Next semester's class

As I've said before, next semester I'll be teaching a class in lit to film adaptation. I had been thinking of having the students write about a text and film I chose first, using criticism I picked out and discussed in class, and then having them launch into their own choice of lit/film, with the help of the textbook and me, of course. It will be difficult, more difficult than the theme I've been doing (modern slavery) because the stuff they'll be reading will be written in jargon sometimes so thick they won't be able to understand it. I will have to help with the texts too, which means I will probably be spending a lot of time individually with the students.
I was going to do a Hitchcock film and the text it came from (The Birds or Strangers On A Train, but I found that not much is written about the adaptations, and that I really disliked Highsmith's novel, so I decided to do Oates' short story "Where Are You Going, Where Have You Been?" with the movie Smooth Talk. I think they will really like both of these, and will be engaged in the process for that reason. Also, I have the story online to put on Blackboard and the movie was cheap on Amazon ($3.00). I bought two copies, one for the library, and there was a bibliography online too. Of course, lots of buyable papers are online, so I will have to watch out for that, but the assignments should be specific enough that they won't be able to use those papers, I hope.