Bearing the Weight of Education – Without Air Review

“Without Air” is one of those movies which just work better if you have had some experience dealing with some of the situations depicted in the film. It is no fancy American high school drama, it is a story based on true events that actually happened and, as a person who had the “pleasure” of experiencing the wonders of going to high school in a former Eastern Bloc country, I have to say that the movie delivers on realism rather well.

Because of this, Katalin Moldovai’s film will surely polarize opinion when released to the general public in Hungary. In “Without Air”, set in a Hungarian-speaking part of Romania, literature teacher Ana Bauch (played by Ágnes Krasznahorkai) gets dragged into a Kafkaesque sequence of events with ethics committees and pointless investigations after she recommends the movie “Total Eclipse” to her class as an option to learn more about French poet Arthur Rimbaud. While it looks like a harmless B-movie on the outside, featuring a young Leonardo DiCaprio, the father of Viktor (Soma Sándor) happens to walk into his son’s room just as Rimbaud and Paul Verlaine give each other a kiss. This prompts the not very intelligent but very well-connected parent into sending a letter to the school’s principal, Eva (Tünde Skovrán), complaining about how “movies like this“ have a bad effect on 17-year-old kids. This is followed by an ethical investigation, and Ana receives a formal warning, which barely has any consequences. End of story? Hell no.

Ana decides to file an appeal, which causes even more thorough investigations to start, handled by a mix of some sympathetic and some needlessly hardass teachers who probably started teaching just around 30 B.C. Meanwhile, Ana’s life slowly starts crumbling down, as her boyfriend (Barna Bokor) has barely any time for their online videocalls as he has to help patients as a doctor who recently moved abroad. He begs her to finally join him, but she couldn’t, as that would mean leaving her sickly old mother (who has absolutely no intention getting into a retirement home) behind. Meanwhile, the students also suffer. None of them found the film offensive, and yet the school’s committee insists on questioning them again and again. And it goes on and on like this…

The thing this 105-minute film does exceptionally is setting the mood. Every single teacher looks slightly dead inside, the school facilities look dated, and the school district hearings are held in a huge hall by people who have absolutely no clue about what they are doing, even though they were probably appointed some 35 years ago, and stayed in place despite the fall of communism. The people seeing the press coverage are divided, parents are outraged either about the showing of the movie or about the fact that their kids are pestered with useless questionaires relating to the investigation. Also, generally, the way the whole incident is overblown is ridiculous, which is exactly how the director wants us to feel. Admittedly without statistical backing, I am fairly sure that the vast majority of today’s 17-year-olds see more “outrageous” things on the internet on a daily basis.

There are some gems in the conversations among Ana and the other teachers. One of her colleagues mention how life will go on, and kids will just “pass the exam and move abroad anyway”. Another one of her colleagues, who is actually rather friendly to Ana, immediately mentions how they should meet in the school’s backyard instead after the principal sees them conversing as she walks to her cozy little BMW.

In terms of individual performances, Krasznahorkai is exceptional as Ana Bauch, depicting a teacher on the edge of burning out, yet still holding on for the kids, and actually believing in her ideals. The chemistry between her and Tünde Skovrán’s Eva is also really interesting as their relationship deteriorates from cordial to downright hostile, especially thanks to some of the sneakier moves by the principal.

The film is not for everyone though. Those looking for loud drama and huge plot twists probably won’t be satisfied, but the lovers of slower movies with gradually building tension will certainly find “Without Air” an interesting view. Also, as I mentioned, I am fairly certain that in order to get some of the more subtle hints in the movie, one needs some experience in a post-communist country.

It is no wonder “Without Air” managed a triple win at the Warsaw Film Festival. While it is not a film everyone will enjoy, it does achieve its aim, and gets its message about today’s education system through eloquently, in a slow-burn fashion.

Cover credit: IMDb