I was interested in immigration and I wanted to use that in the film, not necessarily to talk … - Philippe Falardeau

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When people call me a role model it puts the fear of god into me, because I feel like I'm destined to fail.

Philippe Falardeau

I was interested in immigration and I wanted to use that in the film, not necessarily to talk about immigrants, although I wanted to do that, but to talk about ourselves through the eyes of an immigrant. The film takes place in the school and it tells us a little bit about who we are and where we're at, but through the eyes of someone who has a different background.

Eye, Immigrant, Immigration, School

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If you're writing a screenplay from scratch, it involves a lot of creation. In this play, I had a strong main character and it involved some creation around him. That's what I like about adapting that particular play because I added some maneuvering space as a scriptwriter to invent my own things.

Character, Creation, Particular, Strong, Writing

I needed to create some dramatic tension to sustain the interest of the audience. For instance, the boy in the film is not in the play, so this relationship that he had with the former teacher, and his guilt, this is not at all in the play. I thought it would be interesting to look at in the film, and I added stuff like that around the main character. For me, it was not more difficult or less difficult.

Audience, Boys, Character, Look, Play, Teacher

In the private system and the private schools, the principal is pretty much a dictator. He or she can hire whoever s
he wants. Of course, in the movie, in the story, she makes a mistake by hiring him. But, if she doesn't, I have no story.

Hire, Mistake, Pretty, School, Stories, Story

Any place where you have to deal with many social actors like a school - you have the parents, the Ministry of Education, the school board, and the teachers - you need all kinds of sets and rules. You're trying to foresee anything that can happen and everything becomes really rigid. They don't want to talk about death because they don't want to overwhelm the children, but that has already happened, so you're not going to overwhelm them more.

Actors, Children, Place, School, Social, Teacher

We also have this reflex of using specialists for everything, instead of having the person who is there every day with them, the teacher, talk about death and suicide. In the film, it's portrayed a little bit like a caricature, but it's the psychologist who comes in and Monsieur Lazhar does not think it's a good idea. He thinks he should be the one who should talk about that with the children.

Children, Portrayed, Specialists, Suicide, Teacher