In honor of Black History Month, the Bay Theatre is screening writer-director James Clavell’s aspirational 1967 film, To Sir, with Love, based on the autobiographical novel by E. R. Braithwaite. The story deals with important issues of class and race and ultimately is a testament to the power of treating adolescents—even badly behaving ones—with care and love, which has the power to change lives.
Unable to find engineering work, Mark Thackeray (Sidney Poitier) reluctantly accepts a teaching position. Little does he know, his class consists of students rejected from other schools for behavioral problems. Thackeray makes it his mission to make well-behaved young men and women out of them, with plenty of problems along the way.
It’s a compelling story and time capsule of its era, but it’s also very pat and preachy in retrospect. The script has been called sententious, pious, sentimental, and unrealistic—and it is—but Poitier is wonderful, and some of the performances by his students are effective. One of the students, the singer Lulu in her film debut, also sings the theme song, “To Sir with Love,” that became the bestselling U.S. single in 1967. (105 min.)
—Glen Starkey
This article appears in Feb 20 – Mar 2, 2025.