II

		originate from solid filmic principles. These requirements express rather the fear of the unknown: what the "unassimilable" would do to all those who presently benefit from consensus filmmaking. To adopt such an inclusive view of cinema would, of course, require a radical change of direction for film schools, to some extent even a return to earlier days. But there is no alternative: one cannot simply sit back and expect fresh, uncommon perspectives to appear in students' minds as if by magic.

		VIII

		Beyond this global acceptance of all forms of filmmaking, what would be required to further such an environment in the class room itself? It might be useful here to go back to some of John Dewey's ideas regarding education. Although his writing was for the most part directed toward primary and secondary schooling, it is in higher education, especially in film departments where the curriculum keeps students on a very short leash indeed, that his thinking can perhaps be most beneficial today.

		Having witnessed the great social and economic changes at the turn of the century, Dewey was concerned about democracy's ability to survive. A real democracy, in his view, required an active citizenship to combat the natural tendency of society to harden itself and become static. This could be achieved only if the young were allowed not just to integrate prevailing values but also to test and eventually modify them for everybody's benefit. The key to the creation of socially concerned individuals was to be found in a different kind of education. Dewey certainly had little sympathy for traditional schooling. For him, to try to fit a child into a preexisting scholastic model made no sense whatever. This would almost certainly guarantee the production of conformist minds in the future. One had to use instead what was of immediate interest to the student, for each individual, he wrote, "has a certain primary equipment of impulse, of tendency forward, of innate urgency to do." 44

		Translated into film, this suggests that instructors should take advantage of the drive that brings the student to the classroom in the first place. That young man or woman wants to make films, be involved in the process, meet actors, understand light, see what happens when you play with sound, or move the cut around in editing. Dewey was formal about this: "As long as any topic makes an immediate appeal, it is not necessary to ask what it is good for."45 The teacher should grab the opportune