I am planning to write my thesis on the representation of "inner city" schools in popular film.
There is an entire genre of unmotivated, doomed to fail students being turned around by a benevolent, inspirational and tough teacher/principle/coach. Blackboard Jungle is quite a bit different from the bulk of the movies I'm interested in--which are Stand and Deliver, Dangerous Minds, Freedom Writers, Lean on Me, Coach Carter, etc.--but it is still an interesting representation and reflection of popular American "common sense".
I have not yet watched Blackboard Jungle (one of the first movies to illustrate the failing inner city schools), but just looking at the trailer a few prevalent cultural narratives are evident. So here are a few quick observations I made while watching the trailer:
One thing that is noticeably absent from the trailer is black bodies, with the exception of Sidney Poitier, which does not make the messages of the film any less racially marked. This movie is released during a time when urban spaces are experiencing an influx of people of color coupled with suburban white flight--during this time urban spaces become equated with non-white spaces.
The language of savages and the images of violence are striking in the trailer. It even includes the white woman in peril trope, so common to racist representations of people of color and the underlying threat to white masculinity.
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