The Lesson – for which Kristina Grozeva and Petar Valchanov won the New Directors Award at San Sebastian in 2014 – is a hard-hitting social realist drama following the fortunes of a woman under duress.
Margita Gosheva is excellent as the initially uncompromising Nadezhda, a teacher in a small Bulgarian town who’s troubled by petty thefts in her classroom and is trying her best to uncover the culprit.
But financial woes are stacking up in her own life, after her unemployed and hapless husband spends money they don’t have, and she must utilise all her energy to ensure that their house isn’t repossessed.
Facing the problem largely alone, as her desperation escalates Nadezhda is forced to lower her rigorous moral standards in order to come up with the cash.
Reminiscent of the Dardennes’ brothers recent Two Days, One Night, this is a tough and unsentimental drama; a tale of the near-impossibility of behaving well when in dire financial straits, and a parable for the contemporary economic woes faced by much of the EU.
