On Tuesday December 5, Spanish A-level pupils had an all-round day trip to London. The day started at BFI Southbank, where pupils attended a lecture on Pedro Almodóvar and Volver, the film they are studying in depth at school for their literature assessment paper. After lunch, they watched the film in the theatre hall. Then, they strolled along the Southbank until they arrived at their dinner location, a scrumptious Tacos restaurant on Shoreditch, where they ordered authentic Mexican food in Spanish. It was an excellent day for all!"
L6 Pupil, Eleanor McGuire, shares how she found the trip;
"Before watching the film ‘Volver’ we were treated to a lecture by two university lecturers – Dr Miguel García and Professor Sarah Wright. It was an interesting session that focused on other films by Almodóvar, drawing links between his works and examining the filming techniques that were used. While we haven’t started to study ‘Volver’ in our Spanish lessons yet, the study day provided a useful introduction to the film and its themes, whilst also improving our Spanish skills as the entire session was spoken in Spanish. I also enjoyed watching ‘Volver’ for the first time and getting to know the film a bit better in preparation for our future studies, especially in the excellent conditions of the British Film Institute cinema. Additionally, it was great to experience elements of Hispanic culture, such as enjoying delicious churros and tacos. L6 Pupil, Daisy Pickering, also shares her experience of the trip;
"On our trip to the BFI we began with a lecture in Spanish by Dr Miguel García, with helpful comments in English from Professor Sarah Wright in case we got lost in the Spanish. This covered the many shared themes in Pedro Almodóvar’s films, in particular Spanishness, motherhood and the actresses he commonly works with. We also discussed his techniques and how the camera angles he uses reflect the genre of the film and the relationships between characters. It was a very enriching experience since we were immersed in the Spanish language for around 2 hours, and it was nice to know that I understood almost all of the lecture. After this we had lunch then watched Almodóvar’s film ‘Volver’, which depicts all of the themes we discussed clearly and we will be studying next year in U6. Later we looked around a Christmas market and then had tacos and churros for dinner."
