A Movie Admission Exercise: Play Along With Me

Prep School Admissions
1

<p>The object: List 10 movies that “fit” you…the ones you’re confident that you can watch any time and won’t get bored with. These should be movies you’d be proud for people to know you’d watch.</p>

<p>Considering all the movies out there…even just the great ones, this should be pretty easy, right? But in this exercise you can’t just pick any 10 movies that you happen to like the most. This is going to be a little different. There are three twists. </p>

<p>First, you must satisfy some special designations. Second, your list may only have a few movies that others select (before or after you post your list). And finally, you can name several alternates, in case your list has too many movies that other people select.</p>

<p>FULFILL 10 SPECIAL DESIGNATIONS:</p>

<p>2 must be musicals. Designate these with: <a href=“M”>b</a>**
2 must be about sports. Designate these with: <a href=“S”>b</a>**
2 must be black and white. Designate these with: <a href=“BW”>b</a>**
2 must be sequels. Designate these with: <a href=“2”>b</a>**
2 must be box-office successes. For our purposes, they must have been NOMINATED for an Academy Award for Best Picture. Designate these with: <a href=“$”>b</a><a href=“Click%20here%20for%20movies%20that%20qualify:%20%5Burl%5Dhttp://theoscarsite.com/bpnoms.htm%5B/url%5D”>/b</a></p>

<p>Don’t worry, you still have wide latitude. For purposes of this exercise a movie can satisfy more than one designation. If some obscure studio had made “Pride of the Yankees II: Gehrig Returns” into a black & white musical, it would take care of 4 designations all at once. 5 if it had somehow won Best Picture.</p>

<p>COME UP WITH 7 UNIQUE SELECTIONS:</p>

<p>Oh, and you can only name 3 movies that are named by one or more other people in this thread. AT LEAST 7 of your movies must be unique to you. </p>

<p>SELECT UP TO 4 ALTERNATES:</p>

<p>To make sure you come up with 7 unique movies, you can name UP TO 4 movies as “Alternates” that will count towards your 7 in case your list has too many movies popular with others. Your alternates shouldn’t be movies that others have picked as their top 10.</p>

<p>**Remember…**the idea is not to come up with a list of movies nobody else will pick. The idea is to come up with a great list of movies that you’d be proud to say is your best list of movies.</p>

<p>And even if it’s too complicated for you to bother trying out…perhaps just watching will prove fruitful. Let’s keep this going for about a week. Let’s say that submissions will close at 11:59 PM ET on Friday, April 13. If, during the week you come back and find others have named too many of your movies, feel free to revise your list and resubmit it. But only do so if your original list fails the 7 unique movies test and make a note that your previous list is being withdrawn.</p>

<p>I have to think of my list now… It’s not like I knew which movies I’d pick when I started this thread. Heck, I didn’t even know most of the rules when I started typing this!</p>

2

<p>Some resources to get you started…</p>

<p>List of some of the better sports movies: <a href=“http://www.filmsite.org/sportsfilms.html[/url]”>http://www.filmsite.org/sportsfilms.html&lt;/a&gt;
Some of the best musicals: <a href=“http://www.afi.com/tvevents/100years/musicals.aspx[/url]”>http://www.afi.com/tvevents/100years/musicals.aspx&lt;/a&gt; also <a href=“http://www.channel4.com/film/newsfeatures/microsites/M/musicals/results_100to96.html[/url]”>http://www.channel4.com/film/newsfeatures/microsites/M/musicals/results_100to96.html&lt;/a&gt;
Sequels to consider: <a href=“http://www.zeropaid.com/bbs/theatre-lounge/t-the-15-best-sequels-in-movie-history-nsfw-33066.html[/url]”>http://www.zeropaid.com/bbs/theatre-lounge/t-the-15-best-sequels-in-movie-history-nsfw-33066.html&lt;/a&gt;
Black and white film list: <a href=“http://www.amazon.com/Black-White-Movies-Ever-Made/lm/343O6WAX5JTFJ[/url]”>http://www.amazon.com/Black-White-Movies-Ever-Made/lm/343O6WAX5JTFJ&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/p&gt;

3

<p>MY LIST:</p>

<p>Seven Brides for Seven Brothers <a href=“M”>b</a> ($)**
The Endless Summer <a href=“S”>b</a>**
12 Angry Men <a href=“BW”>b</a> ($)**
Field of Dreams <a href=“S”>b</a> ($)**
The Pride of the Yankees <a href=“S”>b</a> ($) (BW)**
Rocky III <a href=“2”>b</a> (S)**
Godfather II <a href=“2”>b</a> ($)**
Mary Poppins <a href=“M”>b</a> ($)**
The Thin Man <a href=“BW”>b</a> ($)**
Casablanca <a href=“BW”>b</a> ($)**</p>

<p>M = 2; S = 4; BW = 4; 2 = 2; $ = 8</p>

<p>ALTERNATES:</p>

<p>Grease <a href=“M”>b</a>**
His Girl Friday <a href=“BW”>b</a>**
Eight Men Out <a href=“S”>b</a>**
Terminator II: Judgment Day <a href=“2”>b</a>**</p>

<p>The real value to this comes from doing it for yourself and seeing the compromises and internal negotiations you go through to create the list of 10 best movies according to the three rules I laid out. For those who (understandably) aren’t interested in doing this, you’ve got my fourth lesson (see below) figured out. I still encourage people to try it themselves, but if you just want the Cliff’s Notes version, here’s what I got out of completing this exercise (and, to be perfectly honest, not all of these “lessons” were expected after I finished with the “rules” last night). </p>

<p>First, it seemed very useless for me to list a terrific movie that, no matter how much I really like it, didn’t fall into at least one of the five designations. There are just too many movies for me to choose from that also help me satisfy other needs that I have to fulfill for me to select, say, The Station Agent, even though it’s one of my favorite movies. The Station Agent may be one of my all-time favorite films but it doesn’t fit into any category, so no Station Agent on this list. Oh well.</p>

<p>Second, I posted a Top 50 list of my favorite movies on another message CC board ( <a href=“http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/showthread.php?t=324259[/url]”>http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/showthread.php?t=324259&lt;/a&gt; ) and I ended up selecting many movies here that weren’t even on that expansive list. Now it’s true that this exercise made me find some films that I wish I had included on that first list (The Thin Man and Endless Summer) but more frequently I looked past my top 50 to find others that helped me meet multiple “needs” (all the musicals and all the sports films besides Endless Summer).</p>

<p>Third, for whatever reason, I kept looking to at least double-up on my needs by finding movies that had one “hook” AND were also big dollar producers. I had to fulfill 10 “needs” but you’ll see that I took care of 20 in my list. I realized that the big dollar movies (as that term’s defined in this exercise) have plenty of great musicals, sports, sequels and B&W films to choose from. So, if you’re picking a “hooked” film, you may as well pick one that’s also a $ film. I only needed to pick 2 blockbuster films, but I tried to meet my needs with as many of them as possible because that pool offers everything else I need and it allows me to double up on needs. That dynamic changed for my list of alternates where I felt safe about meeting my $ needs for my list and added movies that didn’t have multiple needs and, thus, were less likely to be picked off by other people should I need to turn to those to meet one of my other needs (including my “7 unique picks” need) if my top selections get picked away by others.</p>

<p>Fourth, it’s really REALLY hard to pick movies that reflect who you are while trying to fulfill specific quotas. My List of Top 50 movies just rolled off my fingers. This exercise, on the other hand, took quite a bit of effort, partly because I could only list 10 movies (or 14 with my “wait list/alternates”), and partly because my picks aren’t being made in isolation: I have to concern myself with what movies other people might also pick.</p>

<p>Fifth, I don’t think I’m placing too much stock on an Internet exercise that I created in about 20 minutes’ time to conclude that I have a heightened appreciation for the importance of “hooks” (particularly money) in BS admissions, the difficulty of the admission process, the reasons why some outcomes don’t seem to make sense, and how even being “loved” by the admissions people isn’t a ticket in to a BS.</p>

<p>Also, if other people take the time to try out this exercise, I bet that some of the movies that I really love will surprisingly end up on other lists for the simple reason that their lists will “fall together” differently. And that makes me have a different sense of what is meant by “fit.”</p>

<p>This doesn’t deliver any universal truths. But trying this exercise out in earnest – even if you don’t finish it or share it here – may help you get a better sense of the fact that BS applicants are not viewed in isolation (such as in a “chances” thread) and that the outcomes from the admissions offices are impacted to a great extent by the many different objectives that they must meet (from generating a very tight range of people who will choose to enroll to satisfying numerous constituencies).</p>

4

<p>I’ll bump this because I’m still thinking of my choices. :)</p>

5

<p>A great post! If I get around to it I’ll do it.</p>

<p>Another invaluable resource to consider–<a href=“http://www.imdb.com”>www.imdb.com</a> (The King of all movie sites).</p>