Movie Review – High School

High School (1968)
Directed by Frederick Wiseman

While the asylum featured in Frederick Wiseman’s debut documentary Titicut Follies is not an institution most of us would ever experience firsthand, America’s education system is far more universal. Asylums and schools are strangely similar. They house people who would otherwise be deemed a danger to themselves and others if they roamed the streets unattended. They are run by rigid rule followers under the guise of caregivers. While the individual nurses and teachers at each respective institution may be doing their best, those higher up on the chain of command who control the purse strings often overlook great suffering that they could otherwise alleviate. In 1968, the American high school was a powder keg on the frontline of growing cultural discontent, making it a fascinating environment.

Wiseman posted up at Northeast High School in Philadelphia for five weeks. There was vague talk of a lawsuit that caused Wiseman to not have the film shown in that city, but unlike Titicut Follies, this picture was widely available at its release. There’s a strong sense that the adults, especially administrators, believe anarchy looms just beyond these walls, and as a result, they are keen to stomp out any student who doesn’t conform. We witness a dictatorship of the bland, principals and some teachers speaking in an emotionless monotone that belies a simmering contempt for the youth. The imperative among leadership is that these young savages must be tamed, made to conform, and obey. And it’s all done in front of cameras.

Despite many attempts to claim otherwise, the United States is a profoundly reactionary society. Such a culture does not naturally lead to inquisitive, thoughtful people. This clashes with the very purposes of education, right? I was homeschooled my entire childhood, so when I entered the teaching profession, I was unaware of how awful this aspect of public education is. I loved my career teaching, but I fucking hated every instance of a building or district administrator imposing another pointless initiative. The metaphor of teachers carrying around plates with their contents spilling off onto the floor was a common refrain among those of us who were exhausted.

What was most unsettling was what some faculty were comfortable to say around me. I am a white straight man from the American South, and so they assumed, based on my exterior, that I would be aligned with them, especially in matters of race. I was not. I never developed any long-term, meaningful friendships with many fellow teachers. You see similar things more out in the open in this documentary. The school is holding a fashion show, and the teacher organizing it spends a good chunk of time highlighting each girl’s physical imperfections in front of the rest as they walk the runway. School has often been quite the political arena when it comes to the presence of girls.

A cluelessness is ever present in almost every adult we see on camera, from the authoritarians mentioned above to even well-meaning but ultimately wrong teachers. In one sequence, an English teacher explains to her young students that music is poetry. She hands out mimeographed lyrics she’s typed up so that students can follow along. It’s not a terrible idea, but the way it plays out and the looks on the students’ faces as Wiseman’s camera takes them all in reveals this poor woman is not reaching them. A gynecologist appears as a guest lecturer in one sequence, outright lying to the students about sex and sexually transmitted diseases, as well as describing female anatomy in vivid yet not helpful detail.

Throughout the film, we get references to significant events happening in the world – NASA’s Apollo program, the assassination of MLK, and the Vietnam War. There’s a palpable disconnect between the instruction and this authentic, violent world outside. You can tell that the people in charge honestly believe that if they can just beat these kids into submission, it will ensure a better, brighter tomorrow.

The final scene in the documentary is an assembly where an administrator reads out a letter he’s received from a former student who has been drafted into the war. He delivers the contents of the letter with pride and remarks that receiving such a letter makes him feel like the school did a fantastic job in preparing this young man for the world. It’s like watching a nightmare, but it’s real. And it explains so much about our current moment and the psychological horror we allow ourselves to endure.

While many things have changed on the surface level, especially in the instructional relationship between student & teacher in American education, so much of the reliance on blind authority is still there. Growing up and teaching in a small Southern town, I noted that anyone in a uniform was expected to be given complete deference, and when a young man or woman signed up to join the military or become a police officer, it was met with enthusiastic celebration. In the minds of these people, the world is composed of a two-track hierarchy – those who are told what to do and those who do the telling. To be the one with the badge & the gun meant you were as free as you would get.

While I never attended a public high school, though I think it would have been better for me than the fundamentalist right-wing Christian-informed education I got, I did attend college. It was a private Christian college, but the air of conformity was thick. It wasn’t until we moved to the Netherlands that I ceased having nightmares about either being back home or back in the dorm. I have seen the same type of dreams come up for my peers who did attend public high school.

There’s something to be said about how these places haunt us long into our adult years. It speaks to a psychic horror that at least our subconscious will acknowledge. Upon reflection, these institutions seemed designed expressly to confuse us about what it means to be an adult. The older I get, the more lies I realize I was told and how those in authority never really seemed to care whether we got it right or not, as long as we obeyed.