The Kindergarten Teacher

One of the holy grails of film is openness to varied interpretation. Despite its implied narrative unity, The Kindergarten Teacher (2017)is as open-ended as they come. What appears to be a predictable story of a bored 40-something teacher looking for self-actualisation slowly takes on dark themes of psycho-sexual obsession and acts of criminality.

Deep in a marital and career rut, kindergarten teacher Lisa Spinelli (Maggie Gyllenhaal) craves more than life has offered. Her teenage kids prefer social media than listening to her admonishments and her tolerant husband Grant (Michael Chernus) cannot understand why she is so restless. To ease her sexual and career frustration, Lisa attends an evening poetry class to immerse herself in literary beauty, hoping to become a writer despite a paucity of talent.

Her dreams are answered in the strangest of ways. One day in kindergarten, she overhears five-year old Jimmy (Parker Sevak) spontaneously create a short poem. To Lisa, this is an epiphany: if she cannot find great writing within, then her gift is to recognise sycg prodigious talent. She plagiarises Jimmy's poem and her evening class and teacher are impressed. Believing that only she can save Jimmy's talent from obscurity, she becomes obsessed with the boy and ingratiates herself into his broken family life.

This storyline description does not come close to capturing how disturbing Lisa's behaviour becomes. Today's global awareness of child abuse has rewritten the rules of how an adult can relate to a child. At first imperceptibly then manifestly obvious, Lisa bends then breaks all the rules for child contact. Her physical touch, excessive attention, and taking him where others cannot see, gradually dial-ups audience levels of discomfort. When Jimmy's father withdraws him from the kindergarten because of Lisa's behaviour, her complete breakdown and subsequent responses make it impossible to predict where her obsession might lead.

There are many horror and thriller films that pale alongside The Kindergarten Teacher: it is a superb example of how less can be more in filmmaking. Reliance on ambiguity and audience imagination creates a tense psycho-drama on the nature of psychotic obsession. Maggie Gyllenhaal gives an extraordinary yet understated performance; she dominates every scene and exudes normality with just a hint of madness. Young Parker Sevak is amazing in his innocence and bewilderment over the fuss he seems to cause. Tight direction keeps the narrative moving forward with well-measured escalating tension until it is impossible to guess what will happen next in this low-key but highly disturbing film.

Maggie Gyllenhaal gives a stellar performance in The Kindergarten Teacher. This movie was a touch watch, but it was oh-so-worth it. It was very slow and methodical. I'm laughing at all the one-three star reviews because it's clearly people who were on their phone half the time or just haven't ever seen a movie which actually makes them feel something for a change. I don't normally post reviews because why should anyone care about my opinion, but I couldn't let this great movie get bogged down by fools who coooompletely missed the point the movie was trying to get across.

This is a fascinating film, although not one that immediately appears as such. The Kindergarten Teacher is a patient and slow-moving watch, but it's one that creates an enthralling tension beneath the surface, as we see rather bizarre but fairly innocent behaviour get more and more out of hand, furthered by a riveting social perspective that adds a brilliant emotional depth to the main characters.

So, the main thing to know is that if you watch The Kindergarten Teacher, it's not a film that will come to you in the first ten minutes. In fact, it's all a little strange over the course of the first act, as we see Maggie Gyllenhaal's character being bizarrely obsessed with a five year old boy, yet with the story presenting it as if there's nothing abnormal about what's going on.

However, the story really does come good in the latter stages (which I will get into), but that doesn't mean that it's a boring watch early on either.

Above all, Maggie Gyllenhaal's performance is what makes The Kindergarten Teacher work right the way through, as she gives a down-to-earth and thoroughly convincing portrayal of a clearly kind-hearted woman, yet is able to subtly create a certain tension and unpredictability about her over the course of the first act - getting a little too close to her student, and coming out with rather uncharacteristic hippie-esque soundbites - something that really intrigued me as her character's true nature becomes clear throughout.

It's an undoubtedly excellent performance, and Gyllenhaal gives it the ambiguity and tension that the film really needs to make its central themes work.

Now, while that tension and uncertainty grows and grows as the teacher's behaviour becomes ever more bizarre, the film introduces some really fascinating central ideas that lend a stunning emotional depth to our main character, as well as the story as a whole.

At first, you're left a little bemused as to why this woman is acting in such a strange way, but there's a riveting peeling back of the layers throughout that show the stress and disappointment in her own life that has eventually led her to this point.

In that, the film has a little bit of a commentary on the nature of mid-life crises, while also bringing the widely relatable notion of feeling disappointed at your own failures, as we see a woman with ambition and a wider appreciation for the world, and yet has come up short time and time again, further frustrated by the rest of the world's seeming apathy towards the finer things of life, as she sees her own failings mirrored in the potential future of a young boy.

What's even more interesting about those central themes, however, is that they can be interpreted in a variety of ways, largely depending on how optimistic or pessimistic you are towards the nature of art and poetry, as well as your own personal take on ambitions and purpose in life in general.

As a result, The Kindergarten Teacher isn't a film that spoonfeeds you with a narrative showing our main character as simply good or bad, but instead makes you think with a more ambiguous portrayal, leaving you to fall back on your own interpretations to make a judgment of your own, something that I found absolutely fascinating and incredibly rewarding come the end of the film.

Overall, I was really rather impressed by The Kindergarten Teacher. It starts off in bizarre fashion, and although its main thematic core doesn't really come about until about halfway, there's a riveting dramatic tension that bubbles right from the start thanks to Maggie Gyllenhaal's fantastic performance, culminating in a drama that's both enthralling, and really makes you think.

The 6.7/10 on IMDb is disappointing to me. This film is not exactly the genre I am typically drawn too, but it proceeded to instantly peek my interest by performing well fundamentally. The score was eerie when it needed to be, and it was chipper and enticing the rest of the time. There was nothing crazy in this film and it had no huge plot twists, but that didn't stop it from building and building until I just couldn't wait to see what happened next. The characterization was what really made The Kindergarten Teacher shine. Only two characters really needed development, and they got ALL of it. I was enthralled in their relationship. Give this film a chance even if you are not a fan of dramas.

I've never reviewed a film on IMDb but this felt necessary, because a lot of you completely miss the point. There's a difference between an honest look at mental Illness and validating the actions of a mentally ill person. This movie in no way says that what the title character is doing okay. It just had you watch the behavior and judge it as you will.

This is a sad story. As an artist, poet and highly creative person, it made me think about how difficult it is when we only value one type of intelligence or life experience. It does have psycho sexual themes but there's a difference between elevating /romanticizing a child, lack of boundaries, and being a pedophile.

It's uncomfortable, yeah. But obsession is. And obsession dissnr have to equate to sexual desire. The little boy in this story is not sexualized.