The We and the I

Best material if you're teaching about BULLYING.

Perfectly pitched and written. So much to relate (and not) to. Plus the rejoicing you get through and at the end of it thanks to the rounded characters' evolution.

Yes, I'm being super biased. Who isn't.

I just saw this film. It was interesting film. I kept thinking it such a long ride. I had the feeling they were bused from Long Island. I kept thinking that these kids would have hidden some guns in the bushes so when they got mad at each other. Someone would have gotten shot. I thought that most of the kids are in jail or dead, I watched it on tape and because they didn't go hear some of the dialogue.

i have to say that all the kids who played roles in this film just looked natural and performed well. but when i watched this film i also felt deeply disappointed and in despair. watching those kids riding a bus to their high school and what they did and talked to each other or among them only proved one thing: no wonder our American's public high school education is a total failure. looked at those kids in this film, they just looked like a bunch of thugs-in-progress, males or females, they were all the same. there was no one in this film looked well educated. there's nobody in this film worried about their future. those boys, they were a bunch of bullies, young thugs or just lamers. those girls, their conversation really gave me a nauseating feeling. water bras? this is American higher education in the making? is this what we got from high school education? i've tried so hard to sit tight to keep watching it, but every scene, every word or sentence of the dialog disgusted me to the extreme. i just wondered why we have to pay for these thug-like, hole-like kids with a daily free bus ride to school if they didn't and couldn't learn anything from it? this was one of the worst viewing experience i've ever had, maybe just because it was so true, so ugly and so purposeless of our public high school education. i think that only the kids from such bad high schools would enjoy it completely, because it's what they are doing every day right now, not just on a school bus. i was told how bad the education systems in other countries are, but at least they didn't produce so many young thugs like what we saw in this film. there are so many kids in lot of countries they couldn't have normal education when they grow up and really want it, but we American kids just waste it for nothing.

I know many are shocked at this film but I can say first hand that not all public high school kids are like that and not all high school kids that misbehave dismiss further education. I rode the bus my entire education from elementary to high school in Washington DC and I can say school is very interesting but on the bus it's the adults that were my entertainment, not the kids.

Also, I lived in Washington Heights in Manhattan and formerly Bed-Stuy Brooklyn. I'm currently in Jersey. They are in the Bronx. It's a tough burough to grow up in. I believe the movie stayed pretty true of life a kid from the projects. I don't know if it's true for the bus ride (I only took the bus in Queens and Manhattan. I take the subway mostly) but I don't need to. They are kids being kids and I love it. It brought back memories I almost forgot. Everything was relatable from the couple loving and fighting to the jokes to the unfortunate deaths. This is high school. This is life.

I got out alive and ironically joined the Army lol but went on to college and own my own venture as a stylist and a designer so every kid has a dream big or small. Half the time it's not the school system, it's the social surroundings, the culture, the family household, and the lack thereof.

All in all, it was a true depiction of what it's like to be young and free.

"The We and the I" has sort of a "My Dinner with Andre" feeling. Both movies have the cast members playing themselves in a closed space in New York having conversations, to the point where both movies feel like documentaries. These high school graduates - mostly Black and Latino - discuss a variety of topics, knowing that it might be the last time that they ever see each other, and some shocking things happen along the way.

Michel Gondry is probably best known for "Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind", about a man who wants part of his memory erased. I would've never guessed that this is from the same person. Either way, it's a good look into the minds of the era's teens. It's not a masterpiece, but it still addresses issues facing these youngsters (note the odd piece of clothing that one girl has to wear). Worth seeing.