The Wave (1981)

Είδος: Ταινία
Γλώσσα: English
Υπότιτλοι: -
Χρονολογία: 1981, US
Σκηνοθεσία: A. Grasshoff
Διάρκεια: 44'

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0083316/

In 1967, at the Cubberley High School in Palo Alto, California, World History teacher Ron Jones was asked about the Holocaust by a student. "Could it happen here?". According to the press release accompanying the latest retelling of the events that followed, "Jones came up with an unusual answer. He decided to have a two week experiment in dictatorship. His idea was to explain fascism to his class through a game, nothing more. He never intended what resulted, where his class would be turned into a Fascist environment. Where students gave up their freedom for the prospect of being superior to their neighbors. 

According to the original author of 'The Wave', Mr. Ron Jones, the story is no fiction. He describes how the story took place in 1967 at the Cubberley High School. The school which closed in 1979 was located in Palo Alto, California. Apart from Jones' own recollections, not much documentation exists about the experiment. Brief mention of the events can be found in the "The Cubberley Catamount" which was the Cubberley High School student newspaper.

On his website, Mr. Jones responds as follows to the many questions surrounding his story: "I'm not proud of The Wave but I can't escape it! It is like a calling that just gets louder! For me The Wave is a story of ghosts. What we can be. The allure of good and evil. Choices. I'm sorry, but in the end I can't answer your questions about The Wave."

Norman Lear, an American film maker, made a television adaptation of Jones' original story, simply called 'The Wave'. The movie is described by the publishers as follows:
"A thought-provoking dramatization of an actual classroom experiment on individualism vs. conformity in which a high school teacher formed his own "Reich" (called "The Wave") to show why the German people could so willingly embrace Nazism. This unflinching yet sensitive 1981 Emmy Award-winner raises critical questions: When does dedication to a group cross the line from loyalty to fanaticism? Does power corrupt? What is the nature of propaganda and mass persuasion? Can something like the Nazi Holocaust happen again? Grades 7-12. Color. 46 minutes."

The Wave wins the 1981 Emmy Award for Outstanding Children's Program and the 1981 Peabody Award.

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