The English Teacher (2013)

Save your money for something good and enjoyable

Nice effects though.

The film creates a perfect balance between action and depth of basic needs, in the midst of an infertile atmosphere.

It is an exhilarating, distressing, funny and profound film, with one of the more memorable film scores in years,

I enjoyed this film...though I will admit parts of it made me uncomfortable, it is also a funny tale of how sometimes even with the best intentions, we end up making mistakes. What struck me with this movie is that one can relate to each of the characters who in some way have made some kind of mistake but ultimately end up moving on and have some kind of positive change and resolution after the fact. That being said, I feel like the film was a little uneven. The opening was entertaining, but I don't feel like the light-hearted beginning that was somewhat Bridget Jones-esque carried all the way through the film until the very end. It was darkly humorous in the middle and I feel like the British narration would have lightened up the movie significantly if it was featured throughout the entire movie and not just at the beginning and end.

I had contradictory feelings after watching the film. On the one hand, the idea is interesting, characters are attractive, and some narrative tools (e.g., the narrator voice) are refreshing and imaginative. On the other hand, many characters are underdeveloped (e.g., Halle is a key character but we never understand her), the story move forward to fast (How do Halle and Will accept the new ending? How does Miss Sinclair make up with her students?). I liked this film and I recommend it to you if you want a different romantic comedy, but I think it could have been better.

Julianne Moore did a wonderful job portraying a teacher who has become too out of touch with reality as she dwells on romance found in literature. When her former student comes back from New York her world gets a little shaken up. She helps him in getting the school to stage his play. There is a lot of humor with her character's insecurities and false hopes. It was fun to see her in the role. There is humor and drama with misunderstandings between the different characters. She gets too close to the student, Jason. There are problems with the school administration regarding the dark subject matter of the play.Afterwords she is changed which is to her benefit.

Julianne Moore gives a memorable performance as Linda Sinclair, a stodgily cool, attractively nerdy high school English teacher who finds herself in a compromising position with a talented former student whose play she's promoting to the school's administration and Thespians. While I loled once or twice, most of the consistent humor is of a drier, more satirical variety. This film does a nice job of compassionately satirizing a number of institutions and stereotypes, and this is one English teacher that really knows how to keep at least some of the class's attention without asking them to think too hard.Notwithstanding the mock Masterpiece Theater narrator, THE English TEACHER is quite light comedy in the end, without a lot of character depth or conflict development. Though it's pretty tame stuff and looks like it could be rather uneventful, plenty happens throughout its short (90-minute) length.Not to sound snooty, elitist, or anything else, but it seems that someone would need one and preferably both of the following in order to really enjoy THE English TEACHER: A) Some familiarity with the world of Secondary Education, its various workplace clichés ("Just take it down one level, please," etc), and sensitive legalities--admin's concern about the possibility of a lawsuit if they allow the students to put on a play that ends in bloody murder, etc.B) Some familiarity with (and interest in?) classic American and British literature. While the frequent allusions are nothing heavy, it helps to know a little about who Lord Byron was, the basic plot of Thornton Wilder's OUR TOWN, and so forth.I strongly recommend this film to anyone who falls under those categories, particularly those who teach English. Some current high school students (and parents) with relatively sedate tastes may also like it. Those outside these perimeters may be rather bored by THE English TEACHER.Nothing really wild happens beyond some implied sex, a lot of realistic profanity, and generally sensitive subject matter.