Entre les murs

At the 2008 Cannes Film Festival, two movies were able to give viewers a vivid glimpse of the very real social context they dealt with. One was the Italian crime drama Gomorra, based on a non-fiction bestseller about the Camorra's dealings. The other, which received the coveted Palme d'Or (although Gomorra is a tad more riveting), is Laurent Cantet's The Class (the original French title translates as Between the Walls), which some described as the new Dead Poets Society for obvious reasons. The comparison is legitimate but a bit weak, mostly because The Class focuses less on the Greeek tragedy structure typical of school-set dramas. Instead, it gives an incredibly accurate idea of what really goes on in an average school class.

Cantet's film is based on the eponymous book by François Bégaudeau, a former teacher who decided to inaugurate his writing career with a memoir of sorts recounting his experiences in a middle school in a Parisian suburb. Not surprisingly, when word of a cinematic adaptation came out, Bégaudeau wanted to be involved, contributing to the screenplay and taking on the lead role, virtually playing himself.

Well, not really: there's a degree of fiction in his character, at least in the fact that his last name is Marin. Everything else is spot-on, though: he gets along with his colleagues, has an intelligent teaching plan and is generally considered a good French teacher. Still, that doesn't mean there aren't problems in the class, especially when most of the 13-year old kids in there are foreign (Moroccan, Chinese, etc.). Situations range from a new student struggling to fit in to troublemakers refusing to pay attention, and it looks like some of them might not make it to the end of the academic year.

The magic of The Class is of course that it doesn't feel like a movie, but like something real, tangible - a slice of life, if you may. This is because Cantet prepared the film by selecting thousands of real students for the various parts and then going through a year-long improvisation exercise with those who made it to the final cut. In this case, though, "improvised" doesn't equal loads of swearing like in Judd Apatow's body of work (even if some of the lingo used by the kids is on the stronger side), but things people say and think when they're going through that delicate period of their life. There isn't really a point in talking about performances, save for the adults, who are nonetheless teachers in real life. These people, particularly the young ones, aren't acting, they're living. And that is a beautiful thing to behold.

It is said that movies and life do occasionally merge. Few examples are closer to the truth than The Class: it's not a biopic, it's not a documentary. It's a lesson.

Best movie I've seen since No Country For Old Men. And you won't hear these two titles mentioned together too often.

The greatest accomplishment was in re-creating, in naturalistic documentary style, well....a classroom. And although it's almost half a century since I participated in such an environment, it seems not an awful lot has changed (well, apart from the total disrespect shown by many of the children towards their mentor). They were all there, mouthy, loud, quiet, bright, stupid. And real, or so it appeared.

Dead Poets Society it ain't. Remarkably free from schmaltz, the film traces a reasonably undramatic class year, with its group dynamics, teacher cock ups, mutinies - pupils that is - with a very small sprinkling of what is being taught academically. The result should have been fairly prosaic and I suppose it was, but I was transfixed by the skill of the players the art of the director and the total ordinariness of the people being so brilliantly portrayed. A terrific achievement by all.

I watched another French film in a row (after ""Il y a Longtemps que Je T'aime"). "Entre Le Murs" (known in English as "the Class") is the French bet for the Best Foreign Language Film Oscar, and also the first French film to win the Palm D'Or of the Cannes Film Festival in 20 years. It is simply begging to be seen, so I did, despite knowing nothing about its subject matter.

"The Class" turns out to be a documentary-like movie about the tense interaction between teacher and students in a French multiracial high school. In particular, the film follows French grammar teacher Francois Marin who would like to think of himself as a progressive teacher who employs the interactive and self-discovery classroom technique, rather than by traditional lecture style.

However, most of his students are disturbingly belligerent, frank and disrespectful. The main conflict is with a particularly insolent Mali boy named Souleymane who has violent outbursts in class. But there are other students too from Tunisia, Morocco, China, the Caribbean, etc.. all of whom with their own personality and issues which the teacher has to deal with.

Everything in this film is very realistic indeed. It becomes even more personal after knowing that the lead actor who played Mr. Marin is Francois Begaudeau, who actually wrote the semi-autobiographical book about his experiences as a teacher, as well as adapted his own book for this film's screenplay. This is another instance when I am sure a lot of the richness of the language interplay will be lost in the subtitled translations.

A lot of people will find this film boring because of the two hour length, the single setting within the school, and no additional personal side stories about the teachers and students. But with my recent foray into the theory of Education in Graduate School, this film is quite an eye-opener about how different the school situation is these days. Definitely, this film has no Hollywood story arc and uplifting ending. It just tells the situation as it is. And that is precisely where its strength is.

Greetings again from the darkness. Not a film in the traditional sense and not a documentary by true definition, it mixes the two into an absorbing, addictive 128 minutes.

Over the years, I have often questioned the educational system and why both teachers and students are so frustrated. Here we get an inside look at both sides and it still leaves me wondering "why?". Why do otherwise intelligent people commit to becoming teachers? Why do we insist on teaching formats that are miserable for both teacher and student? Why do so many parents blame the school and so few take an active, supportive role? This is the story of Francois Begaudeau, who also wrote the book upon which director Laurent Cantet's film is based.

Begaudeau is a junior high teacher in a working class, multi-ethnic Paris school where the teachers have resigned themselves to the fact that most of the students just don't care to learn. We get an incredible amount of classroom time showing how the melting pot of cultures has so much to offer, yet seems impossible to tap into.

Also fascinating are the teacher meetings and discussions that occur away from the students. We see no joy in these teachers and most seem just beaten down. The film offers no solutions, it strictly acts as a peek inside the institution.

While we are left to our own accord to pick sides or dream of alternatives, I continue to ask the same "why" questions over and over.

I will start with saying that the subtitles made it difficult to understand the specifics of their dialogue. But notwithstanding, Entre Les Murs really feels like I've spent a year in the school with these students. We see the power structure between teachers, admin, and students. We see the problems and challenges that the system has. We also, more importantly, see the interpersonal relationships between the teachers and the students.

This movie doesn't sentimentalize or sugar-coat the learning experience. Lean On Me, this is not. This vision is as stark and cold as the fluorescent light bulbs above the class. The warmth, however brief, is provided by the students and their teachers.

I enjoyed the realistic acting. I never for once thought that I was anywhere else except for a real classroom. I enjoyed the characters, though I wish that I would be able to get in their heads more and see their motivation.

What I liked the most is that we saw an unbiased, holistic viewpoint of the school year. Some students learned a lot, some learned nothing, and life moves on like a soccer match in the school halls.