‘Bad Teacher’ fails to make the grade
‘Bad Teacher’ (Cert 15, 93 mins, Comedy/Romance)
Elizabeth Halsey (Cameron Diaz) is a booze-addled wreck, draining her drippy, rich boyfriend dry until he finally musters the courage to dump her... with mummy beside him for support.
So she reluctantly returns to her teaching job at a high school run by Principal Wally Snur (John Michael Higgins).
Rebuffing the advances of oafish PE master Russell Gettis (Jason Segel), Elizabeth sets her sights on handsome new teacher Scott Delacorte (Justin Timberlake). Unthinkably, Scott resists her flirtations and begins a tender romance with the school’s prim and proper teacher, Amy Squirrel (Lucy Punch).
Elizabeth is used to getting her own way and she declares war on Amy, by fair means or – preferably – foul.
Bad Teacher is a potty-mouthed comedy, underpinned by a script with too few laughs and a central heroine whose selfish escapades leave us without a single drop of sympathy.
Diaz is a gifted comic actress but she is on a hiding to nothing here, never quite hitting the target with the lacklustre one-liners.
Punch is more appealing as the victim of Elizabeth’s cruelty, while Segel and Timberlake vie for their leading lady’s affections, the latter poking fun at his Trousersnake tag in the film’s obligatory gross-out moment.
Gene Stupnitsky and Lee Eisenberg’s gleefully un-PC script is a clutter of mean-spirited barbs and innuendo that leave us to wonder if we’re in detention and Jake Kasdan’s film is the punishment.
Rating: 2/5.
