A (Mostly) Unruly Guide to Film History

Because film school wouldn’t dare...

May 09, 2025

A tightly packed DVD shelf featuring titles like Citizen Kane, L'Avventura, High and Low, Pather Panchali, Tokyo Story, interspersed with Cruel Intentions, The Legend of Billie Jean, Point Break and Exit to Eden. A box set of Showgirls with vibrant bright polka dots juts out right of center, domineering over the other titles. The arrangement blends Criterion classics with cult cinema and pop trash. — The Crash Courses shelf, in all its sacred/profane glory. One title kneels at the altar of the very films that shaped it in much the same way—spot it if you can. (And,no, it’s not *Showgirls.*)

Not Your Professor’s Film Shelf

I’ve designed the Crash Course series to make exploring film history a little more fun—and a lot less like homework.

No stodgy syllabi or painting inside the lines. Just small collections of 10 films that act as reference guides to quickly (yet thoroughly) understand what a genre, artistic movement, or filmmaking discipline is all about.

Think everything from the French New Wave to the Erotic Thriller, Modern Korean Cinema to Neo-Noir.

We’ll tackle German Expressionism, dip into Giallo, as well as explore the difference between parody, satire, screwball, and slapstick.

And what was the deal with awards categories for Sound Design, Sound Editing, and Sound Mixing, anyway?

Some directors may even get their own Crash Course—because let’s be honest, Hitchcock and Verhoeven are practically genres unto themselves.

Rodney Dangerfield speaks to the professor while seated surroundied by his humiliated son and other students in a shot from Back to School (1986). — **Back to School** **(1986):** Rodney Dangerfield want to know, “Why don’t you call me sometime when you have no class?”

Curriculum Rewritten

This series is inspired by my time working at Criterion, eons ago.

Sure, I’d taken a few elective film courses in college (the only two even offered at my school)—but when I needed to fill in the critical blindspots fast, I turned to the six-foot metal office cabinet off our sound room that housed a single copy of the entire Criterion Collection. Yes, even the ones that famously got pulled off the market.

Today, that locker (as deservingly as Criterion’s charter) has grown hugely in scope, rebranded as the Criterion Closet, and welcomed visiting celebs, becoming YouTube-famous in the process.

But back then, I was the only one who really dug in there and it was just my nightly pile of homework. I discovered plenty of hidden gems. And, for as enjoyable as it was, it was still kind of a chore.

Not all of us are as obsessive about film and Crash Courses is my attempt to give you the crib sheet I wish I’d sometimes had and help you understand the ways in which the movies and shows made today are reflections of what came before.

Join me as we peel back the layers of film history in the best way possible: by celebrating the masterpiece and the megaflop, sometimes simultaneously.

With a little luck, we’ll all learn something new along the way—myself included.

Other film schools may not have room for Easy A. Mine does.