Direction: Cory Finley
Country: USA
Cory Finley’s follow up to his well-received debut feature, Thoroughbreds (2017), is this crackling fact-based drama, Bad Education, in which he further explores directorial capabilities by giving the film an adequate pace, structural organization and gradual emotional intensification.
The film builds its case around the painful truth of embezzlement - the biggest in the American history - occurred in Long Island’s Roslyn High School in 2004, when assistant superintendent Pam Gluckin (the always infectious Allison Janney) and the fake-to-the-bone district superintendent Frank Tassone (a charismatic Hugh Jackson proving he can be more than just Wolverine) have stolen more than 11 million dollars from the district’s public funds.
Although with small branches in the accuracy, the script by Mike Makowsky was found pretty effective, developing with a fine perspective and giving the audiences an inside look on how hedonists operate and think, just as if they were above any regulation or authority.
Jackson gives a tour-de-force performance, portraying Tassone with incredible alertness and spontaneity. His deceptively practical character fully emerges as his luxurious double life is gradually exposed and his name implicated in first class flights, expensive hotel bookings, fancy suits, facial plastic surgeries, exotic vacations for two, and more, all with stolen money from the school.
The lack of integrity and the disrespect shown by these spenders are outraging, and Finley was able to convey that aspect with lucidity and competence.
