“You are a menace.”
Here at the Family Valued pixel playhouse and pastel
pressroom, we are interested in anything that furthers socializing. Toward that
end, we are experimenting with exposing small groups to dinner and a movie.
Ideally, the movie is something no one in attendance has seen in a long time.
The food should lend itself to a lack of utensils.
Our first victim was the original Planet of the Apes because it was rated G and was sitting on the
library shelf. Two of the adult males had fond memories of the film (though it
inspired eye-rolling “oh yeahs” from the rest of the adults).
The movie starts more slowly than we remembered; network
television probably edited out the seemingly endless walk through the desert
which occupies the first third of the film. On the other hand, all you Planet of the Apes buffs can only
imagine how grateful we were that the protagonists did not forget the TX-9.
I did notice fewer forays for food once the apes appeared.
One adult began muttering, “This is so weird,” which seemed remarkably apropos.
We’d all forgotten that Rod Serling was involved in writing the film and were
impressed by the heavy amounts of philosophy mixed in with the action. Much to
our surprise, we ended up discussing the appropriate places of religion and
science in society. Who knew that heavy rubber masks could spark such thoughts?
I can’t imagine how it received a G rating; one character is
shot and killed on screen, another is shot in the neck, prisoners are beaten,
and the results of a lobotomy are shown. That being said, the film’s violence
had nothing on Harry Potter or most current pre-adolescent fodder. Lastly, the
DVD cover reveals the film’s final surprise, so hide it from anyone who doesn’t
know.
— Craig Brownlie
Odyssey of the mouth
Odyssey of the Mind (OM) nearly kills parents for the same
reason it’s fantastic for kids. Rule number one of the school-sponsored,
parent-coached competition is that parents keep their mouths shut. It’s not
easy. All students — 4th grade through college — choose among the same set
of seven complex technical and cultural problems.
My 4th-grader’s team chose Tech Transfer. The OM
website says it “requires teams to create and present an original performance
that includes the use of a technical device that extends into different areas
to move items. The team will design, build and operate the device, and create
the items. The team will integrate the moving of the items into its
performance.”
This alone was enough to get “helpful” parents talking. But
we couldn’t. On competition day, we knew the judges would question the students
about who did what. All we could do was to read and explain the six pages of
rules to the kids. In this case, the device had to deliver 20 objects to three
different staging areas six and eight feet away.
No brainer, the kids thought at first.
“A light saber delivering ammunition.”
“We’ll make it nuclear powered.”
“Hydraulic claw!”
Their mouths zipped, the parent coaches showed the kids how
to use tools and took them to Home Depot. There the kids hefted wood and tested
wheels and drawer slides. The resulting device, an extendable electromagnetic
arm mounted on a sturdy rolling cart, is all theirs.
And no parent could have thought up this play. It’s about an
alien-run Italian restaurant where both dirty-sock pizza and humans are on the
menu, inspired by a Twilight Zone episode. “Welcome to the Toilet Zone,” the aliens chant, using the device to
deliver pizza to the unsuspecting humans. In the finale they sing the show’s
theme song and punctuate it with loud “FLUSH” sounds.
— Jennifer Loviglio
This article appears in Mar 22-28, 2006.
