Always Learning, Always Listening
By Paul Hall
What makes a friend? Can a teacher be more than just a learning conduit?
Adam (Mark Duplass) is gifted a package of Spanish lessons to be taught in a virtual environment. It’s a BIG package of lessons that leads him to start a teacher-student relationship. His teacher, Cariño
(Natalie Morales), has a pattern and is ready to take Adam deep into his lessons. But tragedy strikes one of our characters and the relationship become more about a true friendship between two individuals and less about revisiting Spanish class. Where will it lead?
Filmed primarily during the pandemic in 2020, Language Lessons is a simple yet amazingly beautiful display of the power of friendship and how a person, thousands of miles away, can help another in the darkest of hours. Duplass and Morales are magical and absorb you as a fly on the wall in this film that is experienced through each other’s screen from beginning to end. The folks at Zoom should pay royalties to the pair as they truly unlock the potential that the video service can offer.
A near-perfect date movie that deals with love and loss, and without a direct sexual tension between a man and a woman, it provides a heartwarming and heartbreaking experience. Take Language Lessons with a friend, and be there to listen when you are done.
Paul’s Grade: B+
Language Lessons
Rated NR
Stars: Mark Duplass, Natalie Morales
Director: Natalie Morales
Available in Select Theaters – 9.10.21
Content released to Syndicated Partners – 9.10.21