Greenes Please don't spend money on this.

Beystiman It's fun, it's light, [but] it has a hard time when its tries to get heavy.

Doomtomylo a film so unique, intoxicating and bizarre that it not only demands another viewing, but is also forgivable as a satirical comedy where the jokes eventually take the back seat.

Gary The movie's not perfect, but it sticks the landing of its message. It was engaging - thrilling at times - and I personally thought it was a great time.

writers_reign In some respects this is Etre et Avoir both urbanized and upgraded from ecole to lycee; at yet another remove it's a latter-day Blackboard Jungle inasmuch as both titles feature multi-racial inner city schools where the pupils are more or less killing time before becoming old enough to leave. Evan Hunter based his novel on his own experience as a teacher at a vocational school in New York but he stopped short there, unlike the author of Between The Walls who not only penned a semi-autobiographical novel but adapted it for the screen and then played the lead who is, of course, more or less himself. Strangely enough there is less violence here (2008) than there was in Blackboard Jungle in 1955 which could, of course, be taken as an encouraging sign.The kids and the teaching staff are also real and the twelve month rehearsal period results in a documentary which has been polished to fictional standards. Definitely worth a look.

maryartwizard When you think about it, a movie that had obtained the Palme d'Or award would make you think for a moment that what you're about to watch is absolutely amazing. Unbelievably, this isn't true for this movie! A show about school that's centered on a teacher and his students… along with the almost supernatural amount of patience the teacher has with his rowdy students makes up what you're currently interested in watching.Entre Les Murs, other known as The Class, is a dramatic film made in 2008 that was created to express what the school life of some teachers in the outskirts of Paris would look like during the year, and how the students might react to them. Starring François Bégaudeau, the author of the book that inspired this story, we look into the life of a struggling French teacher as he goes through the twists and turns of a school year. Through the director, Laurent Cantet, and the very teachers and middle school students in the school where the story takes place, you will glimpse into the chaos that goes on in order to keep a class in check as well as trying to motivate them to do their best. Most of this film takes place in a plain, ordinary classroom: M. Marin's French class. M. Marin, the main character of this story, is an abnormally patient man that tries to reason with his students and get to know them instead of punishing them for their constant rude behavior. This doesn't last very long, especially since the kids he teaches are a diverse group of troubled kids, including immigrants from China and Africa. Throughout this story, you'll get a feel of most of what goes on during a school year in France, including the parent-teacher conferences and teacher meetings involving the students. While watching, you will be most drawn to the heated interactions between M. Marin and his students, and how everything continues to spiral out of control all year long.A key point to mention in this film would have to be the lack of a developed plot. Everything piles on top of each other and seems to get nowhere throughout the entire year. Even the most interesting conflict of the story wasn't resolved in a proper way, so in a way everything revolves in a sort of circle, repeating it over and over. Another thing to mention would be the lack of music, that makes it more natural but also more painful to watch. There's no added suspense or feeling of chaos that there could have been through the power of music, leaving the silences to be awkward or to be filled with constant chatter.In my opinion, I would have like to have started watching it during the middle of the film. That's when the pace starts to pick up and things get more entertaining, if only a little bit. It's not a bad story, once you get past the fact there's no plot and it's just the same sequence happening over and over again, but other than that I'm surprised it even became a film in the first place. It makes one wonder what the director or producer was thinking when they came up with the idea of making this a movie based on its book. I would not recommend this for anyone who wasn't curious about what school is like in the outskirts of towns or cities in France. So, naturally I would expect 16 year olds and above—either students or teachers themselves—to watch and even remotely enjoy this film, since they might be curious about what the lives of people in schools from other countries might look like. They would be able to make any connections between the schools in their home country and the school in France that no one else could, meaning they would get the plot-less chaos that goes on in Entre Les Murs more than any other group of people. Senseless and unable to follow at times, students and teachers have to live that sort of torment every day, which may in itself be the reason for wanting to watch this film.

hharrod5798 ​If you think this is going to be some fantastic movie because it won the Palme d'Or, you're absolutely wrong! At first I thought this movie was very similar to Daddy Daycare, I now feel as if this would be an insult to it. That movie is a film with terrible camera work, bad acting, and a repetitive plot. It's the type of movie I would want to sit in the back row of the theatre so you could chatter with your friends instead. Released in 2008, "Entre le Murs" received the Palme d'Or award which is the highest prize awarded at the Cannes Film Festival and is presented to the director of the best feature film of the official competition. This movie was produced from the book Entre les Murs which was written by the lead actor François Bégaudeau or known in the film as Mr. Marin. This movie is about the conflict between a French teacher in the outskirts of Paris while he is trying to help his middle school students cooperate and learn their 8th grade French. During this movie you see the hardships a teacher in France faces on a daily basis. Mr. Marin maneuvers through nine months of recess, daily classes, parent-teacher conferences, fights, arguments, and council meetings with a plethora of diverse people. While he may be a patient and caring man you can often tell that Mr. Marin gets overwhelmed and tries to instigate tough situations. His class consists of a diverse group of 13-14 year olds; Wei from China, Souleyman from Africa, Esmeralda being a rather chunky and brace faced girl and Louise being a skinny, pale and naughty girl. ​I feel as if the main theme or key point of the movie is "How do you do deal with discipline?" Mr. Marin's class is constantly out of whack; from name calling, to physical contact, and students refusing to do their work. At the council meeting a teacher suggests a point system with rewards. While some teachers thought it was necessary to discipline children for bad behavior and not reward them for good behavior, others thought saying "Good job" or just giving children the education was enough of an award. This is an example of exactly how students and teachers feel at WHHS, none of us can agree on a halfway decent disciplinary system. The tension gets so bad in Marin's class that he has to send a student out several times. ​All in all, I can say that "Entre les Murs" is a terrible movie. During the first half, you're so miserable sitting there watching the same thing over and over again, you feel as if you are part of the class and in all of the craziness. There were absolutely no music or sound effects which is crucial in an interesting and entertaining movie. I would not recommend this movie to ANYONE; no one should waste their time on this!

paul2001sw-1 Laurent Cantet's absorbing film, 'The Class', tells an apparently true tale of the life in the year of a French schoolteacher. It's a portrait of an incredibly dedicated and imaginative man, working to engage with a mostly first or second generation immigrant class whose members are not bad children but who fundamentally have, in many cases, little idea of why they are in school in the first place. Teacher and script-writer François Bégaudeau plays the lead role; the self-portrait is flattering, but not overly so, the story of his efforts to cross the cultural chasm are fascinating and convincing, and the fruits of his labours real yet frustratingly small. One to watch if you've ever been tempted to utter the old cliché that "those who can't, teach".