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The Class. |
The Class, Exeter Picturehouse
Cert 13, 130 minutes
By Lee Rice
The Class , aka Entre les Murs , is a French film set in a Parisian, suburban high school, following an academic year in the life of a class of teens, taught by Francois Marin.
The Class convincingly conveys the stresses and strains experienced by all involved in the classroom setting – from the pupils and the parents, to the staff and head-teacher. Primarily though, the film focuses on Mr Marin.
Although emotionally inaccessible and surprisingly frank, Marin is a likeable character with teaching traits sure to remind viewers of their own favourite teachers. Amongst his colleagues, Marin is a man of few words; but in the classroom he encourages healthy debate, however tangential, with the aim of encouraging an appetite for knowledge. For the most part, when Marin does speak, he tends to say the right thing and has a knack for reasoning and diffusing situations.
Marin’s teaching style is less conventional than those of his colleagues, encouraging lively debates and giving his students a certain amount of freedom within the classroom. When it works, this technique results in an enjoyable sense that the pupils are enjoying learning, and a restoration of faith in a generation that usually gets a bad press. However, when events seem to turn against him, Marin’s reluctance to follow rules and guidelines works against him.
The camerawork in The Class has a tight, realist focus on characters’ faces. This preference for tight shots helps emphasise tensions and anxieties, but loses impact when the action calls for wider shots.
Overall, The Class is a well-made film with plenty of enjoyable moments. With its various points of view and its racially mixed pupils, some may try to argue some sort of allegorical intent, but The Class ultimately feels like it lacks wider scope. However with convincing dialogue, and impressive performances from the younger actors, The Class is certainly entertaining and well-made.
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