Leith Johnson, co-curator of the Wesleyan University Cinema Archives, rounded out Thursday at SAA with a lighthearted look at how archives and archivists have been portrayed in film. There were audible gasps throughout the room whenever a character would do something that was not strictly archivally correct. Like, say, using the Declaration of Independence as a bulletproof shield (yeah, I’m talking to you, Nicholas Cage.) Or beating an archivist over the head and then eating the original document.
Plus, as Johnson pointed out, even the most mundane research task can seem thrilling if you have tension-filled soundtrack behind it!