The upside of a miserable school experience: It might help you become a great artist. Take French director Jean Vigo. His traumatic years in a substandard boarding school helped turn him to a life in art; in his 1933 film Zero for Conduct, he draws upon those years for inspiration. In the film, the students stage a rebellion to protest the conditions in which they are forced to live and learn. The grand-scale pillow and food fights are quaint by modern American standards, but this comic drama, which was banned for twelve years in France, has fantastical special effects and surrealistic interludes that made it far ahead of its time. 612-375-7622; www.walkerart.org
Leave a Reply