A TEACHER
US, 2020, 10 x 25 minutes, Colour.
Kate Mara, Nick Robinson, M.C..Gainey, Grace Gummer.
Directed by Directed by Hana Fidell, Andrew Neel, Gillian Robespierre.
This television miniseries, screened in 10 episodes of 25 minutes, takes up the issue of teacher/student in the context of high school. While it dramatises the characters, the situations, implications, consequences, it serves as a dramatisation rather than an exploration of the themes. The impact of the series comes from how well the situations and the implications are presented.
The film introduces the teacher, Claire played by Kate Mara, in an unhappy marriage, wanting children but unable, her musician husband spending money on instruments, her memories of harsh past with an alcoholic father, her brother the local police officer.
The film introduces a group of teenagers in their last year at school, aged 17. Prominent among them is Eric, wanting a scholarship, needing good grades, popular with friends, casual in relationships, part of the teenage school drug culture, at home with his mother and younger siblings.
With this set up, the film introduces the two characters and their meeting, Claire at the school, Eric and his job at a diner and his encounter with Claire alone. There is an attraction.
While the film shows Eric, age 17, taking some initiative in developing the relationship, having Claire as a tutor, various meetings, the setup at a social, their leaving, sex in the car, and Eric participant in the relationship, urging it on when Claire says she should not be a tutor, the film also shows Claire taking advantage of the teenager, not putting boundaries, letting her emotional needs takeover. When the police raid a party, Eric asks Claire’s brother to get her to come and vouch for him.
There are sequences with Claire and her husband. Claire also confides in a friend and, after drinking, reveals the relationship with Eric. The friend, a teacher, said she has no option but to inform the authorities. Claire is arrested and goes to jail but not before Eric proposes that they run off and they drive away. However, reality prevails.
Claire goes to jail, served a sentence, is divorce by her husband. She cannot get a job. She is considered a predator. She goes to reconcile with her father and stay with him.
Eric goes to college, participates in the life, girlfriends, friends…
The final episode takes place 10 years after the initial events, Eric returning from his work in taking groups on nature excursions for the school reunion. By chance, in a supermarket, he encounters Claire who is now married with two children. Claire asks to meet him and there is a very frank exchange, Eric very strong in blaming Claire completely for what happened. While Claire is responsible, given Eric’s behaviour, even at 17, while he says he has never got over the experience, he still needs to acknowledge his role in the relationship.
