Challenged to re-consider his teaching practices, the author conducted a classroom research study designed to investigate and improve how he uses film to teach middle school students about history. He conducted this study in collaboration with his class of twenty-nine grade eight social studies students, who represented a range of ethnic backgrounds and academic abilities in his suburban independent school near Vancouver, British Columbia. His findings, derived from recurrent themes and observations that emerged from his students' work samples, from focus-group discussions, and from surveys and classroom observations, address how film might be used to scaffold historical inquiry. This study also adds the voice, currently missing from the research literature, of middle school students' experiences learning about history using feature films, docudramas and documentaries. He believes that his findings show that film should be an integral component of a curriculum that engages middle school students in learning about history through historical inquiry. (Contains 7 figures and 65 notes.)