TEACHERS' NOTES

This material is designed for teachers of GCSE and A Level Film and Media Studies students and students of Higher Still Media Studies courses. It offers guidance and suggestions for classroom activities, assignments and coursework. It can also be used for the Personal and Social Education curriculum as it deals with issues such as bullying, death and bereavement, sexuality, violence and depression. It looks at young people's experience of urban and rural life and at their boredom and frustration as they pass from adolescence into the so-called 'mature' or 'real' world.

The films that are examined in detail are:

• Kes
• Stand By Me
• The Night of The Hunter
• Rebel Without A Cause
• An Angel At My Table.

We also include films such as Clueless and 10 Things I Hate About You, two adaptations of literary texts which grasp the universal themes of teenage society and love; The Breakfast Club which looks at American high school life; Beautiful Thing which looks sensitively at a young boy's realisation of his sexuality; What's Eating Gilbert Grape which presents ordinary people dealing with the pain of daily life and the attempt to escape it; East is East where two cultures clash causing pain and disruption within one family and La Haine which shows teenage life in the suburbs of Paris where boredom, frustration and violence predominate.