’ve chosen for my classes. It should be noted, I teach high school, so I’m limited in what I can show. Some of those limits are self-limits because I don’t want to have to address certain concerns or skip past controversial sections. For example, Life of Brian is a film that I would like to show in my “Introduction to the Bible II: The Christian Scriptures” class but it has enough controversial content that I’ve decided it’s not worth it. I do show a couple of “R” rated movies so my students have to have parental consent forms signed but they’re not the type of “R” rated movies that upset parents. Here are the movies that I’ll discuss over a series of future posts:

“Introduction to the Bible I: The Hebrew Scriptures”

1. Noah (2014)
2. The Prince of Egypt (1998)

Also, I supplement my lessons with the first five episodes of the miniseries The Bible.

“Introduction to the Bible II: The Christian Scriptures”

1. The Star (2017) or The Young Messiah (2016)
2. Mary Magdalene (2018)

Also, I supplement my lessons with the second five episodes of the miniseries The Bible.

“Religion in Global Context”

1. Free Guy (2021)
2. Seven Years in Tibet (1997)
3. An American Pickle (2020)

“Religion in the United States”

1. Malcolm X (1992)
2. Cesar Chavez (2014)
3. The Apostle (1997)

When I write my posts, I’ll explain (1) why I show the movie; (2) the strengths of the movie for what I’m trying to accomplish; (3) the weaknesses of the movie for what I’m trying to accomplish.