The Lesson

The film ultimately understands poverty as a profound and often irreversible desolation of terra firma.

It's a tough, gripping watch made emotionally rewarding through trenchant plotting and Gosheva's tight-lipped expressiveness.

The naturalistic style of the storytelling is stealthily enthralling, as is the lead performance by Margita Gosheva as a provincial Bulgarian schoolteacher who is slowly, inexorably driven to the edge by crushing debt.

There’s a superficial resemblance to the Dardenne brothers’ “Two Days, One Night,” and like that film it has a strong lead; Gosheva’s Nade is prickly, and no suffering saint.

The plot undermines the film’s power. At the end you may be impressed at the skill on display, but you may also wish that you were more fully moved by the spectacle of a soul laid bare and transformed.

While the plot relies too much on generalities, the film as a whole thrives on specifics.

In exploring how an honest person might compromise her integrity in the face of insurmountable obstacles, The Lesson compromises its own sense of reality; the movie just keeps piling on the misfortune, pushing past believability into what feels like questionably intentional comedy.