BAD EDUCATION : Official Reviews ( SPOILERS)

[jo]

Sept 8, 2019 23:33:12 GMT -5 jo said:

If this were a Broadway show -- the whole review should be reproduced in BOLD print -- and splashed all over the lobby!!

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September 8, 2019 8:52PM PT

Toronto Film Review: ‘Bad Education’

Hugh Jackman delivers an acting master class, trading on his charismatic star persona to reveal the rotten core of bad-apple superintendent Frank Tassone.


By Peter Debruge

Peter Debruge
Chief Film Critic
@https://twitter.com/askdebruge?lang=en


CREDIT: Toronto Film Festival


Director: Cory FinleyWith: Hugh Jackman, Allison Janney, Ray Romano, Geraldine Viswanathan
Running time: 108 MIN.


Going forward, what will Hollywood do when it needs a Kevin Spacey type? The disgraced Oscar winner is precisely the actor a movie like “Bad Education” calls for: Cory Finley’s audacious second feature centers on the true story of Frank Tassone, district superintendent of the Roslyn School District in Long Island, N.Y. — a hero to parents and students alike, responsible for turning the Roslyn High into one of the state’s top-achieving public schools, while exploiting the trust the community put in him. It’s a tricky, two-faced role that calls for the kind of firm-handshake, direct-eye-contact duplicity Spacey brought to “House of Cards” and half a dozen movies before it. Google “Frank Tassone” and tell me that I’m wrong.

Now, Hugh Jackman isn’t the actor I would’ve expected to fill those shoes. He’s more movie star than character actor, and this role presents him in such an unflattering light — quite literally so, shooting its Caucasian cast such that their skin looks like raw chicken and every wrinkle casts a shadow — that you’d think his agent would have advised him against it. (George Clooney’s probably did.) That’s what’s so courageous about Jackman’s decision, and one of several reasons that “Bad Education” is the best work he’s ever done.



Toronto Film Review: 'Bad Education'

Here’s a star at the height of his powers leveraging his own appeal to remind that even our heroes are fallible and that you can never really judge someone from the outside. And Finley — whose only prior feature credit is the ice-cold, Patricia Highsmith-worthy high-wire act “Thoroughbreds” — is every bit the director to bring it home, pairing Jackman with an equally astonishing Allison Janney as school business administrator Pam Gluckin, Tassone’s creative-accounting accomplice. Finley, who clearly thrives when dramatizing morally complicated situations, doesn’t do the first thing you’d expect from any telling of this national-headline-making story (one that was first exposed by the school paper, the Hilltop Beacon): He doesn’t sensationalize it. Not that it would have been wrong to do so.


It worked for Martin Scorsese in “The Wolf of Wall Street.” It worked for Steven Soderbergh in “The Informant.” Splash it up — that’s the obvious answer. Make the colors pop, the movie’s carotid artery bulge. That’s how such material is usually played. Look at this story on paper — a high-school student exposes an $11 million embezzlement scheme perpetrated by the institution’s most admired figure — and you might expect a tongue-in-cheek cross between “Election” and “To Die For” (the Gus Van Sant-directed satire inspired by Pamela Smart, a high school employee locked up after enlisting her teenage lover to murder her hubby).

Written by Mike Makowsky (“I Think We’re Alone Now”), who was attending Roslyn Middle School when the Tassone scandal broke, “Bad Education” doesn’t shy away from the humor of the situation, but it doesn’t go for the cheap laughs either (unless you count some of the distractingly tacky decorating choices in Gluckin’s ready-for-remodeling home). With their strong accents and “Sopranos”-like way of dressing, the movie’s all-too-trusting Long Island residents would’ve been an easy target for parody, but that’s not the tone Finley’s going for. From the high-contrast, stark-widescreen look of things, he’s most interested in the way that people like Tassone and Gluckin could rationalize what they were doing.



That’s easy: Of all the careers in America, educators are by far the most undercompensated. In New York, where the cost of living is high and the real estate outrageous (the latter ironically exacerbated by the quality of the public schools), how are teachers supposed to afford being part of the community they serve? That doesn’t justify graft, mind you, but it suggests how people who’ve dedicated their lives to a low-earning field might find themselves bent toward skimming a little something extra for themselves out of the school budget.

“Bad Education” makes a point of showing how much Tassone meant to the community. Early on (the year is 2002, as signified by flip phones, compact discs and other period details), Tassone is seen tweezing his nose hairs before going onstage to take credit for turning the school into a success. Roslyn is ranked No. 4 in the country. Test scores are up. Seniors are getting into Ivy League schools in record numbers. And the school is set to break ground on a $7.5 million “sky walk,” that could give the community a massive boost.

Rachel, a sophomore played by “Blockers” standout Geraldine Viswanathan, has just joined the school paper, whose editor isn’t prepared for the deep dive into the school’s financial records that she has in mind. “We are an extra-curricular designed to get us into good colleges,” he says. But Rachel (who is a fictional character based on an actual student journalist) has something to prove — to herself; to her father (Harid Hillon), who was canned in an insider-trading scandal; and to Tassone, who truly cares about the students, encouraging her to turn the puff-piece assignment into something meaningful.

At times, the story borders on the incredible, and it may spoil the surprise to read some of the details that follow. Through an imbecilic mistake — in which Gluckin’s son charges thousands of dollars of home renovation supplies to the school account — the school board gets wind of Gluckin’s financial misdeeds. When it happens, audiences don’t know whether or to what degree Tassone is involved, and it’s fascinating to watch Jackman in action: Like a master politician (or a brilliant actor), he sizes up the situation, assesses his audience and begins to spin things to best protect all involved. In other movies, scenes like these are played such that audiences can see the con man’s hand, but Jackman keeps a poker face, which protects the remaining surprises until such time that Rachel can reveal them.




True-crime movies so often serve to reinforce the notion that wrongdoers are eventually brought to justice in this country. But “Bad Education” refuses to get so reductively didactic. Yes, Tassone and Gluckin stole millions of dollars, but they also made Roslyn an extremely successful school (if you don’t dwell on the leaky ceilings and outdated equipment). When certain details of Tassone’s private life come to light — including a reunion with a former student (“Blindspotting’s” Rafael Casal) and an unconventional arrangement with one of the school’s mysterious suppliers (Stephen Spinella) — one may be tempted to judge. But the real takeaway is how hard that can often be.


Maybe Spacey isn’t the only one who can handle the ambiguity such a performance demands. The way Jackman plays it, Tassone was a villain who didn’t see himself as such. Finley finds creative ways to suggest the discrepancy between inner and outer appearances. The hair-slicked, health-conscious superintendent is constantly watching his cholesterol, forgoing carbs in favor of charcoal smoothies — which amounts to nourishing his insides with what looks like black bile. Late in the game, before the jig is up, he goes in for a face lift — another reminder of the mask Tassone wears (and an unexpected sight for a now-50-year-old movie star). Appearances can be deceiving. This we know. But how do young people cope with seeing their heroes shattered? “Bad Education” can be a hard lesson to accept, but a necessary one in how the world works.



Toronto Film Review: 'Bad Education'

Reviewed at Toronto Film Festival (Special Presentations), Sept. 8, 2019. Running time: 108 MIN.
Production: An Automatik, Sight Unseen, Slater Hall production. (Int'l sales: Endeavor Content, Los Angeles.) Producers: Fred Berger, Eddie Vaisman, Julia Lebedev, Brian Kavanaugh-Jones, Oren Moverman, Mike Makowsky. Executive producers: Leonid Lebedev, Caroline Jaczko.
Crew: Director: Cory Finley. Screenplay: Mike Makowsky, based on the New York Magazine article "Bad Superintendent" by Robert Kolker. Camera (color, widescreen): Lyle Vincent. Editor: Louise Ford. Music: Michael Abels.
With: Hugh Jackman, Allison Janney, Ray Romano, Geraldine Viswanathan
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Allison Janney
Bad Education
Cory Finley
Geraldine Viswanathan
Hugh Jackman
Toronto Film Festival

Hope everyone sits up and appreciate that this is an acting gem from HUGH JACKMAN!





PS: That was why I was so keen to see him at Toronto -- if this could be the start of an awards campaign - his presence could further cement any extremely favorable critique of his performance. Because sad to say -- that is how the ball bounces in the world of awards

EDIT : And seeing that the film has not been picked up for distribution, it was hoped that Hugh Jackman's presence at the film festival would be helpful. But maybe given the personal review of his performance, his actual presence and the movie's storytelling strengths would already sell the movie to distributors and audiences! And Hugh can enjoy the brief break allowed him... On second thought, didn't Sutton Foster mention that there is a forthcoming lab for THE MUSIC MAN in September … and of course Hugh and Deb's hosting duties on Sept 28 for the GLOBAL CITIZEN FESTIVAL.

Jo

[jo]

Sept 8, 2019 22:36:29 GMT -5 jo said:

Done!

The Hollywood Reporter


Courtesy of TIFF

The Bottom Line : Gets a solid B+ without even cheating.

Hugh Jackman, Allison Janney and Ray Romano star in 'Thoroughbreds' director Cory Finley's second feature, which was inspired by a school district scandal on Long Island.

An embezzlement scheme whose total take was $11.2 million seems like peanuts compared to Enron, Bernie Madoff or any other billion-dollar fraud of our epoch.

But in Cory Finley’s engagingly devious new dramedy Bad Education, it takes on the guise of a real-world morality play where the mighty fall from up high — even if up high means the superintendent seat of a public school district on Roslyn, Long Island.

Based on a scandal that rocked the upmarket New York suburb over a decade ago, and adapted to the screen by a former student, Mike Makowsky, who witnessed the ordeal firsthand, the film marks something of a departure for Finley from his pitch-black comic debut Thoroughbreds, which drew more than one comparison to Heathers.

Here, the satire is softened to let reality sink in, with characters and plot-points drawn from actual sources, resulting in a movie that plays like a slow-burn investigative thriller with comic touches and a major comeuppance in the last act. It’s perhaps less flamboyantly enjoyable than Finley’s first feature, but it also digs deeper into the souls of its characters, asking how a few people meant to ensure the pedagogy of hundreds of children could flunk out so badly.



The man behind all the monkey business was one Frank Tassone (Hugh Jackman), the beloved Roslyn School District superintendent who rules over his fiefdom like a lifelong educator, assuaging the fears of overzealous parents and encouraging his students with generous pep talks. He’s assisted by Pam Gluckin (Allison Janney), who minds the budget in the office next door, and flanked by school board president Bob Spicer (Ray Romano), who works as a local realtor and sees Frank's success as his ticket to major bucks.

With his house-of-wax complexion, oversized suits and jet-black pompadour, Frank resembles a textbook New Yawk bureaucrat, even if he reads Dickens for fun and appears to be more refined. Jackman slips into such a role perfectly, staring beady-eyed at his interlocutors in the creepy way we all remember school officials used to look at us, and joining Janney, Queens boy Romano and the rest of the cast in a chorus of Long Island accents that could constitute its own Billy Joel fan club.

Initially the film’s plotting seems a bit subdued as we follow Frank on his mission to make Roslyn number one in the region, — only in such a location-specific movie could the competing towns of Jericho and Syosset be referred to as “sons of bitches” — watching as he deals with the dull day-to-day duties of running his district. Things seem to be going fine, and Frank seems like a great guy, so why should anybody worry?

It’s at this point that the superintendent dishes out advice to an eager but somewhat inhibited student reporter, Rachel (the excellent Geraldine Viswanathan), telling her to take the puff piece she’s writing about a planned school renovation a little more seriously. Little does he know that Rachel will become the Woodward & Bernstein to his Richard Nixon, spinning her story into a full-blown inquiry that will open up a giant can of worms.


Things slowly but surely unravel, and then completely fall apart, as we learn that the supposedly grieving widower Frank leads a double life both professionally and personally — the latter when we see him start a fling with a former pupil, Kyle (Rafael Casal), now working as a bartender in Vegas. Meanwhile, right-hand gal Pam has been doing some unruly things with the official credit card, including making major improvements on a house in the Hamptons that seems way over her pay grade. This will get her fired, but it will also be the tip of the iceberg in a much bigger conspiracy.

If Finley eases us into the action during the first hour, teasing out lots of information with occasional jokes and digressions, his film snowballs into a tragic-comic tale of retribution in the second half as Frank’s shiny Botoxed mask tumbles, taking down everyone else in the rooms. It’s at this point that emotions run high, especially during a moving montage and dance sequence — set to Moby’s “In This World,” which came out a few years before the actual scandal broke — where we see Frank experiencing one sad last hurrah before his number’s up.

While the filmmaking overall is less distinctive here than in Thoroughbreds, the characters seem more lifelike and the story itself is riddled with irony. Frank is not only undone by one of the very students he tried to motivate, but the movie ponders what his guilt means in a place where parents, many of them way wealthier than he is, are constantly pushing him for favors and then showing little gratitude for it: Didn’t the guy deserve a few million for helping so many of their kids get into Harvard?

Working once again with cinematographer Lyle Vincent, Finley captures this ethical s---show in cool colors and wide lenses that frame Jackman against some of L.I.’s finest schools, administrative offices and seven-figure homes. Production design by Meredith Lippincott and costumes by Alex Bovaird further add to the suburban authenticity, turning Bad Education into a paean to bad taste and even more questionable morals.


Production companies: Automatik, Sight Unseen, Slater Hall
Cast: Hugh Jackman, Allison Janney, Geraldine Viswanathan, Ray Romano, Alex Wolff
Director: Cory Finley
Screenwriter: Mike Makowsky
Producers: Fred Berger, Eddie Vaisman, Julia Lebedev, Brian Kavanaugh-Jones, Oren Moverman, Mike Makowsky
Executive producers: Leonid Lebedev, Caroline Jaczko
Director of photography: Lyle Vincent
Production designer: Meredith Lippincott
Costume designer: Alex Bovaird
Editors: Louise Ford
Composer: Michael Abels
Casting directors: Ellen Lewis, Kate Sprance
Venue: Toronto International Film Festival (Special Presentations)
Sales: Endeavor Content (U.S. and international), CAA (U.S.)
103 minutes

LOL - I am presently straddled watching for all the TIFF reactions and possible reviews...and watching/reading up on the just concluded US (Tennis) Open, with my favorite tennis warrior claiming his 19th Grand Slam win

Will try to find other stuff for Bad Education ?


Jo

[jo]

Wow - from David Ehrlich!

‘Bad Education’ Review: Hugh Jackman Is Brilliant in Diabolically Smart American Crime Story

Jackman plays the most human role of his career in Cory Finley's masterful crime drama about the biggest fraud in high school history.

David Ehrlich
1 hour ago
@davidehrlich


“Bad Education”

One of the more beautiful things about being an American is that it’s easy to justify your own success — at least to yourself. This is the land of opportunity, and people are taught from an early age that they get what they deserve, and they deserve what they get; if they weren’t, the injustice of it all might spoil the fun. You don’t necessarily have to earn your good fortune, you just have to believe you’re entitled to it. Needless to say, we are up to that challenge! And we’ll do whatever it takes to keep everything in its right place.

With that in mind, it’s strange that, as Americans, we still tell ourselves that corruption is usually a symptom of greed, as opposed (or in addition) to something that happens when people can’t afford to question their own worth. It’s a red, white, and blue twist on a universal kind of perceptual asymmetry: When you do something wrong, you think of an excuse — when someone else does something wrong, you think of a motive. The incredible magic trick of Cory Finley’s “Bad Education,” a diabolically smart true-life crime drama that stars Hugh Jackman in his best performance since “The Prestige,” is how it manages to balance that asymmetry in the most savage and softhearted of ways, inviting sympathy for the devil even after it convinces you why he should go to hell.


Heavy with poisoned humor and as panoramic as Finley’s “Thoroughbreds” was laser-focused, “Bad Education” is in no hurry to reveal the full picture; watching the first hour of the movie, it’s hard to imagine how this seemingly benign story of suburban malfeasance could possibly explode into the biggest embezzlement scandal in the history of the American school system. But the pieces are there from the moment the film starts, buried just under the sand. Screenwriter Mike Makowsky — whose script is a well-calculated masterclass in narrative economy — takes us back to the Long Island high school where he was a student in 2002.



From the looks of things, that seemed like a great time to go there. Facebook hasn’t been invented yet, college early-admission rates are soaring, and the cash-flush administration is about to pass a budget that allocates $7.5 million for a useless but presumably cool-looking “skybridge.” They’ve earned it. When “Bad Education” begins, Roslyn, New York, is the number-four school district in the entire country, and much of the credit for that belongs to the man, the myth, the legend — Dr. Frank Tassone (Jackman).

It’s rare to see people react to a superintendent like he’s — let’s go with a 2002-appropriate reference — one of the All-American Rejects, but it’s basically pandemonium whenever this guy appears before the PTA. And can you blame them? This is the guy who’s going to get their kids into Yale, even if he has to write all their recommendations himself (Frank never forgets a student). He’ll grant your son extra time on a test if you ask him nicely, he’ll join you for an extracurricular discussion about Dickens at an otherwise all-moms book club, and he won’t even embarrass you when you try to kiss him in the kitchen after everyone else has gone home. Besides, any man that handsome — he’s a dead ringer for P.T. Barnum! — is probably used to being flirted with by now, and there’s a tantalizing layer of sadness beneath that perfect head of slicked-back hair. Frank has been a widower for as long as anyone can remember, but he’s still never seen without his wedding ring.


This may not sound like a particularly engaging world, and “Bad Education” resists the temptation to sex it up for the sake of things, but Finley’s rigid compositions and Lyle Vincent’s gliding camera moves galvanize Frank’s administrative fiefdom with a sense of absolute purpose. The office is a well-oiled machine. Frank and assistant superintendent Pam Gluckin (an excellent Allison Janney, as if there’s any other kind) are a perfect twosome, even if she tantalizes him with the carbs she’s sworn off. Even the millionaire school board president (Ray Romano) is thrilled. God is in his heaven, and all is right with the world.

Except, it isn’t. And it’s not the leak in the high school’s hallway ceiling. Secret lives and brazen incongruities abound. In a film where even the most innocent scenes crackle with nervous energy and even frustrated erotic tension, a chance Las Vegas encounter between Frank and an old student (Rafael Casal) is electric with a where-else-could-this-be-going intensity. Your first inclination will probably be to pity Frank for feeling like he needs to live in the closet. Is this the mask that always seems like it’s about to slip off his face? Did his wife know when she was alive?



Meanwhile, back on the ranch, an intrepid student reporter (“Blockers” and “Hala” actress Geraldine Viswanathan, continuing to strike the right balance in every part she plays), is writing a story about the skybridge. That wouldn’t be a problem if Frank hadn’t encouraged her realize her full potential and not settle for a puff piece; it wouldn’t be a problem if Pam’s idiot son (hopelessly typecast “American Vandal” star Jimmy Tatro) hadn’t bought hardware supplies on the corporate card she’s been using to steal money from the school for years. Janney, who affects a hard Long Island accent that resists parody even during her funniest scenes, affects the part of a wounded lioness; survival is top priority, but it’s not that simple. Pam isn’t a sociopath, just someone with a warped perception of what’s best for everyone. And she’s about to be the victim of a generational reckoning that she never thought necessary.

She isn’t the only one. “Bad Education” always finds its way back to Frank, but Makowsky’s patient script has a knack for catching the superintendent unawares. Here is someone who doesn’t have the good sense to realize that he’s the main character of a movie; someone who thinks that he’s always just outside the eye of the storm. That misperception gives Jackman the space needed to be life-sized in a way that his “bigger” roles seldom have.

This is the most human performance he’s ever given, wrapped in translucent vanity and cut with finely sliced layers of doubt and denial. Whether locked in an oppressive close-up (the vibrating film stock reacting to even the most imperceptible muscle twitch) or trying to wrestle back control of Frank’s domain, Jackman always threads the needle between shock and showmanship. Through him, Frank seems both innocent and guilty at all times, and the actions he’s able to justify (good optics sometimes require bad choices!) steer him right into his blind spots. Early in the film, Frank tells a struggling lower schooler that he was also bad at math, and now look at him: He’s the guy who designs the math curriculum. The tragic thing about Frank — and the most brilliant thing about “Bad Education” — is that he honestly doesn’t understand why that might not add up.



“Bad Education” has some blind spots of its own, not least of which is a reluctance to dig into Frank’s stunted desire for upward mobility. He doesn’t want to be richer, but he still resents the fact that he makes a little bit more than a teacher’s salary while his boss is a multimillionaire; affluent local parents lean on Frank like every test their kids take is a matter of life and death, and they don’t even bother to say thank you once the college acceptance letters go out. “Bad Education” is appreciably embittered about teachers and on the school administrator’s behalf, but the film is doing so many different things — and juggling enough different tones to make Bong Joon-ho blush — that it has to squeeze the distance between its peaks and valleys. Michael Abels’ jangly, effective score sounds like a malfunctioning factory assembly line, and the disorder is such that Finley can’t spare the extra moment he needs to explore the relationship between the underpaid faculty and the wealthy community they serve.

However disappointing it might be that “Bad Education” is too delicate (and true) to really go wild and let Finley indulge in the flamboyance that made “Thoroughbreds” such a wicked treat, this is a young director who can see the whole chess game 20 moves in advance. Whatever compromises he makes are excused and then some by a remarkable third-act scene that defies every rule about conventional filmmaking — a wordless and shockingly moving dance number so human and desperate that it makes you take all your own judgments with a grain of salt. The “Nightshift” sequence from Claire Denis’ “35 Shots of Rum” may never be equalled, but Finley comes awfully close. Dr. Frank Tassone deserves what he gets, but — for at least one perfect moment — we’re all invited to wonder if he truly gets what he deserves.


Grade: B+

“Bad Education” premiered at the 2019 Toronto International Film Festival. It is currently seeking U.S. distribution.
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This Article is related to: Film, Reviews and tagged Bad Education, Hugh Jackman, Reviews, TIFF

[jo]

From VANITY FAIR --

Toronto Film Festival

Hugh Jackman Transforms Yet Again in the Fascinating Bad Education
Perhaps the world’s greatest showman gives another gripping performance in a festival standout.

By Richard Lawson
September 9, 2019

Courtesy of the Toronto International Film Festival




Twenty-five years into a fascinatingly varied career, it’s still a thrill to see __Hugh Jackman__try something new. Or, at least to give his famous charisma a different shade. Last year, Jackman went relatively minimalist in the political downfall drama The Front Runner, a sharp, underseen diagram of fatal stubbornness. This year, Jackman turns up the charm a little—while lathering it in a thin coat of smarm—for Bad Education, a tidy and engrossing corruption drama that premiered here at the Toronto International Film Festival on Sunday.


A detailing of a real-life embezzlement scandal in a Long Island school district, Bad Education allows Jackman to explore the profundity in the petty. As far as financial crimes in America go, former Roslyn school district superintendent Frank Tassone’s theft was relatively minor. (He did steal millions, though.) And yet, there was so much existential squirm behind his actions, this movie suggests, so much want and insecurity and indignant entitlement. It makes for a gripping character study, one that Jackman delves into with his usual full-bodied commitment. Though the once beloved Tassone prided himself on his appearance, his fancy suits and slicked back hair and surgically tightened face, there’s nothing glamorous about the role. It’s an ugly thing, Tassone’s sneaky desperation, the way he launders his misdeeds in self-righteousness.

A lesser actor might play all this with too broad a version of pathetic villainy, figuring all of Tassone’s stated good intentions—he really cared about the kids, he swears—just another part of the elaborate lie. But Jackman does as a trained actor should and operates from the truth of the character; he plays what Tassone believes. Which makes the downward arc of the movie that much more interesting. Jackson(sic) makes our sympathies fluid, so it's much easier to ride the subtle undulations of the movie. We learn with it, just as its characters do.



Bad Education is slow to reveal what it’s really about, first immersing us in the quotidian world of Tassone’s work life. He meets with the school board, offers encouraging advice to students (he knows them all by name), and shares in a few conspiratorial laughs with his second in command, Pam Gluckin. (A co-conspirator played with palpable credibility by Allison Janney.) The world of Bad Education is small, banal even, despite Tassone’s swanning presence. Bit by bit, though, Bad Education takes a larger narrative shape, a carefully meted out progression of little things that mount and mount into a local catastrophe.

The film’s pacing is a neat reflection of how such a crime might be born—just a trickle at first. That parallel is a credit to Mike Makowsky’s sharp, thoughtful script and to Cory Finley’s direction. Finley is the other interesting personality here. He’s a playwright turned director whose first feature was the 2017 Sundance curio Thoroughbreds. Nasty and arch and brimming with style, that promising debut suggested something about Finley that he totally upends with Bad Education.

Finley eschews all of Thoroughbreds adornment and wisely takes a quiet, measured tack befitting of Bad Education’s script. Shooting on film, Finley captures a grainy kind of drear, an everyday plainness, that lends the film a crucial veracity. (This also helps locate the film in the past; 2002, specifically.) It’s patient filmmaking, carefully designed, but humble. Finley honors the script and his actors by getting out of the way, gently applying his artistry instead of making Jackman and company perform for it.


There’s a somewhat major plot point in Bad Education that I’d like to discuss here, but if you’re unfamiliar with the real story and want to go into the film unaware, turn away now.




As the film’s portrait of Tassone and his lies gains texture and depth, we’re gradually clued into just how much of a secret life this shifty man is leading. Specifically, we learn that Tassone is gay, and that he keeps that part of his life painfully private. At least I think it’s pain I see in Jackman’s eyes, as Tassone pursues a former student he runs into on a business trip. But I don’t think that pain is about him being gay, really. It’s more to do with Tassone’s—or, this movie’s version of Tassone—recognition that he’s addicted to doing furtive things, to subverting his good public standing. Desire is so often a secret, its realization more satisfying when there’s little outside air to spoil it.

Jackman and Finley communicate this self-destructive complexity with a compassionate clarity. Tassone is a sneak and a liar and maybe worse. But his ache is real. Bad Education (which honestly isn’t a great title for this movie) is an arresting, nuanced depiction of insatiable want, of the bitter fact that reaching for things is often more instinctual, more human, than holding on to what we’ve already got. I love that Bad Education takes this sorry little story so seriously. The film’s quiet desperation accumulates around Frank Tassone like a snowdrift, slowly piling up until he’s buried in it. Or maybe he was buried already. People just didn’t notice until he came for their money.

[jo]

From a blogger --

lwlies.com/festivals/bad-education-toronto-film-festival-review-hugh-jackman-cory-finley/#.XXbs-8hMIzA.twitter

Hannah Woodhead
@goodjobliz



Bad Education – first look review

Hugh Jackman is rotten to the core in Corey Finley's biting black comedy about public school embezzlement.


Hugh Jackman couldn’t be at the world premiere of his new film at TIFF. He’s on the final leg of his world tour in New Zealand, belting out hits from Les Miserables and The Greatest Showman to adoring audiences. So instead, he sent a video message from his iPhone, which director Cory Finley played before the screening of Bad Education.


In it, Jackman apologises for his absence from the stage of a packed stadium. The crowd all appear excited to be part of the video. Jackman, with his glorious white smile and impossible good looks, is Peak Jackman in that moment – the real-life Greatest Showman. This makes his outstanding turn in Bad Education all the more remarkable. It feels like a genuine risk for him not only as an actor, but as a Brand with a capital B.


In 2004, a huge scandal rocked a small school district in New York. Beloved superintendent Dr Francis ‘Frank’ Tassone was arrested on embezzlement charges. He was convicted for stealing $2.2 million from the public school system he was trusted with overseeing, all frittered away on vacations, cosmetic procedures, real estate, and – most scandalous of all – his double life with a male exotic dancer in Las Vegas.

The extent of the total larceny by Tassone and others totalled $11.2 million, although they were only able to bring charges for about $7 million of that. Who better to pen the script than someone close to the subject? Screenwriter Mike Makowsky is a former Roslyn student who remembers the scandal well. His razor-sharp script, teamed with Finley’s knack for depicting stark amorality first glimpsed in 2018’s Thoroughbreds, works wonders for this wild tale of corruption and greed, while Jackman delivers some of his finest work in years.

His Tassone is as slick and jovial as Jackman himself: he runs a book club popular with all the local mothers; he drinks charcoal smoothies (in 2004!); he wears sharp suits; he drives a nice car. His cologne is Hugo Boss, his hair is groomed to perfection – dyed an inky, box-fresh black. Frank Tassone takes pride in his appearance, meticulously crafted to give off a certain image. Together with the school board, Roslyn has become a school district of national note, with parents jostling for places and students moving on to top Ivy League schools. As such, when scandal threatens to erupt, Tassone et al scramble to avoid a full-on PR nightmare, keen to preserve their hard-won reputation.



It’s a story about the lengths people will go to for self-preservation, deliciously mean and as funny as it is outrageous. Tassone rarely loses his cool, approaching oncoming chaos with an unnatural calmness. It’s shocking, and creates a sense of anxiety in the audience, to see someone who is so utterly convinced of their own superiority and cleverness, that they don’t even have a contingency plan in case they get caught. Finley delights in showing sociopathy at its most banal – in Thoroughbreds, it was bloodthirsty teenage girls, in Bad Education, it’s greedy public school administrators who insist their hard work for a thankless job should come with some restitution.

Yet, as much as Tassone is a villain, Finley invites us into his world and offers vital insight into how his mind works. One scene, set to Moby’s ‘In This World’, is a beautifully choreographed set piece which delivers possibly Jackman’s most challenging scene to date: as a man who cannot dance. He would do well to learn from his Bad Education experience and seek out more roles that offer him a chance to flex his dramatic skills, as beneath all the showboating, Jackman is a very good actor, and it’s nice to be reminded of that every once in a while.

Published 9 Sep 2019

[jo]

[jo]

[jo]

A YouTube review --

[jo]

From an IMDB user ( where the movie has an overall rating now at 7.2, from 36 voters so far


www.imdb.com/title/tt8206668/ratings?ref_=tt_ov_rt

For a USER rating --

*9/10
Amongst the best of the year 2019

imdb-ikysmoviedatabase9 September 2019
Fabulous performance superb acting by all cast members wonderful direction and beautifully written.

[jo]

weliveentertainment.com/welivefilm/tiff-2019-bad-education-review/

TIFF 2019: “Bad Education” Review
Ashley Menzel September 9, 2019 0 likes


TIFF 2019: “Bad Education” Review

The Toronto International Film Festival gets a plethora of great premieres, including huge films like Jojo Rabbit, Knives Out and the North American premiere of Joker, but some others fly under the radar. Don’t get me wrong, a lot of these films still have star power, but they aren’t the most sought out. A good example of this is Bad Education, an engrossing tale of embezzlement and corruption lead by amazing performances by Hugh Jackman and Allison Janney and a razor-sharply written script.

Hugh Jackman plays Frank Tassone, the superintendent of schools for Roslyn School Districts in Long Island, NY. His continued success as an administrator has earned him the admiration of the entire district, but things quickly change. His assistant superintendent for business Pam Gluckin (Allison Janney) with numerous indiscretions, turns a young high school journalist, Rachel (Geraldine Viswanathan) on her tail. The further that Rachel digs into the finances of the district, the more she uncovers, threatening everything that Frank and Pam have built in the Long Island community.

Now, a public school embezzlement story may not scream “entertaining” to you, but Bad Education is entrancing. The pacing and writing in the screenplay is perfection. With a story that could get bogged down in the specifics and minutia of the story, Bad Education soars. The screenplay dodges in and out of the person and professional lives of Pam and Frank with ease, truly creating a web of lies and crimes.


Hugh Jackman can charm an audience and it is certainly perfect casting to have him play Frank Tassone, a man who charmed an entire school district. He embodies the controlled and collected superintendent with ease. As we see the character’s life begin to unravel, you can feel the tension in Jackman’s performance. In one scene, we get to see his shell starting to crumble as he must deal with a mother and son who have no clue what is going on and are focused on what they need. His tense reserve and delivery is spot on. Allison Janney gives us a fantastic performance and also balances the control and chaos that Pam is attempting to keep together.


What strikes me most about this film is how surprisingly funny it is. I didn’t expect to laugh nearly as much as I did during the film and that is thanks to a great script. There are small moments in each scene that are a subtle jab at something or just meant to make you chuckle. Because of this humor, I think the story could keep the audience’s attention. This isn’t always an easy task to tackle but writer, Mike Makowsky has managed to do so.


Bad Education manages to set itself apart from other films thanks to a great script, spot-on performances, and a balance of humor and suspenseful storytelling. Based on a true story, Bad Education reminds us to always beware of a wolf in sheep’s clothing.

Written by
Ashley Menzel



Ashley Menzel is an avid film lover and lives in Los Angeles, CA. She loves foreign films and dramas and reading books that have film adaptations. Her favorite movie of all time is One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest. She loves Doctor Who, Supernatural, iZombie, and Grimm.

[jo]

I didn't realize ROTTEN TOMATOES has already opened a Page for BAD EDUCATION!

www.rottentomatoes.com/m/bad_education_2019


100% for 6 reviews in



I'll take that


On a serious note -- Scroll down for specific reviews. 4 of 6 are from TOP CRITICS of Rotten Tomatoes. Bodes well for the rest of incoming reviews.


Jo

[jo]

I am including tweets from blue-tickmark Twitter accounts here --

[jo]

thecurvyfilmcritic.com/tiff-19-hughjackson-deliciously-diabolical-in-bad-education/

Coming Attractions, entertainment, Film Festivals, Film Reviews, TIFF 2019

TIFF 19: HughJackson(sic) Deliciously Diabolical in Bad Education
No Comments

Earlier this year Award winning actress Felecity Huffman paid thousands of dollars because she wanted her daughter to have a ‘fair shot’ at college. For someone like me, a ‘fair shot’ included my mother working two jobs, me securing financial aid and working three jobs while taking more than 20 credit hours so that I could graduate. Not only did I graduate, but I made the Dean’s List and was Homecoming Queen for The School of Communications.

Hard work and little elbow grease never hurt anybody, but privileged members of society always feel like they can break the rules with no consequences or repercussions. Well, for Rosyln High School in the New York borough of Long Island Pam Gluckin and Frank Tassone learned that lesson in spades.

Inspired by a true story, Bad Education is a smartly assembled, hilariously dark, at times squirm-in-your-seat chronicle of the most fascinating financial crime in the history of the US school system. Directed by Cory Finley from a script by Mike Makowsky, (who was in the seventh grade in the Roslyn School District awhen the scandal hit), the film is a master class in being a con-artists, with the charismaticly handsome Frank taking measures by any means necessary to conceal his authentic self from his colleagues and the law, but attempt this carefully constructed charade from crumbling to bits.
Long Island school superintendent Frank Tassone (Hugh Jackman) and his assistant superintendent for business, Pam Gluckin (Allison Janney), brought the Roslyn School District unprecedented prestige with numbers of college admissions other schools sorely rivaled. Frank, always immaculately groomed and tailored, is a master of positive messaging, who can apparently do no wrong.


All of that goes to hell in a handbasket when Tassone encourages a timid student reporter, Rachel (Geraldine Viswanathan) to dig deep into a skywalk project. Turns out that one project had some questionable expense reports and a major embezzlement scheme of epic proportions is uncovered by Rachel. Quietly panicking, Frank devises an elaborate cover-up without any regard for whose life is ruined or thrown under the bus.

Hugh Jackman is not singing, dancing, smiling or being a superhero wolf and finally getting the chance to flex his acting muscles as a serious actor (he was equally impressive in The Front Runner, which was largely ignored earlier this year about former Presidential Nominee Gary Hart). He is so deliciously despicable and menacing as Frank Tassone that it will literally make your skin crawl. Academy Award-winner Allison Janney hitting another home run as Pam Gluckin. She is so arrogantly annoying that you have no empathy or sympathy for her plight of white privilege. Ray Romano is fantabulous as the School Board President who becomes frazzled to his wits end.


Cory Finley beautifully crafts a tale that weaves and bobs in such a way that you almost forget this was a true story. That opening shot of Tassone plucking nose hair, slicking that perfect hairdo and sucking back his charcoal smoothie perfectly sets up this man who is a total fraud in every way, but yet this is the one aspect of his life that he can control and has normalcy with. Equally impressive is using the holiday classic Blue Christmas to illustrate the pain for Pam and Frank during this ordeal. Frank gets a facelift and Pam is sitting void of any emotion while her family celebrates on Christmas Day. Pure genius.

The most shocking revelation comes during the end credits when the audience learns the school system was scammed out of more that 11.2 million dollars and that due to a New York State Pension mistake, Frank Tassone still receives more than 173,000 a year. Only in America.


Bad Education is an epic lesson in what happens when the community stops paying attention and gets swayed by smoke and mirrors. Your children and communities deserve better. Stay woke.

[jo]

A "B-" Rating --


freshfiction.tv/tiff-review-bad-education-hugh-jackman-shines-in-a-comedy-drama-that-should-have-hit-the-cinematic-books/?utm_source=sumome&utm_medium=twitter&utm_campaign=sumome_share


I wonder how much they drifted away from the original script. Here it mentions about how Tassone developed a relationship with a young man … but no mention that he was already in a long-term relationship with a much older man?

Jo

[jo]

Sorry, but I don't understand the point of this review --

nowtoronto.com/movies/tiff2019/tiff-review-bad-education-hugh-jackman/

It’s a role he wears well, but Bad Education doesn’t give him anywhere to take it.

Er… it is based on a real life story - they cannot change the facts simply to dramatize the story ( maybe give it a different ending?)! In real life, Frank Tassone has already been released from prison without having to serve his full sentence.

[hughmanity]

Here is a 5-STAR review


www.heyuguys.com/bad-education-review/

[hughmanity]

There's another very good review here.  You might have to scroll through some others


www.worldofreel.com/blog/2019/9/774xi9r948m4sd7ea85j9pzuemi81p

[jo]

Very perceptive and well-written! HeyUGuys is a film blog site.

HeyUGuys


Home Reviews Bad Education...

Bad Education Review
By Adam Solomons -
Sep 11, 2019
0
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If the films on this year’s broadly impressive Toronto line-up have had anything in common, it’s that they’re much better than they needed to be. Bad Education, the Thoroughbreds follow-up from young director Cory Finley, centred around one of America’s most costly school frauds, is the best example of that yet. Long Island public schools might not be conventional territory for talented sophomore directors, but Bad Education just so happens to be one of the best films of the year.
A more conventional choice for a Mike Nichols picture, or perhaps a directorial choice for Aaron Sorkin, Finley was an avant-garde choice to take on this Mike Makowsky script, and that’s apparent quite quickly. A career-best performance from Hugh Jackman, who dazzles as the protagonist and antagonist Dr Frank Tassone, alongside a highly coherent script and memorable performances from a stellar supporting cast mean Bad Education is one of the defining American films of 2019 and a new dark horse for major awards success.

Makowsky himself was around the suburban New York City school operation of the era he’s writing about (even meeting Tassone as a young student) and that also shows. He approaches the story with immense authenticity, a feature that Finley evidently pounces on in how he tells the remarkable story of America’s fraudster bureaucrats of the early 2000s. Alison Janney is striking as the business manager and partner in crime Pam Gluckin, once again consuming the role to the extent that you’d think it was written with her in mind.

Finley’s greatest success with Bad Education, aside from bringing a genuinely unorthodox visual style to a script that could be fumbled into something mediocre – think Jackman’s The Front Runner from last year at Tiff – is his fixation with telling a story of a time in history. The soundtrack is perfectly chosen, the setting in social history (without giving too much away) poignant and relevant without being overdone, and a culture of trust in authority led by indifference a well-transmitted one. One supporting character says of the crimes committed by those in power, “When things are going well, you don’t ask questions.” That’s a concept we might think somewhat foreign today, but one that – thanks to shrewd writing in particular – seemingly makes perfect sense in the context of a not-so-long-ago-but-now-scarcely-recognisable world.


Meanwhile, Jackman is unnervingly good as Tassone, a shoo-in for a career-best performance from the actor. He brings deception and sociopathy so compellingly to a character that seems to change in morality every 5 minutes – until we realise he’s been the same person all along. The notion of a stifled bureaucrat sick and tired of public service, now demanding a reward for years of underappreciated loyalty, is common in recent cinema but perhaps still under-utilised considering the world we live in today. As the polite ophthalmologist Judah Rosenthal declares in Crimes & Misdemeanors (1989), “What good is the law if it doesn’t do me justice?"



REVIEW OVERVIEW
Bad Education

SUMMARY
Cory Finley returns after an acclaimed debut to tell the story of one of America’s greatest public school corruption scandals, taking advantage of a sharp script and drawing out memorable performances from a stellar cast


5

OVERALL SCORE

[jo]

Sept 10, 2019 21:16:06 GMT -5 hughmanity said:

There's another very good review here.  You might have to scroll through some others


www.worldofreel.com/blog/2019/9/774xi9r948m4sd7ea85j9pzuemi81p

‘Bad Education’: Hugh Jackman Delivers his Best Performance in True Story of School Embezzlement Scandal — TIFF Review
September 9, 2019 Jordan Ruimy


Directed by Cory Finley (“Thoroughbreds”) from a screenplay written by Mike Makowsky, who was a student when the Roslyn School District drama occurred in the mid-aughts, “Bad Education” is a darkly hilarious take on the most egregious and lucrative financial crime in the history of the US school system.

Long Island school superintendent Frank Tassone (Hugh Jackman) dedicated his career to giving the Roslyn School District its prestige. With each passing year, Roslyn’s record number of graduating seniors were being accepted to the very best Ivy League colleges in the country. However, Frank has a very dark secret.

Immaculately groomed and tailored, with a wake-up morning routine that feels frighteningly similar to Patrick Bateman’s in “American Psycho,” Frank is always there for his students and teaching staff. Hell, even on the sidelines, he fervently tries to memorize each and every student’s name and their life’s ambitions. He never wants to lose touch of why he is there in the first place.

It wasn’t an adult or even the New York Times that ended up uncovering the criminal conspiracy Frank concocted with his “assistant superintendent for business” Pam Gluckin (Allison Janney) — no, it was actually student reporter Rachel (the excellent Geraldine Viswanathan), who decided to dig into the school’s expense reports to find out that there was an embezzlement scheme worth millions of dollars to expose. All of this happened under the clueless watch of school board president Bob Spicer (Ray Romano).


Much like he did with “Thoroughbreds,” Finley slowly eases us into the drama, taking his time, purely teasing the snowball effect to come. His direction here is controlled, assured and never in a rush. It’s more about the hidden truths behind the frames that matter to him (we all know these people are guilty, this is after all based on a true story), but the pleasures in “Bad Education,” if you want to call them that, come in the form of watching these greedy nitwits try to cover-up their own asses with lie after lie, cover-up after cover-up. It’s such outrageous behaviour that it becomes darkly comical and, yet, it actually happened.


Jackman and Janney are the perfect match to carry “Bad Education” forward, both delivering darkly comedic performances. In fact, this could very well be a career peak for Jackman, an Aussie actor who has had plenty of commercial hits in his career, but has not always had his talents taken seriously by critics. His Frank is a man who can be liable one second and repugnant the next.

The unadorned greed on display is nothing new for Finley, who tackled similar themes in his debut feature “Thoroughbreds”, but unlike that movie, the characters here feel richer and more humane. Count this as another taut, tense and terrific drama from Finley. He’s made another scathing indictment on the way money can corrupt and darken the soul.

[B/B+]

[jo]

From the Editor of RogerEbert.com --

[jo]

Brian Tallerico ranks the movies he has seen at TIFF --

He ranks BAD EDUCATION as # 9!


Here's the link to the Bad Education film on his site where responses are featured --


letterboxd.com/film/bad-education-2019/

[jo]

Three unknown reviewers bring down the overall rating at Rotten Tomatoes to 77% at the moment.

www.rottentomatoes.com/m/bad_education_2019

One even suggests strongly that Hugh Jackman is very much miscast in the role

And another thinks he is not given much to chew on


This supposed democratization of coverage by Rotten Tomatoes may boomerang after all! If the veteran and well-known top critics are practically universal in their favorable judgment of the film and the leads, these type of reviews become suspect. I may be biased - but I wonder if these are just looking for click-baits or just lack the sophistication in taste of the more well-honed critiques??

Jo

[luzie]

Sept 11, 2019 3:25:08 GMT -5 jo said:

Three unknown reviewers bring down the overall rating at Rotten Tomatoes to 77% at the moment.

www.rottentomatoes.com/m/bad_education_2019

One even suggests strongly that Hugh Jackman is very much miscast in the role

And another thinks he is not given much to chew on


This supposed democratization of coverage by Rotten Tomatoes may boomerang after all! If the veteran and well-known top critics are practically universal in their favorable judgment of the film and the leads, these type of reviews become suspect. I may be biased - but I wonder if these are just looking for click-baits or just lack the sophistication in taste of the more well-honed critiques??

Jo

I don't read this garbage, but I suppose they belong to the group of younger uber-cool, arrogant, self-important (wannabe) critics on Twitter, who usually try to outdo themselves with snarky comments about actors and movies that don't belong to their darlings. They usually only accept their few favorites and are too simple-minded to recognize good performances by other actors, who don't belong to their favored group of actors. For instance, they hated Greatest Showman and tried to ruin the movie with their negative, often plain nasty postings. I've now seen a - of course - negative tweet by one of these  - sorry - a**holes, who obviously can't stand Hugh, that he (like in Front Runner) isn't the right actor for this kind of roles. Ahem, yep, whatever, idiot! 

Too bad, Rotten Tomatoes accept now too many online reviews by this kind of critics. 

[jo]

[jo]

‘Bad Education’ Review: Hugh Jackman and the Director of ‘Thoroughbreds’ Tell a Story of Small-Scale Corruption [TIFF 2019]
Posted on Wednesday, September 11th, 2019 by Meredith Borders


After the candy-colored bite of his feature debut Thoroughbreds, director Cory Finley handily earned audiences’ attention for whatever he did next. And he was gifted with a riveting story in a 2002 NY Mag article detailing a shocking Long Island public school embezzlement scandal. Yet while Bad Education makes for an interesting watch, it’s a little bit of a bummer that it’s missing the unique style and tone of Finley’s first film.

Still, it’s a hell of a yarn. Bad Education follows Hugh Jackman as treasured educator and popular superintendent Frank Tassone, who’s elevated his district’s test scores to fourth in the nation and seems to know the name and special interests of every student and faculty member in Roslyn ISD. (We later see him memorizing these details via flash card. That’s commitment!) We meet Tassone as he’s preparing to give a speech onstage to an adoring crowd, and the camera follows behind Jackman’s head as he wanders down the halls of Roslyn High School, backstage past a team of glad-handlers, and out into the glowing spotlight. The scene’s edited like a political drama, and with the crowd’s cheers and Jackman’s magnetism, it’s easy to forget that we’re following a small regional superintendent here. Such was the power of Frank Tassone, apparently.

After Frank’s business manager Pam Gluckin (Allison Janney) is caught spending district money on personal expenditures to the (seemingly rather conservative) tune of $250,000, Tassone scrambles to keep Roslyn’s name out of the mud while juggling a lot of personal conflict himself. But, as you might expect, stuff gets much twistier before Bad Education reaches its end, and an intrepid student journalist named Rachel (Blockers’ great Geraldine Viswanathan) does enough digging to discover that there’s something truly rotten going on in Long Island.

With a supporting cast that includes Ray Romano, Pat Healy and Hereditary’s Alex Wolff, Bad Education certainly isn’t slumming it in the performance department. Jackman and Janney in particular are phenomenal, especially in their shared scenes, two powerhouse actors equally matched in charisma and clout. And there are plenty of laughs and gasps in the film, which boasts a swift, engaging energy and lots of surprises. Finley does deal out some visual flourishes, with early-2000s beiges and blues and The Office­-like scenes of school district paraphernalia, menial task montages of envelope stuffing and billboard-stapling. We even get a bit of a message by the end, a nod to our cultural neglect of educators, though it feels a little tacked-on after all the criminal hijinks.

Ultimately, there’s just something missing from Bad Education, an edge or a snappiness or a style. The stakes are high, the story’s juicy, the performances are terrific, but the film never crosses over into must-watch territory, feeling a bit more like an elevated made-for-TV exposé than the sophomore effort of the filmmaker behind the deliciously wicked Thoroughbreds. It’s a fun watch and a good story, but it never again really reaches the heights of that opening scene following Frank’s ingress to the spotlight (even when the film flashes back to it in its closing moments). Bad Education makes for a good time, but it’s too bad it never becomes a great film.


/Film Rating: 6 out of 10