Cloak

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  1. Joe (JRP Penguin)18 March 2012 at 18:13

    Ground down, tired, defeated by the system: I think Mrs Krabappel, Miss Hoover and Skinner are worth a mention.

    You left out Sister Act II! How could you?! It is the template for School of Rock, which, like Old Andrew, I reluctantly like.

    Another blog could be made on the student stereotypes - as long as it includes Elephant by Gus Van Sant. And Donnie Darko. Best lines in Donnie Darko:
    Noah Wyle: 'Donnie Darko'.
    Drew Barrymore: 'I know...'

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  2. Things that movies/tv also say:
    teaching is a fill in job for smart folk (To Sir with Love), school staff-rooms are entirely filled with people trying to get it on with each other (Carry on Camping, Teachers, Waterloo Road),
    and they remember *every* student ever (Goodbye, Mr Chips-the '39 one, I have no idea what the '69 one is like).

    Aside: "Jack Black makes me want to hook my hand down the back of my palette and pull myself inside out" thankyouthankyouthankyou. Every single person I have told about my dislike of Jack Black and how un-amusing I found that bloody film tells me I am soulless and lacking in humour. Because apparently JB is amazing and I just don't get it.

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  3. How about Les Choristes? Category 4? A modest, bald, patient and gifted teacher wins over a group of kids and one in particular through music. A bit slushy maybe, but a lovely film all the same. Nice blog, Tom.

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  4. (Self-publicity alert) I wrote about the annoying habit of movie teachers to never finish lessons on time here:
    http://maths-teacher-goes-to-the-movies.blogspot.co.uk/2009/06/let-right-one-in.html
    It's such a cliche - bell rings whilst teacher is in mid-drone, class gets up and leaves, teacher shouts at departing bodies... enough. What would Ofsted say?

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  5. Have you just dissed Coach Carter?

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  6. So Tom...Waterloo Road? Not film of course, but arguably far more pernicious in its cultural impact. If there was such a thing as "own brand" school drama, Waterloo Road would be it. La Classe is in a different...class!

    The irony of course is, the real thing is so much more compelling. The 14 year old girl tutee of mine, who was talking happily to a colleague on her way to first lesson Monday morning, when he keeled over and died. The boy who threw his housemaster's cat out of a second floor window in an act of revenge, the £250 in cash stuffed up a drainpipe...I could go on!

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  7. Notes on a scandal...

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  8. I'm arriving here desperately late, but just wanted to support votes for a a review of To Sir, With Love, which is absent here I wonder if due to respect. I watched that film avidly when a teenager and it both tipped the scales for me when deciding between teaching and (good heavens) law; and, ahem, started the configuration of my personal trinity of the ideal male teacher/father: Mr Thackeray, Atticus Finch and, some years later, Remus Lupin.

    I also wonder whether you have come across The Browning Version, which I think you would like. Hopefully you don't mind black-and-white and ancient actors.

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