Armed Cowboys Loose in Faculty Hall: A Day In Brenna Sherrill’s Film Studies Class
By: Kate Friedman
The classroom is full of cowboys! A homemade pistol prop, made from two toilet paper rolls, features tally marks representing a cowboy’s number of kills as he stands with his gun raised in the air. He is mounted upon a noble steed: a plastic blow up horse Brenna purchased off of Amazon.
Brenna Sherrill, a 2009 Governor’s Scholar at Bellarmine University, studied the journalism focus area. She went on to take a media writing class in college, but found greater enjoyment in a pop culture studies class. Sixteen years later, on Friday, July 18th, I observed Brenna as she taught her Film Studies class at Murray State University.
Early on in the program, Brenna’s students learned basic film techniques and watched, before analyzing, five movies: Rififi(1955), Rocky(1976), Life is Beautiful(1997), The Lunchbox(2013), and Parasite(2019). Now, towards the end of the program, the scholars are putting these skills into action by making their own movies; titles range from Love on the Perimeter, a GSP take on the popular reality TV show, Love Island, The Curris Project, inspired by the 1999 horror movie, The Blair Witch Project, and Rangers Iron, a western movie which explained the presence of the cowboys.
Experience levels were widely varied between students, with some having little-to-no prior education regarding film, while others had previous exposure as cameramen, theater actors, podcasters, or even as film makers.
Since learning more about movie production and having first hand experience in the production process, film studies students claim that they possess a new level of appreciation for quality movies. On the opposite hand, students also have a new level of frustration with low quality movies: one of Brenna’s students commented on the choppy transitions present in the 2018 film, Bohemian Rhapsody (a movie that, as Brenna pointed out, ironically won the 2018 Academy Award for Best Film Editing.)
Film studies student, TJ, commented that before taking Brenna’s class, he did not reflect on movies after watching them. However, since being a part of class movie discussions, he plans to “…start critiquing movies more intellectually.” To put these movie analysis skills to the test, I asked the scholars their favorite film shown in Brenna’s focus area; the answer was almost unanimous, with Life is Beautiful winning the majority vote by a landslide. When asked their favorite classic film series pick, answers were more varied with choices like Get Out, Ladybird, Pan’s Labyrinth, and You’ve Got Mail being represented.
When asked about the importance of movies, Brenna commented that movies are “…very reflective of social values and society.” Movies are more than a way to pass time when we are feeling bored; movies are an art form that bring culture and new perspectives into our lives.