''This Teacher'' is a 2018 film directed by

Mark Jackson Mark A. Jackson (born April 1, 1965) is an American former professional basketball player. A point guard from St. John's University, he played for the New York Knicks, Los Angeles Clippers, Indiana Pacers, Denver Nuggets, Toronto Raptors, Utah ...

and distributed by

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. The film premiered at the 2018

LA Film Festival The LA Film Festival was an annual film festival that was held in Los Angeles, California, and usually took place in June. It showcased independent, international, feature, documentary and short films, as well as web series, music videos, episod ...

, where it won the U.S. Fiction Award. It also was the closing night film of the 2019

Slamdance Film Festival The Slamdance Film Festival is an annual film festival focused on emerging artists. The annual week-long festival takes place in Park City, Utah, in late January and is the main event organized by the year-round Slamdance organization, which als ...

Plot

A French Muslim woman (

Hafsia Herzi Hafsia Herzi (born 25 January 1987) is a French actress and film director. She is best known for her debut role in the award-winning Franco-Tunisian feature '' The Secret of the Grain'' for which she won the award for most promising actress at the ...

) travels to

New York City New York, often called New York City or NYC, is the List of United States cities by population, most populous city in the United States. With a 2020 population of 8,804,190 distributed over , New York City is also the L ...

from the rough neighborhoods outside of

Paris Paris () is the capital and most populous city of France, with an estimated population of 2,165,423 residents in 2019 in an area of more than 105 km² (41 sq mi), making it the 30th most densely populated city in the world in 2020. S ...

to visit her childhood best friend Zahra ( Sarah Kazemy). Hafsia finds that Zahra was not the girl she knew growing up in Paris. She now goes by Sarah and has completely assimilated into Western culture. Sarah explains to her much older boyfriend ( Gabe Fazio) that Hafsia stinks and she doesn't want her to stay there anymore, which Hafsia overhears. Hafsia steals Sarah's credit card and identity, then disappears to a remote cabin upstate. Deep in the woods and alone for the first time in her life, she experiences a divine revelation. Sarah arrives and tries to convince Hafsia to return with her, which she refuses. An animal breaks into Hafsia's cabin and steals all the food. Initially a couple, teacher Rose (

Lucy Walters ''Power'' is an American crime drama television series created and produced by Courtney A. Kemp in collaboration with Curtis "50 Cent" Jackson. It aired on the Starz network from June 7, 2014, to February 9, 2020. Upon release, ''Power'' gaine ...

) and policeman Darren (Kevin Kane), help her. But Hafsia begins to see intolerance and suspicion which reflects back to an Islamophobic America. This third act explores themes such as the inherent racism and naivety that comes along with being a white American, that most white Americans don't even know they have or the rampant Islamophobia that has overtaken most of the world, and the difficulties of being a Muslim, particularly a Muslim woman, in a post-911 world. Lorry Kikta. January 27, 2019
This Teacher

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Critical reception

The film received positive reviews from critics, the

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website

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reported that of critics have given the film a positive review based on reviews.

References

External links

* {{IMDb title, 8917930 2018 films 2010s English-language films American drama films 2010s American films