Our French and Spanish students in Years 9, 10 and 11 participated in a full day excursion to Adelaide this term, to attend the 2020 French Film Festival. An annual event, which usually takes place in March, we were lucky that it was re-scheduled and we were able to participate.

Renmark High School was very fortunate to view two films of our choice, ‘Les Traductuers’ and ‘La Vie Scolaire’. We were also very appreciative of the Palais Nova Cinema Complex offering our school our own private cinema.

‘La Vie Scolaire’ (School Life) followed the life of an immigrant teen attending a high school in a Parisian suburb. Our students were given some insight into life in Paris for young people, daily routine of French schools, as well as enjoying the antics of some rather entertaining teachers, especially from the PE Department.

The clear favourite film of the day according to the students, however, was ‘Les Traducteurs’ (The Translators). A thriller, featuring ten languages, including French, Spanish, Greek and Danish and Russian. Students were captivated from the opening scene and were stunned on the revelation of the perpetrator; except Alex T. who confidently declared that he had worked it out within the first 15 minutes!

Robust conversation about this film continued long into the return journey home, revisiting favourite scenes and key clues in the storyline. The realisation that the ability to speak more than one language could potentially save your life.

“I want to see it again!”

“That was brilliant”

“How many languages can they all speak?”

“They didn’t know he spoke Chinese too!”

“I want to learn more languages”

Thank you to accompanying staff on the day, Wayne Elliott and Joanna Catalano for supporting the excursion. They also enjoyed the experience and commented on the exceptional behaviour from our students who represented our school superbly. 

Jasmine Sotiroulis - French & Spanish Teacher