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Awix (3310 KP) rated Educating Rita (1983) in Movies

May 18, 2020

Educating Rita (1983)

1983 | Comedy, Drama

9.0

(1 Ratings)

Movie Rating

Julie Walters makes a memorable movie debut in this surprisingly moving comedy-drama. Caine plays Frank, a boozy lecturer and (he thinks) awful teacher who is slightly baffled by Rita, a bright but uncultured new student who wanders into his office one day. She wants more out of life, and thinks studying literature will help her get it. But is she right? And what can they learn from one another?

Very well written and extremely well-played, the heart of the film is the relationship between the two of them and how it slowly changes over time: not really a romance or a friendship, but something still powerful and very affecting. As well as the shifting dynamic between them, the film is also about many other things: snobbery, both standard and reversed; class; the purpose of education; what it means to be a teacher, and much more. The origins of the piece as a two-handed stage play are fairly obvious, and funding issues mean it is set (distractingly) somewhere in the little-known Liverpool-Oxbridge-Dublin region, but the story and performances are strong enough for these not to be serious issues. A very fine film.