Radical review – Mexico’s heartwarming answer to Dead Poets Society makes the grade

Based on the true story of an inspiring teacher arriving in an impoverished school, this bullies you into uplift but succeeds thanks to its top quality cast

The expression “feelgood” is usually just an indicator of cheerful and positive content, but don’t forget it also works as an imperative. As in, you better feel good about this movie or its admirers will get very cross and maybe call you names. Such may well be the case with this Mexican comedy-drama about an unorthodox schoolteacher (winningly played by Eugenio Derbez); it is a film that a certain constituency of viewers is going love so passionately that woe betide any who might suggest that it is profoundly manipulative and unabashedly sentimental.

That said, there’s no gainsaying the skills of director Christopher Zalla and the cast, which is why, by the end, Radical earns the tears of bittersweet joy it yanks out from even the grouchiest of grouches. Zalla co-wrote the script with Laura Guadalupe, working from a 2013 Wired article by journalist Joshua Davis about a real-life teacher and his students called A Radical Way of Unleashing a Generation of Geniuses.

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