Bad Genius

Lynn is a very good student. She lives with her father and money is tight; she got into the school on a scholarship and it does not cover everything. She helps a wealthy classmate and is paid for it. Then she turns it into a system: she passes answers by signals during exams and the number of clients grows. As the work grows so does the target: the international test taken for university entry. Because of the time difference the test is held first in another country, and the plan rests on that. J.C. Lee directs. Callina Liang plays Lynn and Benedict Wong her father. The film is a remake of a Thai production from 2017; the original was a large success in Asia and the same story was adapted in several countries. The tension is built in the shape of a heist film; the exam hall is used like the site of a plan and it proceeds on timing. The matter it treats is the cost of education; the narrative builds cheating not as a moral question but as a question of class. The American version adds immigration and the scholarship system to the narrative, which is its difference from the original. The exam scenes are cut fast and the sound design carries the tension. Its limit is comparison; there is little new for anyone who has seen the original. Who it is for: viewers who like youth thrillers and films about a plan. Who it is not for: the plot is familiar, the characters thinly written, and the ending too tidy.