Sunday, February 15, 2009

How do you do.

The students' reaction to my showing them scenes from My Fair Lady was interesting. They didn't understand it to be a romance. One student like the story of a common girl being coached to become genteel, to move up in the world, as it were.

Apparently, Professor Higgins' teaching methods were not a problem to them. It may well be what they want education to do to them.

There is a scene in the movie where Eliza Doolittle, the common girl, first circulates among the upper crusties after being coached what to say that the students found very funny and confusing. The bits where Eliza says "How do you do?" in a upper-class accent elicited laughter. The time she says "the rain in Spain falls mainly in the plain" when talking about the weather got the biggest laughs. However, her falling in the vernacular of the peasantry when talking about an aunt that maybe died of influenza or was done in, which I thought was very funny, was greeted with silence.

As well, Audrey Hepburn's star power in China is great. Many of the students gave the movie a five star excellent rating because she was in it. Roman Holiday is a perennial favorite Hollywood film among the students. In fact, there is a hotel and spa in Wuxi that uses the Roman Holiday motif - The Roman Holiday Inn.

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