It could be a small group in any college in America, but in this case, the group has been brought together to form a hot mess of diversity prepared to engage — if they only knew how. In Lee Mun Wah’s new film, “If These Halls Could Talk,” the filmmaker explores the process of the group’s unlayering. Members peel back the distrust that’s built up in their lives in order to see each other in a true light for the first time and to experience the real payoff of diversity of any kind: a real heart-felt conversation with a person different from oneself.
No wonder such real conversations don’t happen in real life more spontaneously. As the film shows, it takes real work, essentially a therapy session led by Lee, 65, a trained psychologist and diversity trainer, who in a Zen-like way steers the discussion.
