A Teacher
Oscilloscope Pictures | Release Date: September 6, 2013 CRITIC SCORE DISTRIBUTION
47
METASCORE
Mixed or average reviews based on 15 Critic Reviews
Positive:
5
Mixed:
9
Negative:
1
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Critic Reviews

Critic scorePublicationBy date
80
The Hollywood ReporterDavid RooneyAug 2, 2013
What makes the film work is that this potentially lurid material is treated at all times with sensitivity and probing psychological seriousness. Read full review
75
The PlaylistGabe ToroSep 5, 2013
The intensity of Burdge’s excellent performance—and Fidell's intense, often claustrophobic filmmaking—carries the picture far, but when she turns away from the camera (and she does often), you can almost feel Fidell reaching for spare ideas. Read full review
75
The A.V. ClubIgnatiy VishnevetskySep 4, 2013
By continually deferring dramatic tension, the filmmaker puts more weight on the movie’s closing scenes — which are abrupt but true to life — than they can handle. Read full review
65
NPRTomas HachardSep 5, 2013
The diminishing returns in part are due to Burdge's performance, which too often settles for the same look of fraught anxiety. But they also result from Fidell's decision to pare her film down to the barest elements. Read full review
63
ObserverMatthew KasselSep 3, 2013
A Teacher is more in the vein of Michael Haneke’s brooding 2001 film, "The Piano Teacher." Read full review
60
Film.comWilliam GossAug 2, 2013
Burdge is left to do much of the heavy lifting in terms of inviting the audience into her protagonist’s shaky state, and her performance boasts a remarkable emotional precision throughout — if ever there’s a reason to seek this one out, it would be for her. Read full review
58
Portland OregonianMarc MohanSep 15, 2013
It's clear that Fidell meant to craft a nonjudgmental, non-exploitative exploration of this taboo situation. And she deserves credit for avoiding both tawdry melodrama and earnest moralizing. But by refusing to judge or exploit, she ultimately ends up without much of interest to say on the topic. Read full review
50
The DissolveMike D'AngeloSep 4, 2013
A Teacher feels a bit like watching some fool cross a busy freeway on foot over and over again for an hour and change. There’s little to do but await the inevitable splat. Read full review
50
Slant MagazineChris CabinSep 3, 2013
We're only allowed an insufficient glimpse of the anxiousness and curiosity that drive these creatures, a tactic which feels suspiciously like hesitance masquerading as enigma. Read full review
40
New York Daily NewsJoe NeumaierSep 5, 2013
Writer-director Hannah Fidell’s somber drama of an illicit romance earns credit for being a serious discussion of a tabloid-rich topic, but the movie runs out of places to go. Read full review
40
Los Angeles TimesSheri LindenSep 5, 2013
A flimsy episodic feature. Read full review
40
Village VoiceAndrew SchenkerSep 4, 2013
When Diana's fixations begin to take over, Fidell seems ill-prepared to steer the film into strictly psychological territory, resulting in a project that loses its fraught sense of control at the same moment as its embattled protagonist. Read full review
40
Time OutJoshua RothkopfSep 3, 2013
Less a master class in inappropriate high-school relationships than the CliffsNotes version, A Teacher isn’t going to tell you anything Nabokov or "Election" didn’t. Read full review
40
VarietyPeter DebrugeAug 2, 2013
As first features go, A Teacher demonstrates a willingness to provoke, but doesn’t seem to understand the minimum expectations most audiences place on films in terms of both incident and characterization. Read full review
30
The New York TimesManohla DargisSep 5, 2013
Long on atmosphere and short on believability. Read full review
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