Teacher Saves the Day: A DVD Review of "Freedom Writers"

A New DVD that Covers Little in the Way of New Ground

The ever-growing list of movies about a teacher or coach or guy-walking-in-from-the-street and into some kind of school in a poor neighborhood to make the kids believe in themselves and save the world continues to grow. It's an interesting sub-genre of movies that go back at least until the 50s, but probably earlier. "Blackboard Jungle" had a similar plot and helped start rock and roll. Sidney Poitier was transplanted to England in "To Sir, with Love" after having starred previously as a student in "Blackboard Jungle."

Since that time the entire genre has been visited and revisited. You can almost always recite the plot. The new teacher will be greeted with scorn by the existing teachers. The students will ignore that particular teacher. The teacher will be plucky and determined and manage to overcome the initial fears and gain the student's trust. Eventually the students will come to love this teacher and improve which will breed distrust and suspicion among the other teachers who do not want the status quo to change. Somehow, usually after something that looks like a trial, that teacher will prevail. Music will swell and there will probably be some kind of message at the end that tells us how profoundly successful the teacher still is and her students have been.

Well, "Freedom Writers," a DVD soon-to-be released at your local DVD store, follows each and every one of those steps to the letter. This one stars Hillary Swank. She is entering a school in L.A. just after the riots from the whole Rodney King thing. The entire place is a mish-mosh of Asians who hate the Latinos who hate the African-Americans and all of them hate the few white students left and all of them are, somehow, in gangs. There is a shot that shows this courtyard outside the school and it is filled with so many students you would think it was an overhead shot for this year's Lollapalooza.