Review: The English Teacher (2013)

Cast: Julianne Moore, Michael Angarano, Greg Kinnear
Director: Craig Zisk
Country: USA
Genre: Comedy | Drama
Official Trailer: Here

Editor’s Notes: The English Teacher opens in limited release on Friday, May 17th and is now available on VOD. If you’ve already seen the film we’d love to hear your thoughts on it, or if you’re looking forward to seeing it this weekend, please tell us in the comments section below or in our new Next Projection Forums.

Few professions are not, by necessity, utterly repetitive, the same tasks repeated ad infinitum, replayed day after day after day. It must be all the worse for teachers, whose year-long cycle might seem initially preferable, but which nonetheless pits them in a similar carousel of duties where the students remain the same age as they themselves grow ever older. It’s precisely this circularity that underlies The English Teacher, a colourful comedy focusing on the unshakeable optimism of the eponymous educator as she teaches the same literature to high school kids year after year, determined to impart some appreciation of art to her charges. It worked in one case, at least, and when she reconnects with a budding student turned starving playwright, she insists on mounting a production of his ambitious debut work.

Predominantly, the humour is mounted with an amiable sense of mild manners, the Charitons occasionally dipping their toes in the wider ocean of a crasser, more risqué comedy before sharply drawing back and retreating to the safety of dry land.

The most immediate point of comparison for The English Teacher, hammered home by an Anglophonic voiceover almost straining itself to sound like Emma Thompson, is Stranger than Fiction, though where that movie’s narration was paramount to its meditation on the nature of storytelling, this is little more than the protracted setup for a concluding gag, and not a very good one at that. Scripted by couple Stacy and Dan Chariton, the film does manage its fair share of genteel chuckles as this ill-fated adaptation is played out, the chemistry of its cast well exploited to make the most of the material. Predominantly, the humour is mounted with an amiable sense of mild manners, the Charitons occasionally dipping their toes in the wider ocean of a crasser, more risqué comedy before sharply drawing back and retreating to the safety of dry land.

Seemingly inspired during her tenure on 30 Rock, Julianne Moore sees fit to channel the spirit of Tina Fey in the lead role, re-enacting her awkward ways and whims with all the semi-satisfactory accuracy of the runner-up in an Elvis lookalike contest. The major difference, of course, and the fatal flaw that even gesturing toward Fey’s feminist phenomenon exposes, is that Liz Lemon was never, ever, defined by her relationship with a man. Sure, she spent the series seeking that perfect partner, but never was her character disempowered by being a single woman. The English Teacher, by contrast, treats its protagonist’s “spinster” status with precisely the antiquated sense of gender politics that outdated term suggests, as though it were some unspeakable venereal disease. There’s a modicum of irony to this treatment that emerges here and there, but never is the script sharp enough to work this into the drama, and whether intentional or not, the story only manages to perpetuate the problematic outlook it should really seek to undermine.

The English Teacher, by contrast, treats its protagonist’s “spinster” status with precisely the antiquated sense of gender politics that outdated term suggests, as though it were some unspeakable venereal disease

It’s small mercies the like of Nathan Lane that not only keep the film afloat amidst the heavy weights that threaten to drown it, but actually make it remarkably enjoyable too. At one point landing a line that’s not just the best of the movie, but perhaps the year too, Lane brings bountiful charisma to proceedings, wholeheartedly embracing a role that—though typecast—is indicative of the kernel of an entertaining idea on which the film as a whole was founded. Michael Angarano and Greg Kinnear, too, in the respective roles of the returned student and his unsupportive father, do their part to elevate the end product to a respectably enticing piece of entertainment, if an unsteady one. It’s the cast that does the majority of the heavy lifting here, and their combined strengths are almost enough to earn the movie full forgiveness for its more dubious aspects.

Determined to impose a trace of personality upon the visual composition of this, his feature debut, veteran TV director Craig Zisk opts for an irritating abundance of overhead shots, seeming often little more than a wannabe Wes Anderson. That—paired with the obvious emulations of Stranger than Fiction, 30 Rock, and more—only serves at every turn to undermine by contrast the entertaining impact the film is lucky to manage. The more troubling conceits of its premise aside, The English Teacher is no bad movie, but nor is it anything very special, nor is it ever able to rouse the viewer to dramatic engagement with these characters or visceral reactions to these comic efforts. It is, like a job one works day after day after day, almost exhausting in its passivity.

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Ronan Doyle

Director of Movies On Demand & Sr. Staff Film Critic at Next Projection

Having spent the vast majority of my life sharing in the all too prevalent belief than cinema is merely dumbed-down weekend escapism for the masses, I was lucky enough to turn on a television at the exact right moment to have my perspectives on the medium completely transformed. Those first two and a half hours marked the beginning of a new life revolving around—maybe even depending upon—the screen and the depth of artistry, intellectual stimulation, and emotional exhilaration it can provide.

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