Netflix Accidently Supports Child-Grooming in The Kindergarten Teacher

By: Isabelle Lewis

April 29, 2022

Maggie Gyllenhaal plays Lisa Spinelli, a frustrated kindergarten teacher in New York City who chooses to express her feelings through her after school poetry hobby. She soon develops an unhealthy obsession with exposing one of her student’s talents to the world. This uncomfortable film consists of marital issues and affairs, absent parenting, and border-line child grooming.

The 2018 Netflix drama, The Kindergarten Teacher, goes against all expectations of the film at first glance. The movie is filled with dull, cold colors, going against the warm feelings and memories that most children have about kindergarten; this sets the scene for some uncomfortable, but important screenwriting. Shades of blue and gray envelop the characters as obsession sneaks into the inner city classroom.

Lisa Spinelli is struggling in her role as wife and mother, but finds comfort in teaching. She finds five year old Jimmy Roy (Parker Sevak) who she takes under her wing (a little forcefully) when his prodigic poetry talents are exposed in the classroom. Roy’s father is an absent business man, and he believes that his mother is dead, so little Jimmy is watched over by Becca. An aspiring teenage actress who doubles as Jimmy’s nanny. When Mrs. Spinelli gets wind of Jimmy’s home life, she steps in and offers to watch him after school and drive him to baseball practice. Mrs. Spinelli uses this extra time with Jimmy as an opportunity to market his talents at late night poetry readings without his father’s knowledge.

These creepy undertones shed light on the fact that, although much less common, female teachers can groom students too. Mrs. Spinelli grooms her student’s poetry talents, oftentimes including out-of-school secret activities with Jimmy Roy. Spinelli enters her phone number in little Jimmy’s flip phone so he can call her “anytime”, encouraging him to call her by her first name.

This dark drama is uncomfortable, yet necessary to spread the message on different types of grooming and predators unlike the old man with a van full of candy. However, Netflix missed the mark on this film. They try to make the audience feel sympathy for Lisa Spinelli by including her hard home life to almost give this elementary school teacher an excuse for her disturbing behavior.

This R rated Netflix original film running for 96 minutes deserves a 3 out of 5 stars.