In a postmodern world, there is no such thing as originality. We, as a society, are stagnant, stuck in a perpetual reimagining of the same stories. “There are no new ideas,” charmingly snarls from the lips of revered writer J.M Sinclair (Richard E. Grant) as Alice Troughton’s The Lesson, a playful and sardonic take on authorship and the subsequent scarcity of originality, uses this to form its thematic backbone.
Aspiring writer and apparent savant Liam (Daryl McCormack) takes on a tutoring role helping young and spoiled literary scholar Bertie (Stephen McMillan) pass the Oxford English Literature Admissions Test. Liam, invited by Sinclair and wife Hélène (Julie Delpy) to stay with the family on their grand, isolated estate as a live-in tutor, is eager to impress. Liam’s own writings had not only been inspired by Sinclair’s, but his graduating thesis was based on his writings. But idolisation swiftly poisons the wellspring of originality as power dynamics shift and swirl like a rainbow on an oil slick in a thriller that acts more like a faded silhouette of the sexually charged thrillers that inspire it rather than a corporeal manifestation.
This review was first posted on July 9th 2023. Full review linked below.
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