Notes on a Scandal (2006)

At first rather annoying in its heavy emphasis on reenactments, this movie ultimately proves fascinating, simply because the complicated, highly dramatic tale it tells still almost defies belief.

The thing I enjoyed most about the film is the fact that it doesn't shy away from being a super-sized-cliche;

Although I seem to have had higher expectations than I thought, the movie is super entertaining.

Through painfully honest and emotional moments, the movie becomes irresistibly relatable

This was an explotion of charachter acting,judi dench on the top step and cate blanchet almost there. it a film about lesbianism,infidelity,adultry,''child abuse'',forbidden love,power,school,promises,lies,media,police, prison.... a bloodboiling very speedy drama of high british quality, and a great musical drive throughout the film. i can honestly say that i'd lost my job after an hour in a brattish school environment like this. bravissimo.

Notes on a Scandal (2006) really is an amazing movie, it's wonderfully acted, skillfully written, and directed beautifully. Cate Blanchett and Judi Dench are incredible actresses and this film proves it 100%! They both turn on marvelous performances and interact very well together on screen. The screenplay is very well put together, which is why the movie garnered such good reviews and so many award nominations and wins. The plot is intriguing and the characters are so deep and interesting that there's no possible way any viewer could become bored during the movie, it really keeps your attention. Barbara (Judi Dench) is a very complex and deluded individual in this film and that combined with Sheba (Cate Blanchett) and her issues makes for some pretty intense scenes. 10/10 for notes on a scandal! Highly suggested masterful film!

In Notes on a Scandal, Judi Dench plays Barbara Covett, a spinster history teacher at a British public school, who narrates the story with tart, dolorous wit. A self-described "battle-axe", she is so ensconced by her own loneliness, so embittered by her inability to achieve intimacy with another human, that she has turned inwardly toxic. It doesn't help matters that she's a deeply closeted lesbian.Barbara's newest obsession is the school's new art teacher Sheba Hart (Blanchett), whose wealth and magnificence are a draught of nectar to her own drab existence. Sheba excites Barbara's silent fascination and derision by wafting sexily about the place with her liberal-patrician attitude, her hippy-dippy idealism, and her remarkable beauty. Barbara, who keeps a copious diary of her thoughts and feelings, becomes increasingly delusional about Sheba, concocting a fantasy life for the two of them, imagining her to finally be "the one". Never mind that Sheba is married with two kids - as far as Barbara is concerned, she'd be better off with Barbara. When she discovers Sheba's sensational love affair with one of her students, it's an opportunity Barbara seizes with relish, as we see her moral outrage turn to narcissistic manipulation as she tries to conceal their secret. Notes on a Scandal is about something deeply unlovely in human nature rarely explored by artists: the explosive combination of desire and social envy. The brilliance of the film's concept is matched by a powerful screenplay that proves to be a screen writing master-class from Patrick Marber who makes the subtleties obvious and sets up the story's twists and turns with unmistakable confidence. Director Richard Eyre, with unshowy authority, instills a mildly suspenseful quality to the movie, while imbuing it with enough restraint, pacing the proceedings with an eye for detail. The restraint successfully allows for several moments in which the characters erupt to be that much more jolting.The movie's driving force however is Dame Judi Dench, who is an absolute powerhouse as the repressed, predatory lesbian. We know fully well that Barbara is a kind of monster, but from the moment she cynically sizes up the year's new crop of students - "Here come the local pubescent proles - the future plumbers and shop assistants, and perhaps there's the odd terrorist, too" - she has us. And in Dench's hands, Barbara never lets us go; the acerbic wit never fails. But her biting remarks are always tempered by the sense of her bitter sadness, which in turn is tempered by her moments of uncanny perception. It's a brilliant role and a brilliant performance - witty, hateful and heartbreaking all at once. But it doesn't exist in a vacuum; Cate Blanchett, is every bit Dench's equal, showing great range in moments that demand release of vulnerability and pent-up passion, delivering a harrowing performance as the unwitting target in a tragically fraught relationship. Together, they are an absolute delight! Bill Nighy as Sheba's cuckolded husband displays great range in a relatively small part.Notes on a Scandal is a quintessential tale of twisted love, of festering secrets and emotional self-harm. Something so horrible and abject shouldn't be so compulsively watchable, and yet it is. Engrossing, bewildering, searing and shattering, this is a film that reverberates on every level.

"Notes on a Scandal" is one of my all-time favorite films. In my mind, it's perfection. Directed by Richard Eyre, and adapted by Patrick Marber from the novel by Zoe Heller, it's a film that I can never get enough of. It's as sensational and (pun intended) scandalous as a soap opera but is written with great intelligence and nuance, as well as features first-class acting. This London-set story of a lonely, bitter high-school history teacher, Barbara Covett (Judi Dench), and her twisted friendship with the school's fragile yet deviant new art teacher, Sheba Hart (Cate Blanchett), has all sorts of layers to plumb.It was nominated for four Oscars, after its 2006 release, and one of them was for Marber's Adapted Screenplay. It was very well-deserved and he probably should've won. Eyre directs the film well, striking a balance between a minimalism that shows his theatre roots and a subtle gift for keeping the pacing alive. Yet, the true foundation of the film is the script. "Notes on a Scandal" is not only wildly entertaining and gripping but full of classic dialogue. Marber is, after all, the same man who gave us the line "Lying is the most fun a girl can have without taking her clothes off, but it's better if you do" from his play/film "Closer." So, there's not only zingers here, mostly through Dench's impeccably delivered, acerbic voiceovers, that will make you howl but evocative lines that will make you think. For example: "It takes courage to recognize the real from the convenient." It's quite rare to see a story that is not only woman-centered but so unsentimental and brutally honest in its depiction of said women. In this, Marber sticks faithfully to Heller's novel. Barbara and Sheba are both fleshed out in three-dimensional ways, given sympathetic qualities at the same time that their unlikable, appalling, or absurd traits aren't glossed over. Some reviewers seem to have taken issue with Sheba, in particular, and why we aren't given a clear answer as to why this bright, attractive, happily married woman would sleep with her 15-year-old student, Steven Connolly (Andrew Simpson). But, I think that's the essential point. It's all too complicated to sum up so neatly and logically.Blanchett, who was Oscar-nominated for her performance, does a fantastic job at playing Sheba's ambiguity and complexity. She is full of yearning, vulnerability, and confusion, while also keeping us guessing, as well. Sheba has to be as much of a mystery as she is a bleeding heart and Blanchett nails this balance very well. Bill Nighy shines in his smaller role as Sheba's husband and Simpson brings a roguish, boyish charm that makes him dangerously appealing.And then there's Dench. The Great Dame received an Oscar nod for this role and many would agree that she should have won (no offense Helen Mirren). She does so much with Barbara. First off, she's utterly hilarious, dishing out dry English wit like nobody's business. Second off, she's appropriately unsettling and horrifying, not holding back from the character's creepy, controlling nature. Yet, she is also deeply empathetic. The more the film progresses, the more you forget Barbara is such a "monster". The loneliness and need that Dench grounds her in is superb.Now, Philip Glass was also Oscar-nominated for his Original Score, which I have to mention, as it seems to be quite polarizing. I personally loved it. A bit over-the-top? Yes. But, it adds to the juiciness of the movie. It kept me on the edge of my seat, in certain moments, especially during a climactic showdown between Barbara and Sheba. It helped make the film seem like an actual psychological thriller, not just a drama."Notes on a Scandal" is a movie you truly experience. One minute you're laughing, the next you're gasping, and the next you're feeling deeply for two people who you might otherwise simply judge.