My Avant-garde film class was surprisingly lively today.

• In the middle of watching Trinh T. Minh-ha’s Reassemblage, we suddenly felt a (minor) earthquake that lasted for about 2 seconds. I was pretty much shaken up.
• This one girl who always talk during discussion suggested that Trinh was manipulative. The professor was obviously baffled.
• Another student suggested that Trinh perhaps made a mistake in her filming, specifically going in and out of focus. The professor called this comment arrogant.
• The “arrogant” student then tried to defend himself by using a technical mistake in The Rum Diary as his defense. The discussion then turned into a Rum Diary one. I don’t know about the others but I was completely baffled with this connection.