Forget the Easter Bunny, this paschal it’s the penguin bringing the fun.
The flightless with flippers offers a feelgood fling at the flicks in THE PENGUIN LESSONS, a poignant recent history memoir set in Argentina.
The film follows a disillusioned and cynical Englishman, Tom Michell who accepts a job at a prestigious Argentine boarding school in 1976. Expecting an easy ride, he discovers a divided nation and a class of unruly students. But when he rescues a penguin from an oil-slicked beach, an unexpected bond forms, a bond with a bird, one that will transform his life in ways he never imagined.
With Steve Coogan in the role, Tom’s grumpiness and cynicism maintains a sense of levity that makes him enjoyable and entertaining to watch. As his character forms an emotional bond with the penguin, Juan Salvador, named after Jonathan Livingstone Seagull, he swings and see-saws between heartbreak and humour.
Working with Jonathan Pryce, their natural instinct for balancing humour and gravitas make for a high wire act. Pryce plays the school’s headmaster, Tim Buckle, nicknamed Timbuck by staff and students, leading to his wife being known as Timbuktu.
Also memorable is Bjorn Gustafsson as Tom’s needy, nerdy colleague, maths and science teacher, Tapio, with lots of lost in translation comedy ripe for the picking.
And Vivian El Jaber, as the formidable Maria, fierce matriarch of a family torn apart by the military junta, a lioness of loyalty and courage, teaching the teachers a thing or two about moral fortitude.
THE PENGUIN LESSONS, like Tom’s English syllabus, is awash with metaphor, but also uncomfortably real in recreating the mood and authentic nuance of 1970s Argentina.
Director Peter Cattaneo, Oscar nominated for The Full Monty, helms THE PENGUIN LESSONS with a perfect pitch of pathos and pithy humour.
A finely sculptured script by Jeff Pope, Oscar nominated for a previous Steve Coogan starrer, Philomena, is a gleeful, pertinent and powerful adaptation of Tom Michell’s memoir.
