‘The Class’

If I were to tell you that a film about a year in a Parisian middle-school class was one of the best films of the year -- good enough to win Cannes’ Palme d’Or practically by acclamation -- you might think I was crazy, but it would be true. The reality of this classroom is so intense that it holds our interest even while the film’s dramatic focus is building quietly under the surface. Then, when you least expect it, the drama is there and suddenly things are deadly serious for some of these students, as a chain of events takes us and them by surprise, and we see how fragile the opportunity for learning is, and how inflexible a system can be when things threaten to spiral out of control.

-- Kenneth Turan