Synopsis
A veteran high school teacher befriends a younger art teacher, who is having an affair with one of her 15-year-old students. However, her intentions with this new "friend" also go well beyond platonic friendship.
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Cast
- Judi DenchBarbara Covett
- Cate BlanchettSheba Hart
- Bill NighyRichard Hart
- Andrew SimpsonSteven Connolly
- Phil DavisBrian Bangs
- Michael MaloneySandy Pabblem
- Juno TemplePolly Hart
- Max LewisBen Hart
- Joanna ScanlanSue Hodge
- Julia McKenzieMarjorie
Recommendations
- 90
Newsweek
A wicked delight. Adapted by playwright Patrick Marber from Zoe Heller's acclaimed novel, it's at once a comedy of cluelessness and class, a melodrama of two women in the grips of wildly inappropriate obsessions, and a "Fatal Attraction"-style thriller. - 90
Variety
The riveting interplay between Dench and Cate Blanchett draws blood with every scene, thanks to a precision-honed script and Eyre's equally incisive direction. - 90
New York Magazine (Vulture)
Anyone who loves live-wire acting will gasp in awe at Blanchett, more emotionally exposed than ever, and, most of all, at Dame Judi, who’s so electric she makes you quiver. - 88
New York Daily News
As the relationship between the two British schoolteachers begins (quietly), builds (deceptively) and dissolves (spectacularly), Dench and Blanchett give a master class in acting. Pick your own sports metaphor, but watching them go at each other is the match of the year. - 75
Rolling Stone
If you want to see explosive acting, just watch Judi Dench and Cate Blanchett ignite in this film version of Zoe Heller's 2003 novel. - 63
Premiere
If the resultant wreckage is a little underwhelming, and the film's coda useless and trite, the getting there is pretty absorbing. - 63
ReelViews
The most important part of any thriller - even one as upper crust as this - is the resolution, and that's where Notes on a Scandal falls on its face. The ending itself isn't bad but the single act leading to it is unforgivable. - 60
The Hollywood Reporter
Eyre does a fine job overseeing performances by a terrific cast that rings true until female hysteria takes over the final act. But in tone and theme, the film has all the hallmarks of playwright-screenwriter Marber's stark, uncompromising misanthropy, if not misogyny.
