Teaching Mrs. Tingle (1999)

Directed by Kevin Williamson. Starring Katie Holmes, Marisa Coughlan, Barry Watson, Helen Mirren, Michael McKean, Molly Ringwald, Liz Stauber, Jeffrey Tambor, Lesley Ann Warren, Vivica A. Fox. [PG-13]

Would a black comedy without any real darkness and no laughs be called a shadow of nothing? Well, that’s what Teaching Mrs. Tingle is, an incurably listless stab at showing how a withering, venomous history teacher (Mirren) can push otherwise good students toward criminal behavior—in this case, knocking out the tyrannical teach in her own home and keeping her captive by tying her to the bed. Alas, that’s where the kinkiness ends, since not only is the situation contrived beyond belief, but writer/director Williamson neglects to give these characters anything interesting to do besides tediously transparent mind games and viscid slapstick involving a horny (and none-too-bright) coach (Tambor) who comes a-knocking. Though far from being a saving grace, Mirren’s straight interpretation at least provides a rickety platform upon which all these dull shenanigans are hoisted; the three students doing the dirty work are a staggeringly insipid bunch that can’t even breathe life into the enterprise with a little hanky-panky betwixt Holmes and Watson on the none-too-sly (Coughlan’s over-the-top Exorcist vamp, however, can at least make jaws drop in its ill-fitting ineptitude). Williamson’s one and only venture as film director, and the benighted uncertainty shows.

17/100