Seeking Justice: To Kill a Mockingbird (2020)

Lesson 19
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ELA

Unit 7

8th Grade

Lesson 19 of 35

Objective


Analyze the extent to which the filmmakers have stayed faithful to or departed from the original text of To Kill a Mockingbird by comparing and contrasting text and film.

Readings and Materials


  • Book: To Kill a Mockingbird by Harper Lee  — chapter 20

  • Movie: To Kill a Mockingbird  — 01:32:25–01:42:48

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Target Task


Writing Prompt

To what degree have the filmmaker stayed faithful to the original text? Compare the scene where the verdict is given in the text (pages 240–241) to the film version (01:39:41–01:42:48). Think about timeline, plot events, dialogue, and character actions. Provide at least three specific details that demonstrate how the film stayed faithful to or departed from the text.

Key Questions


  • To what degree has the filmmaker stayed faithful to the original text? Compare Atticus’s closing arguments in the text (pages 230–234) to the film version (01:32:25–01:39:41). Think about timeline, plot events, dialogue, and character actions. Provide at least three specific details that demonstrate how film stayed faithful to or departed from the text.
  • What significant event(s) from chapter 21 have been omitted from the film? What was most likely the filmmaker’s motivation in removing these events?
  • Discussion: In the text To Kill a Mockingbird, the narrator is Scout, a character in the text. How is the experience of watching the film —which does not have a narrator (at least not in the same way a book does)—different when you are not seeing the world just through Scout’s eyes?

Lesson Guidance


Notes

  • Because it will take significant time to play the film in today’s lesson, there are only two key questions. You may wish to have students read through the key questions and target task, then play the scene through from beginning to end and then replay specific sections or pause at different sections during the first viewing.

Common Core Standards


  • RL.8.7 — Analyze the extent to which a filmed or live production of a story or drama stays faithful to or departs from the text or script, evaluating the choices made by the director or actors.

Next

Gather evidence relevant to the topic.

Lesson 20
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