| To Sir, With Love | |
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VHS cover |
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| Directed by | James Clavell |
| Produced by | James Clavell |
| Written by | James Clavell |
| Based on | To Sir, with Love by E. R. Braithwaite |
| Starring | Sidney Poitier Christian Roberts Judy Geeson Suzy Kendall Lulu |
| Music by | Ron Grainer |
| Cinematography | Paul Beeson |
| Editing by | Peter Thornton |
| Distributed by | Columbia Pictures |
| Release date(s) | 14 June 1987 (US) 29 October 1967 (UK) |
| Running time | 105 min |
| Country | United Kingdom |
| Language | English |
| Budget | $640,000 (est.) |
| Box office | $19,100,000 |
To Sir, With Love is a 1967 British drama film starring Sidney Poitier that deals with social and racial issues in an inner city school. James Clavell both directed and wrote the film's screenplay, based on the semi-autobiographical novel To Sir, with Love by E. R. Braithwaite.
The film's title song "To Sir With Love", sung by Lulu, reached number one on the U.S. pop charts, and ultimately was Billboard magazine's #1 pop single for the year, 1967. The movie ranked number 27 on Entertainment Weekly's list of the 50 Best High School Movies.
A television film sequel, To Sir, with Love II, was released in 1996.
Contents |
Mark Thackeray (Sidney Poitier) is beginning his teaching position at the North Quay Secondary School in the tough East End of London. He comes from British Guiana via California, and holds a degree in Communication Engineering. He has applied unsuccessfully for numerous engineering positions throughout England, and is taking this job to make ends meet while he continues to look for a job in his field.
The staff of North Quay offer varying opinions about students at the school. Mr. Weston (Geoffrey Bayldon) is openly contemptuous of them. Gillian Blanchard (Suzy Kendall) is admittedly afraid of them. Deputy Head Evans (Faith Brook) and Clinty Clintridge (Patricia Routledge) warn that while they are mostly good kids, they come from rough homes, and excel at riding roughshod over teachers. Headmaster Florian (Edward Burnham) explains that they are principally rejected from other schools. The audience is informed that their antics drove their last teacher to resign.
The students more than live up to their reputation. Led by Bert Denham (Christian Roberts) and Pamela Dare (Judy Geeson), the pupils are an unruly mob who view the classroom as their domain, not Thackeray's. A battle of wills ensues. Thackeray tries to establish order and the students resist his authority. As the students' antics progress from simple disruptive behaviour to embarrassing Thackeray by rigging his desk to collapse, his calm manner and resistance to being baited earn him some early respect with the class.
One day, a water balloon dropped from the window of his classroom narrowly misses Thackeray as he enters the building. In the classroom, he discovers something, presumably a sanitary pad, burning in the grate. He finally loses his composure, ordering the boys out of the classroom and berating the girls for their disgusting behaviour. Fearing he's made a fool of himself, he retreats to the staff room, expressing his dismay that he has been so easily manipulated by 'these kids,' then realises that treating them as kids is precisely the mistake he has been making with his students.
Thackeray returns to the classroom to outline a new approach and set some ground rules. The students will be leaving school soon, and therefore, he will treat them as adults and allow them to decide what topics they wish to study. He emphasizes this by throwing out all the textbooks and insisting that they will be expected to use proper forms of address (both toward him and amongst themselves) and to take pride in their appearance and deportment.
Denham continues to bait Thackeray but the rest of the class is won over. Although Thackeray's humble background is quite like their own, he's made a success of himself by cultivating his language and dress. The students are especially excited when he suggests that they should go on a class outing to the museum. The Headmaster approves the outing and Thackeray arrives on the morning of the trip to find a classroom of well-dressed, well-scrubbed students. As they leave he discovers that Tich (Gareth Robinson) is missing. They run into him by the bus and he throws out a cockney phrase asking them to wait a minute. Confused, Thackeray is given an impromptu lesson in 'Cockney Rhyming Slang' The outing is depicted as a photo montage of happy, wondrous students having the time of their lives. During the bus ride back to school, some of the girls idly speculate whether a personal relationship is budding between Thackeray and Gillian (who volunteered to accompany the group on the outing). But as their classroom environment approaches perfection, the outside world infringes, threatening to derail everything.
Their gym teacher, Mr. Bell (Dervis Ward), insists that 'Fats' Buckley (Roger Shepherd) participate in vaulting, despite his classmates' objections. The vault collapses under Buckley's weight and Potter (Chris Chittell) threatens Bell with the vault's broken leg. Thackeray is called to defuse the situation. In class, he demands that Potter should apologise for the incident, pointing out that if a knife or gun was available, things could have been much worse. Potter only agrees when Denham points out that Bell will press criminal charges if he doesn't apologise and that Potter will need Thackeray's recommendation for a job interview when school ends.
Thackeray has obviously lost the support of much of the class, especially the boys. They refuse to invite him to the class dance. When Seales' (Anthony Villaroel, the only black student in the class) mother dies, the class takes up a collection for a wreath but refuses to accept Thackeray's donation. The girls still seem to respect him, though. It is clear they feel uncomfortable delivering the wreath personally, due to racial issues but Pamela offers to take the flowers to the funeral over Denham's objection.
Thackeray finally receives a job offer while the Headmaster advises him that he feels 'the adult approach' has failed, that future class outings are cancelled, and that Thackeray will take over the boys' gym classes.
Pamela's mother comes to speak with Thackeray, concerned that Pamela is staying out late and might be getting into trouble. When Thackeray speaks with Pamela, she insists her mother does not care about her and that the presence of male callers at her mother's house excuses her actions. Thackeray maintains that Pamela still owes her mother respect, and disillusioned, she angrily accuses him of being 'just one of them'. She also refuses to take the flowers to the funeral. Thackeray's split with the class is complete - now they all hate him. Due to this, Thackeray considers resigning, but decides to keep going.
In gym, Denham insists they have a boxing class, beginning with him and Thackeray. Thackeray reluctantly agrees. Despite getting in some early blows, Denham is disabled when Thackeray knocks the wind out of him. Thackeray draws back his fist to hit Denham again but gains control of his emotions and declares the fight over. Afterward, Denham waits to speak with Thackeray in the stairwell. Although Denham admits he was trying to hurt Thackeray in order to convince him to resign from teaching, Denham is surprised that Thackeray did not capitalize on his advantage. For his part, Thackeray admits that he lost his temper but that he understands the apparent unfairness of some of his decisions. Thackary then offers Denham a position as a boxing instructor to the younger students next term. Surprised that he would be regarded as a potential teacher, Denham nevertheless promises to consider it. Denham is clearly impressed, and expresses his admiration for Thackeray to his fellow students. By winning Denham over, Thackeray wins back the respect of the rest of the class. He is invited to the class dance and when he shows up at the Seales funeral, he is greeted by the entire class, who have come to pay their respects.
At the dance, all has clearly worked out well. Weston admits that Thackeray is really quite a gifted teacher and should reconsider leaving. The Deputy Head concurs, suggesting that he should go to another school, if nothing else. Barbara Pegg (Lulu) announces a "ladies' choice" dance and Pamela singles out Thackeray as her partner. Denham announces that the class has 'something special' for Thackeray and Miss Wong presents him with a pewter mug while Lulu sings the movie theme. Thackeray is too moved for words and retires to his classroom.
Two young students storm into the classroom, mocking his gift and joking that they'll be in his class next year. When they leave, Thackeray rises, ponders his situation, then retrieves the job offer from his pocket and rips it.
The film is in a now well-established genre in which an idealistic teacher is confronted with a class of cynical teenagers, disengaged from conventional schooling. The first such film was Blackboard Jungle in 1955 — in which, incidentally, Poitier played a disruptive pupil. This film sets Poitier, a black teacher, in a predominantly white London school. The film touches on racial issues but concentrates on the themes of teenage angst and inspirational leadership. The film portrays a sanitised and fictional Swinging London. Issues of sexual infatuation between a pupil and teacher were rather less sensitive in the 1960s than they were to become in the 21st century, as evidenced by the rather provocative tagline, "A story as fresh as the girls in their miniskirts."
Subsequent films that explored the inspirational teacher drama theme include: Why Shoot the Teacher?, The Principal, Conrack, Stand and Deliver, Lean on Me, Teachers, Dead Poets Society, Dangerous Minds, Mr. Holland's Opus, Music of the Heart, Take the Lead and Freedom Writers, The Ron Clark Story as well as Sister Act 2.
The film was well received when released. The film had grossed $19.1 million in the box office domestically on a $640,000 budget.[1]