High Hopes

Mike Leigh is a British film director whose early work is dominated by issues of class and potential movement between classes (or not, as the case may be). My plan is for us to use scenes from Mike Leigh's 1988 film High Hopes to practice listening to colloquial conversations and to look at the features of different accents. The scenes should also provide the opportunity to talk about social class in the UK and make comparisons with the idea of class in other cultures.

For more about the film, there's a New York Times article on Mike Leigh's High Hopes here.