The Ron Clark Story

Ron Clark, a successful teacher in a small North Carolina town, quits, moves to New York and asks for one of the hardest classes in Harlem. The class shuts him out from the first day. The film is not interested in the teacher's self-sacrifice. It is interested in whether the method works: Clark writes classroom rules, builds a reward system and raps if that is what it takes to hold attention. The film makes this charming while still accounting for the children's circumstances at home. The form is television scale: classroom scenes, short flashbacks, direct emotional accents. The story is true: Ron Clark did teach in Harlem, became known through the book he wrote, and later founded his own school in Atlanta. Randa Haines directed. Matthew Perry plays Clark in one of his better-known departures from comedy, and was nominated for an Emmy for it. Who it is for: viewers who like teacher films and true-story television drama. Who it is not for: anyone uneasy with the white saviour narrative. The film leaves little room for the class's own voice and rests its solution on one person's effort.