The Lesson - Playing by the rules doesn't always help you win in life

In the Bulgarian film The Lesson, teacher Nadya tries to play by the rules, but unfortunately for her, this means she always seems to be the loser.  Quite reasonably, she feels like since she does what she is supposed to be, she deserves to keep some semblance of pride and dignity, but still the world doesn’t seem to want her to catch a break.

The Lesson is quite a slow film, with a slight over reliance on long scenes of mundane life that maybe didn’t add as much as they could have. The opening scene has a promising sense of discomfort and unease, but the film doesn’t quite hold the tone and becomes a little more staid and static. The one thing the pacing did do was intensify the most dramatic scenes, but it perhaps could have done with a bit more impetus at times to really grip the audience.  I’m not sure the documentary style, hand held camera work helped, as it gave the film a restless feeling which didn’t quite match the content.  Black humour sometimes broke through, and had this been more prominent, the film could have been a little more compelling.

What it really does have going for it, and what means the film does hold your interest enough, is an excellent central performance.  Margita Gosheva as Nadya does a great combination of patience, stoicism and politeness in the face of the world trying to knock her down, that is genuinely credible and empathetic. She has an optimism and faith in the fundamental reasonableness of other people but at the same time you get a convincing sense that there is something ready to burst out just under the surface.  It is this characterisation and performance that keeps the audience rooted in the film as you do genuinely warm to Nadya and want something, anything, to come through for her. Some of the most interesting schemes are when she does break out of her placidity and try play the world back at its own game, just a little, but always without enough conviction so that it backfires on her. You get the sense that maybe she isn’t ready to be a rule breaker.

Nadya is a more memorable character than The Lesson is a memorable film, which is at its best as a character piece. It has some moments of genuine drama and tension and an interesting surrounding cast meaning I did hold my interest and enjoy it as a film. But perhaps it just needed to pack a bit more of a punch or find a bit more of a distinctive feel or style to really elevate it to something special.