An Education (12A)

I've been to see it reading your review, I want my money back! very bad acting: the main character only switches between two expressions. very poor screenplay, cheesy, predictable, with unexplainable gaps: why would he ask to marry her? embarassing scenes, check the banana scene: the whole cinema was in astonished silence

there is an idea here which evolves to an intelligent parafdigm ,where jenny played by a 17 year old mulligan ,starsts to question the idea of formal education itself ,here she is challenging the shallow and hollow social and redundant traditions that insist on education being an obligatory essence for anyone who has the ability to think . At the same time we see the past consequences of what has happenned to the other so-called successful icons of educational triumphs played by a dowdy frustrated bored school headmistress in a brilliant cameo by emma thompson . THE ENCOUNTERS BETWEEN the teacher and pupil about her extra curricular romance and affair with an older good looking rich jewish man , and their french adventures in sixties paris are both charming and very intriguing as they raise some relevant questions about what is happiness and what is pseudo -satisfaction . the scenes where jenny challenges her peers -parents and teachers are zealously executed with a pomposity which is commendable and convincing simultaneously . Jenny is happy with her illicit lover who drives a posh bristol and takes her away from her twickenham suburbia to the wonders of saint germaine with the eclectic FRENCH music ,CAFES,CUISINE and movies to tempt her . Yet the discovery of her ultimate betrayal by Skarsgard ,her tender and conscientious lover brings this lovely gallic liaision to a halt and brings us full circle into the frustrated world of reality but as for the movie it delivers and mulligan as jenny is a contemporary brilliant talent who reminds one of katherine hepburn in her forties classics where the project was based upon the strong shoulders of an eccentric talent and an innovatively written script -a definitely entertaining and provoking movie which takes a very wicked tongue in cheek view of the english education system and the satirical remarks about OXFORD ,JEWS AND LATIN itself are hiariously divine yet very subtle where no one is forcing anything down your throat in the name of so-called romcom . intelligent cinema and art too with mellow entertainment like summer rain with a tongue in cheek ending which is priceless .

I could see this was a well produced and acted film, but I didn't enjoy the story.

I loved this film, for all it's small faults, as it speaks to life moments of school, innocence, love, parenthood and experience. A film without 3D, CGI or big budget stars, but it does have everything else for a great night out at the flicks. Sit back, think about yourself as a 16yo, your Mum & Dad, school and your first love. What could be better?

thank you for one of the few less than golden reviews of this. i thought it was so misguided. sure, there were a couple of wonderful scenes, but the entire film was phony, scary, and frothy. it had to be saved by swelling strings in the soundtrack, not a good sign. in the end, a very slight picture -- maybe a good lark if it was truly told -- but in its bombastic form, it rang false.