Penguin lessons review: softness of the usual pen

The unique relationship between animals and people is a territory often exploited for cinematographic fodder; The torsion of “The Penguin Lessons”, based on the 2015 memories of Tom Michell, is in the exoticism of the animal and the frame, although the message transmitted is indeed familiar. Adapted for the screen by the screenwriter Jeff Pope (“Philomena”, “The Lost King”) and directed by Peter Cattaneo (“The Full Monty”), the creative team behind the film is well paid in the presentation of stories of human interest quirky with a humorous and slowly effective message – and a clearly British sense of humor.

When Tom (Steve Coogan) arrives in Buenos Aires to teach English to the privileged adolescents of St. George's College, it was on the eve of the military coup in 1976, which he entered with a steep upper lip and a good dose of cynicism. We don't know much about it, except that it is only interested in keeping your head down and out of trouble. He is not much interest in his students, the painful political situation or even friendships. On a bus for Uruguay for a weekend getaway to avoid the coup, the Finnish colleague from Tom, Tapio (Björn Gustafsson) says that he loves his new friend Tom, who sighs: “You do? I don't do it.”

It is during this fateful trip to Punta del Este that Tom's life begins to change, after an evening with an attractive woman (Micaela Breque). Wandering the beach at sunrise, they discover an oil slipped dotted with penguin carcasses. His new knowledge persuades him to bring one of the surviving birds to his hotel to try to save him, then to rush, leaving him with the penguin now partition. Try as he can abandon his feathered companion, the penguin will not leave him alone, so Tom as a counterbalance in Argentina and in his apartment on the campus, mainly because no one else wants to face a loose penguin.

The story of comforting and standard humorous animals takes place while the penguin – ultimately named Juan Salvador – Force Tom to get out of his grumpy and annoyed existence. The care, the food and the hiding place of this creature offer him to open up to those around her, such as Maria (Vivian El Jaber), the Cook and Cleaner campus, and his granddaughter Sophia (Alfonsina Carrocio), a radical left-hander that urges Tom to play a more active role in his policy but as a member of the community. “I expect bad people to do bad things,” she said. “But when the right people do nothing, I could hit them in the face.”

Juan Salvador also becomes the way to Tom in the link with his unruly students, who competing for their dispersed attentions with the unusual (and adorable) animal. He finds inspiration to teach them quietly radical poetry, to the chagrin of the school director (Jonathan Pryce). The little penguin becomes a kind of mascot, a very cute creature for them to rally and a therapist in a way.

Juan Salvador obliges Tom to connect with others, and through it, he finds his spine, supporting his new friends while they endure the turbulent and terrifying periods of the military dictatorship of Argentina. Cattaneo and the Pope manage to balance the tone of a dramatic historical representation of fascism with a charming story of animals and their secret weapon is Coogan. Its delivery to drying to the bone makes it possible that the open is never too clear and that the sentimental is never too syrupy. Even in moments of deep sadness, he will make an elegant joke, and when he leaves the spectacle of Tom's vulnerability, we see the effort that it takes to this man to stick his neck.

“Penguin lessons” are quite formulates – it strikes the beats you are waiting for, exactly when you expect it to hit them – but it's a moving thread, has made all the best based on a true story. Fortunately, Cattaneo chose to throw a real bird (in fact a pair). Coogan's thought acting in front of a CGI penguin is frightening.

Perhaps we do not need the recall that our personal relationships with animals are among the most special and the most enriching that we can appreciate as human beings, but “penguin lessons” also emphasize that our relationships with people are even more important and that sometimes animals are the best stewards for this particular trip. Juan Salvador is certainly one of the most memorable.

Katie Walsh is a film critic from the Tribune Information Service.