PT155.S3.P1.Q7

PrepTest 155 - Section 3 - Passage 1 - Question 7

The following passage is adapted from a 2001 article by a film historian.

P1

Question: Which works of art should be shown together?

Answer 1: Group art according to artist
E.g. Rembrandt paintings

Answer 2: Group art according to theme/period
E.g., Modernist art

Similarity: Both answers use common characteristics to group art together

Analogy: Film retrospectives are like art exhibits. Similar works of film are grouped by a common feature and screened together

Narrowing topic: Early nonfiction film retrospectives

P2

Main point / author's criticism: Early films shouldn't be grouped by similarity
Premise: such films were never originally shown this way

Support criticism: Original format for screening films
Author gives more detail: instead of grouping similar films together, cinemas originally showed different films together in "mixed program"

P3

Target of criticism: Film archives and retrospective festivals
Their priority is to showcase how films supposedly originally looked; author implies this shouldn't be sole priority

Support criticism: Authenticity in how films were originally grouped is important
Screening films in mixed-program format adds context and improves viewing experience

Clarify main point: Exhibition of early films shouldn't ignore the context in which they were originally viewed

Passage Style

Problem-analysis
Single position

Question Type

Author’s perspective: Implied
The author says these cuts are presented as "authentic" because they’re accurate restorations of the films themselves. But he thinks that when talking about authenticity, we need to consider not just the films themselves, but the context in which they were watched. He’s concerned about how that context often gets ignored.

Analysis

Difficulty: 48% of people who answer get this correct

This is a very difficult question.
It is significantly harder than the average question in this passage.

Answer Popularity

Answer	Popularity	Avg. score
a	2%	155
b	2%	156
c	46%	158
d	48%	164
e	2%	153