Stevecorp Don't listen to the negative reviews

FirstWitch A movie that not only functions as a solid scarefest but a razor-sharp satire.

Arianna Moses Let me be very fair here, this is not the best movie in my opinion. But, this movie is fun, it has purpose and is very enjoyable to watch.

Geraldine The story, direction, characters, and writing/dialogue is akin to taking a tranquilizer shot to the neck, but everything else was so well done.

CrisPat The moment the teacher kidnaps her students and then gets into a hotchpotch of moral dilemmas which make her character ambivalent - obviously she had good intentions but goes the wrong way to achieve them, you would expect her to die in the end. It is disappointing to see that you are not disappointed - yes she dies.The whole film starts from a very strong and challenging premise - the difficult assimilation of the Muslim immigrants into the French society - and just builds towards the inexorable death of the heroine. It didn't grip me though, and I found the pace slow. In its quest for social exploration, it lost the elements of the thriller. And as a social drama, it had too much thriller recipe to allow for the proper exploration of any of the characters.It also doesn't have a credible thread. In a high school where students shout at and threaten the teacher, carry revolvers and film the rape of their colleague, you would expect the soft looking, elegantly dressed woman to give up her high ideals at the first bullying or beating. She is not congruent with anything around her. Mouss, the other pupils, the minister representative - they are all half-baked characters, you only wonder why do they do what they actually do. The good-cop policeman is probably the worst construed - we understand vaguely he's got some family troubles in the background, but we can't really understand what drives him. With his superior not objecting to what is presumably a clear violation of procedure, he goes in for a heart-to-heart talk with the armed terrorist, he keeps protecting the teacher despite pressure from everyone around him etc. His motives get too little air time to be credible.Yes, Adjani acts very solidly, the rest of the cast is on and off. But for a film to be enjoyable, it takes a lot more than that.

ghibliii Mediocre at best. Important social issues but a in predictable plot, cheesy and melodramatic, weak cast, poor directing, and, as a whole, a really disappointing cinematic experience.Once Isabelle Adjani might have been a star but here and now she is pathetic. Not only she is miscast -- looks way too luxurious and sophisticated for the social milieu and compared to the rest of the cast -- but, apparently, she had a lot of cosmetic work done and as a result her face now resemble an expressionless death mask. Not much of acting either. A parody of her former self.Need I say more....

nyc host A high school teacher loses it and ends up holding hostages half her class, turning the situation into a reflexive introspection on the various crisis of modern youths.Isabelle Adjani, very pretty in her white skirt and blazer, and rolled-up sleeve holding "caids" at gunpoint, is unpredictable and convincing - the rest of the cast, amateur or not, is very weak.The subject (education and equality) is strong, very relevant and more to-the-point than the very flat and bland take of the last Palmes d'Or "Entre les Murs".La Journée de la Jupe takes it to another level, more brutal, more real and less entertaining. Less humor and more critical analysis.The two weakness of the movie are the very feeble and bad acting on almost all the characters. And the overuse of Issues. During the hour and half, the movie feels obliged to tackle every single issues possible: from gang rape to condoms, from Islam to immigration, from respect to racism ... Too much. I was almost waiting to hear about Finance or the Ozone layer ....Interesting subject but awkward construction.

michel-verdier Adjani, as high school teacher, attempts to hold a class on a Moliere's play in the school's small theater. As usual, she receives continuous intimidation, pressures and insults from chauvinist pupils. Then a scrum between irresponsible pupils lead to a gun accidentally falling down at the foot of Sonia. Taking it, she wounds by accident one in the leg, and then initiating an hostage taking. Outside the school, police and political try to react to the situation. Inside the building, using the gun Sonia requires from his students her own vision and finally try to place them in front of their own contradictions : in a real secular society one religion should not be replaced by another one under the pretext of cultural exchanges and social improvements . This film points a finger at the whole confusion in today Western schooled society. This film presents a current and realistic situation!