“Submission,” a tale of a teacher-student relationship gone wrong, plods along predictably for about 45 minutes, but once the laborious set-up is out of the way, the film perks up, thanks mainly to a cast that is better than the material.
Ted Swenson (Stanley Tucci, solid) is a creative writing professor at a Vermont college. Despite a happy marriage, he is bored with his life and even more with his students, until the talented and flirtatious Angela (Addison Timlin, decent) shows up in class and wows him with her erotic prose.
Writer-director Richard Levine spends too much time establishing the obvious, so we wait around for Ted and Angela’s inevitable extracurricular activities. Neither character is particularly interesting, but Tucci and Timlin make them watchable.
The most interesting thing about “Submission” is the collateral damage of the relationship, as Ted must face the repercussions of his actions, which may or may not be as bad as the college disciplinary committee thinks.
Yet the film squanders some dramatic possibilities and has a truncated sense about it. We are left to wonder whether something went wrong with the script, or in the editing room, or both. “Submission” is not a bad film — it just feels like an early draft.
MOVIE REVIEW
“Submission”
Grade: C
Starring Stanley Tucci, Addison Timlin and Kyra Sedgwick. Directed by Richard Levine.
Not rated. Check listings for theaters. 1 hour, 46 minutes.
Bottom line: A slow predictable film that needs a bit of work
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