A TEACHER — Movie Review
By John Argote-Rodriguez
ROAD TO A TEACHER (Miniseries)
“A Teacher” was released on September 6, 2013 worldwide after its original premiere in Sundance January 20 earlier that year. “A Teacher” stars Lindsay Burdge and Will Brittain and is directed by Hannah Fidell.
“A Teacher” tells the story of high school teacher Diana Watts (Burdge) who’s engaging in a secret sexual relationship with fellow student Eric Tull (Brittain) that begins as an infatuation that slowly descents into a unhealthy obsession.
I’d never heard of this movie until I began watching the Hulu miniseries it’s based off on and I thoroughly enjoyed that series so I decided to check out the film it’s based on and it’s the same thing only shorter. The miniseries covers the events leading to the relationship and the events after the relationship whereas the film just covers the middle.
By the time “A Teacher” starts the relationship of both Diana and Eric has already started and the film wastes no time in showing us the negatives of this student-teacher relationship, but mostly see it from the teacher’s point-of-view. We see what her life is, how she’s feeling emotionally and we get a glimpse of her personal life and her issues that lead her to getting attached to this kid that becomes a unstable obsession.
The film is okay it’s slow burn there isn’t much to it. I previously mentioned we get a glimpse into her personal life, but that’s really it, we see her brother for a bit and learn there’s some parental issues going on that she’s trying to avoid, but she leaves and never see him again and we don’t get any kind of closure on the matter. “A Teacher” is all about a woman trying to escape her problems and she’s lonely she’s stuck alone in a black hole struggling with her demons and the way she buries that pain is by engaging in this relationship with Eric.Will Brittain as Eric Tull.
We don’t get much from Eric’s point-of-view. We just see it as a teenager giddy that he’s sleeping with the hot teacher, though it seems like he is genuinely interested in her, but by the end it’s unclear especially with Diana becoming more unhinged as the film progresses.
“A Teacher” isn’t a great film, it touches on a controversial topic and I think it covers it okay. Again it’s not great I think the film is missing too many pieces of the puzzle because to any story there’s a beginning, middle, and end and the movie begins in the end and ends in the end. I don’t know maybe it’s because I saw the miniseries first and loved more than the film, the performances are solid especially by Lindsay Burdge who carries this movie. All in all I recommend to this if you’re into character studies it’s a sensitive subject matter so if it’s something you don’t feel comfortable watching them don’t, besides the miniseries did better.
Grade: C
