Netflix’s “The Kindergarten Teacher” is an unnerving, engrossing drama
Writer/director Sara Colangelo’s The Kindergarten Teacher is a beguiling film. The remake of Israeli writer/director Nadav Lapid’s 2014 film of the same name starts as a fairly benign drama about a teacher living a frustrated life and gives way to a potent tale of obsession and the cost of greatness. Colangelo’s storytelling is deft enough that I didn’t realize I was being lured in until it was too late.
The Kindergarten Teacher follows Lisa Spinelli (Maggie Gyllenhaal), a public school teacher who seems to love her job, takes a continuing education course on poetry, and goes home to a loving husband and two teenagers. It’s the kind of life that seems practical only in the movies. But there are cracks in the façade, visible right off the bat: Lisa’s poetry is mediocre at best, she’s bor...