The School for Good and Evil (2022)

Poster Description: There are two sides to every story. (From left) The School for Evil is a dark, spiralling castle on a precarious cliff, surrounded by lightning, darkness, and thorns. Lady Lesso (Charlize Theron) is pale with wild red curls on either side of her head. She wears a structured suit and holds a cane. Sophie (Sophia Anne Caruso) has short blonde hair and a black dress with a leather bodice. She holds her glowing finger superiorly with her head turned to the right. On the other side of a tall, thin tower, The School for Good comprises circular and pointed buildings bathed in the light of a sunset. Professor Dovey (Kerry Washington) has her hands on her hips. She has dark skin and wears a gold gown with a high, round collar and tiara on her blonde bun. With her head to the left, Agatha (Sofia Wylie) sits in a wing-backed chair in front of the other women. The Never thorns and a meadow of frosted roses frame her, and she wears her black curls loose over bare shoulders. Aggie’s flowery dress has a heart-shaped bodice and oversized bell sleeves that stop at her elbows. The film’s title and release date are below them.

 

Contains spoilers!

 

Based on the book of the same name by Soman Chainani, The School for Good and Evil began developing as far back as 2013 before Netflix took over in 2017. Besides the token trailer, I knew nothing about it; however, a chum (and fellow fan of quirky fairy tales) recommended it to me.

 

Best friends Sophie (Sophia Anne Caruso) and Aggie (Sofia Wylie) are dropped into a magical school for heroes and villains. Ever since she was a child, Sophie believed she was meant for brilliant things, while Aggie was happy living a quiet life despite being called a witch by nearly everyone in town. Except Sophie gets stuck with the witches and fairy tale villains, and Aggie is expected to wear pretty dresses with all the other princesses. That's right, they're in the wrong schools! Aren't they?

 

Genuine female friendship in film is still rare, so I had high hopes for this. I enjoyed Sophie and Aggie's bond at the beginning, thanks to Caruso and Wylie's warm chemistry. It feels natural, and the characters' opposing personalities cement how unlikely their friendship is. Because her mother is a medicine woman, Aggie is considered an outsider, but Sophie is on hand to come to Aggie's defence whenever she is threatened by the townsfolk. I particularly like how Aggie is cynical without coming off as obnoxious, and Sophie expects excellent things to happen to her on their own (in short, fairy tale female character tropes turned on their head, which is pretty cool). The seeds for Sophie's eventual revelation as a character are sown right from the start, so it's not shocking.

 

 The "kids plucked from childhood and dropped into a magical school that may or may not kill them" trope is shorthand for comparisons to Harry Potter. In TSFGE, the good guys are known as Evers, and the baddies are the Nevers. Geddit? They are the children of the characters we know from all the fairy stories, so we have Prince Tedros (Jamie Flatters, Avatar: The Way of Water), son of King Arthur, who is the main friction between Sophie and Aggie. Because heaven forbid, we don't have a movie without romantic conflict between two female pals! As a bonus, the kids who don't have fairy tale nepotism on their side are branded Readers. Yup. That's it, and it's used as an insult.

 

World-building aside, the visual differences between Evers and Nevers are gorgeous thanks to costume designer Renée Ehrlich Kalfus utilising pastel colours and flowers with black lace and leather. It's a bit basic, but I'm here for it. Indeed, there are only two houses in TSFGE, which makes for a compelling, if muddled, philosophy. For example, Prince Charming's son is blasted to bits (!) after failing too many classes! Except we never see what would happen if a villain did the same. Would that automatically make them good? There might be a teeny hint of exploration into this with a girl named Dot, whose evil ability is... turning things into chocolate. Dot is not as cruel to Sophie as the other girls (and my headcanon is she's the daughter of the witch from Hansel and Gretel), but my favourite character is Captain Hook's son, Hort (Earle Cave). He develops an instant crush on Sophie, and he's happy in his skin, so they could have made him a guide for her into the Never culture. You know, if Sophie wasn't such an unlikeable character.

 

As Professor Anemone, Michelle Yeong (yes, THAT Michelle Yeong) offers some welcome cynicism to the Evers curriculum with one hilarious line. I adore the brittle dynamic between Professor Dovey and Lady Lesso, but Kerry Washington and Charlize Theron have next to nothing to do besides exposition. Likewise, Lawrence Fishbourne may look fabulous in flowery fabrics, but he isn't given much else beyond introducing a brilliant McGuffin called the Storian. Voiced by Cate Blanchett, it is a magic quill that chronicles the stories of those worthy. The Storian narrates the story before we know who is speaking, but it would have worked well at the film's beginning. Instead, there is a written info-dump about the balance of Good and Evil, ehhhh…As a nod to fairy tale adaptations a la Disney, the film could have begun with opening a bejewelled book. They did with The Sword in the Stone, and who's the guy who wields it, eh?

 

The cold opener certainly grabbed my attention with two twins (both played by Shadow and Bone's Kit Young) fighting. Later, the Evil twin grooms Sophie into super-Evil, and it's all kinds of ick. Just because Rafal and Sophie are conventionally attractive doesn't make a hundred-plus-year-old seducing a teenager okay. (Oh, my revisit to Twilight will be utterly feverish when I get to it, I can tell). The MCU's Scarlet Witch has made red glowing eyes a bit cliché, but still very creepy in an evil context.

 

Theodore Shapiro wrote the score, but the decision to include pop songs at significant moments spoiled the immersion somewhat. It was as if someone had searched for "POV: You're a supervillain" for a YouTube playlist and viola. With that in mind, The School for Good and Evil could have benefitted from being a TV series instead, so they could have explored the world and characters more; with tracks from artists such as Billie Eilish featured, TSFGE would have looked right at home on The CW. Unfortunately, given its poor reception, it seems unlikely now. 

 

I enjoyed The School for Good and Evil despite all my criticisms. There aren't enough films with more than one female lead, and it explores their characters without resorting to cliche; in fact, it turns many of those on their heads. But, sadly, there are wasted opportunities to delve into the plot's world (most notably Never culture) and utilise the obvious talent on screen. I'll give this school a D for effort but a B for its potential. It could do better!  

 

My Rating: 3 STARS OUT OF 5  

 

My Sources:

The School for Good and Evil poster: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_School_for_Good_and_Evil_(film)

The School for Good and Evil cast and plot: https://www.imdb.com/title/tt2935622/?ref_=nv_sr_srsg_3

Jamie Flatters filmography: https://www.imdb.com/name/nm7370588/?ref_=ttfc_fc_cl_t43

TSFGE costume designer: https://www.netflix.com/tudum/articles/school-for-good-and-evil-costumes-renee-ehrlich-kalfus

Who wrote the score for The School for Good and Evil? - https://vaguevisages.com/2022/10/24/the-school-for-good-and-evil-soundtrack-netflix/