'Bad Teacher' and classless film educators

Don't all raise your hands at once: If movie theaters were classrooms, who would be our favorite teachers? (Ooh! Ooh!) Sidney Poitier in "To Sir, With Love" (1967)? Edward James Olmos in "Stand and Deliver" (1987)? Bette Davis in "The Corn Is Green" (1945)? Robert Donat in "Goodbye, Mr. Chips" (1939)? Peter O'Toole in "Goodbye, Mr. Chips" (1969)? Roy Marsden in "Goodbye, Mr. Chips" (1984)? How about Martin Clunes in "Goodbye, Mr. Chips" (2002)? The list never ends. Neither does the nobility.

On the other hand . . . the unlikeliest candidate for Educator of the Year is shaping up to be Cameron Diaz in "Bad Teacher," which arrives Friday and won't be winning any NEA Image Awards. Diaz's Elizabeth Halsey is interested in: 1) marrying rich and 2) getting a "boob job" (in the words of co-star Phyllis Smith). Miss Halsey's respect for her pupils is off the charts: "Always be honest with your students," she says. "If they suck, they should know."

Is the political landscape right for such a demonic take on education, given the ongoing debates about unions, tenure, charter schools and rubber rooms?

However . . . anyone who thinks bad teachers haven't gotten their share of screen time hasn't been paying proper attention. From Jim McAllister (Matthew Broderick) of "Election" (1999), who tries to keep Tracy Flick (Reese Witherspoon) from becoming class president, to the uninspiring, pot-smoking Professor Dave Jennings (Donald Sutherland) of 1978's "Animal House" ("Hey! This is my JOB . . . "), teachers on-screen have been tedious, odious and, now and then, felonious.

NOTES ON A SCANDAL (2006). Cate Blanchett is marvelous as Sheba Hart, a teacher who, in the course of being betrayed by her supposed friend and colleague Barbara Covett (Judi Dench), has a white-hot affair with a 15-year-old student.

HALF NELSON (2006). Ryan Gosling's teacher, Dan Dunne, is devoted and inspiring in this critically acclaimed Ryan Fleck-Anna Boden drama. He's also a drug addict.

SCHOOL OF ROCK (2003). "This is the best school I've ever teached in," Jack Black tells Joan Cusack in Richard Linklater's comedy about a washed-up rocker named Dewey Finn and the band he forms with his privileged private-school students. How someone like Dewey is so easily hired by such an elite school was, of course, one of the bigger jokes.

BLUE CAR (2002). In Karen Moncrieff's indie drama, David Strathairn plays an English teacher who becomes a comfort and father figure to a troubled young student (Anna Bruckner). And then has sex with her.

THE PIANO TEACHER (2001). A symphony of sexual repression. Isabelle Huppert's Erika Kohut is a piano professor at a Viennese conservatory who engages in voyeurism, self-mutilation and sadomasochism, becomes obsessed with a male student (Benoit Magimel) and ruins the musical career of a young woman she views as a rival, by hiding broken glass in the pocket of her coat. From the always cheery Michael Haneke.

KINDERGARTEN COP (1990). "It's not a toomah," but it is a pretty assaultive take on the teaching profession, with Arnold Schwarzenegger's undercover cop essentially becoming teacher of the year, with no training, education or reasonable command of English. He also shoots the place up and brings a rodent to school.

FERRIS BUELLER'S DAY OFF (1986). Ben Stein's droning economics teacher ("Bueller . . . Bueller . . . ") could put you into a coma.

BACK TO SCHOOL (1986). In this Rodney Dangerfield comedy, Sam Kinison's screaming lunatic Professor Terguson was an equally dubious commentary on teachers and Vietnam vets.

HEAVEN HELP US (1985). While the religious brothers played by Donald Sutherland and John Heard are decent guys in this Brat Pack classic, the sadistic Brother Constance (Jay Patterson) is the guy you have to hate. He has a close relative in the teacher in "How Green Was My Valley" (1941) who beats young Roddy McDowell and is, in turn, beaten up by Rhys Williams and Barry Fitzgerald.

LOOKING FOR MR. GOODBAR (1977), Diane Keaton starred in director Richard Brooks' adaptation of the Judith Rossner novel as a New York City teacher who spends her nights doing cocaine and having sex with random men. Based on an actual case.

THE PRIME OF MISS JEAN BRODIE (1969). Maggie Smith won a best actress Oscar for playing Muriel Spark's '30s-era heroine, a manipulative and misguided teacher of young girls who romanticizes Mussolini and blinds her young charges to the world's realities. Brodie's coterie of hand-picked pupils was a device echoed in 2009's "Cracks," from director Jordan Scott, in which Eva Green played the delusional and ultimately dangerous teacher Miss G.

'Bad Teacher': Few morals, no moral

What is the message of "Bad Teacher"?

"The truth is, there's absolutely no message," says actress Lucy Punch, who plays Amy, the "goody-goody-two-shoes teacher and Cameron Diaz's nemesis" in the Jake Kasdan-directed comedy starring Diaz, Jason Segel and Justin Timberlake.

But while she agrees that there's no moral to the story, Phyllis Smith, who plays another Diaz colleague, says, "I think teachers might find it refreshing -- maybe Elizabeth is saying things they're really thinking and just don't want to say?"

Smith has some credibility on the subject: She holds a degree in elementary education from the University of Missouri-St. Louis. "I slipped under the wire when they were still giving out lifetime certifications," the actress said. "I doubt I could ever get certified again; I think it was a shot in the dark to begin with. I taught first grade, and I enjoyed it; the kids were great, but my heart lay in another field." And "The Office" actress adds that she "probably would have been a bad teacher now that I think about it."

Meanwhile, Punch is gung- ho about her character, unlike Diaz's Elizabeth (whose Top Ten Rules of Teaching include "Movies are the new books" and "Stay hydrated -- keep a bottle of your favorite liquor in your desk drawer").

"She thinks she's the perfect teacher," Punch says of Amy. "She's very enthusiastic, loves her job, loves her kids, and works very, very hard and tries a bit too hard and gets incredibly annoying and is hated by everyone at the school and becomes somewhat deranged, and more and more unhinged as the film goes on. It was a really fun part to play."

Punch agrees that the movie has no message, "It's outrageous, but not disgraceful. It's a comedy for everyone," she says. "Well, maybe not very young children. Or very old people. But everyone in between will enjoy it."