Backdrop fallback

Sylvia

Share

Sylvia

"Revolutionary teaching brings International Acclaim"

1986

1h 40m

7.3(2 votes)

Drama

Overview

New Zealand chronicle of the life of noted writer and teacher, Sylvia Ashton-Warner. An interesting look at the unusual teaching methods she used while working with the children from the indigenous Maon.

Links & Resources

Social & External

Production Companies

The people behind it

Cast & crew

8 featured cast members

Starring

Eleanor David

Eleanor David

Sylvia

Nigel Terry

Nigel Terry

Aden

Tom Wilkinson

Tom Wilkinson

Keith

Mary Regan

Opal

Martyn Sanderson

Martyn Sanderson

Inspector Gulland

Terence Cooper

Terence Cooper

Inspector Bletcher

David Letch

David Letch

Inspector Scragg

Sarah Peirce

Vivian Wallop

Creative team

Directed by: Michael Firth
Written by: Michele Quill
Produced by: Don Reynolds

Similar Movies

Spoiled Children

Spoiled Children

Successful writer/director Bernard Rougerie is at a creative dead end and decides to isolate himself from his wife in order to complete the script for his next film. Bernard moves into an apartment building whose tenants are in the midst of a revolt against their abusive landlord. Reluctant at first, he joins their cause and then becomes involved in an affair with young, unemployed resident Anne.

The Piano Teacher

The Piano Teacher

Erika Kohut, a sexually repressed piano teacher living with her domineering mother, meets a young man who starts romantically pursuing her.

Children of a Lesser God

Children of a Lesser God

Starting his new job as an instructor at a New England school for the deaf, James Leeds meets Sarah Norman, a young deaf woman who works at the school as a member of the custodial staff. In spite of Sarah's withdrawn emotional state, a romance slowly develops between the pair.

Small Change

Small Change

The lives of a motherless young man, who's just starting to find interest in women, and his physically abused, poverty stricken friend, are mixed with more or less innocent childhood experiences and challenges most their age experience.

Grave Decisions

Grave Decisions

In this black comedy set in small-town Bavaria, 11-year-old Sebastian thinks you can never be too young to be a murderer. He's convinced that he killed his mother on the day he was born and is certain he's already been condemned to purgatory. Deciding he might be able to knock off a few years of his sentence by doing good deeds, Sebastian sets out to find a wife for his father Lorenz. When Lorenz and Sebastian's schoolteacher Veronika fall madly in love with each other, it seems the heavens must be smiling. There's just one hitch: Veronika is married.

To End All Wars

To End All Wars

Based on a real-life story, this drama focuses on a small group of Allied soldiers in Burma who are held captive by the Japanese. Capt. Ernest Gordon, Lt. Jim Reardon and Maj. Ian Campbell are among the military officers kept imprisoned and routinely beaten and deprived of food. While Campbell wants to rebel and attempt an escape, Gordon tries to take a more stoic approach, an attitude that proves to be surprisingly resonant.

Sounds of Sand

Sounds of Sand

On the one hand, there’s the desert eating away at the land. The endless dry season, the lack of water. On the other there’s the threat of war. The village well has run dry. The livestock is dying. Trusting their instinct, most of the villagers leave and head south. Rahne, the only literate one, decides to head east with his three children and Mouna, his wife. A few sheep, some goats, and Chamelle, a dromedary, are their only riches. A tale of exodus, quest, hope and fatality.

Inherit the Wind

Inherit the Wind

Schoolteacher Bertram Cates is arrested for teaching his students Darwin's theory of evolution. The case receives national attention and one of the newspaper reporters, E.K. Hornbeck, arranges to bring in renowned defense attorney and atheist Henry Drummond to defend Cates. The prosecutor, Matthew Brady is a former presidential candidate, famous evangelist, and old adversary of Drummond.

Or (My Treasure)

Or (My Treasure)

Or shoulders a lot: she's 17 or 18, a student, works evenings at a restaurant, recycles cans and bottles for cash, and tries to keep her mother Ruthie from returning to streetwalking in Tel Aviv. Ruthie calls Or "my treasure," but Ruthie is a burden. She's just out of hospital, weak, and Or has found her a job as a house cleaner. The call of the quick money on the street is tough for Ruthie to ignore. Or's emotions roil further when the mother of the youth she's in love with comes to the flat to warn her off. With love fading and Ruthie perhaps beyond help, Or's choices narrow.

The Good Teacher

The Good Teacher

Julien, a young teacher, is wrongfully accused of sexual misconduct by a teenage girl from his class. As he faces mounting pressures from the girl’s older brother and her classmates, the situation spirals out of control. Allegations spread, the entire school is thrown into turmoil, and the teacher has to fight to clear his name.

What Becomes of the Broken Hearted?

What Becomes of the Broken Hearted?

Five years have passed and Jake has turned his back on his family. He's still up to his usual tricks in McClutchy's Bar, unaware, as he downs his latest opponent, that his eldest son, Nig, has died in a gang fight. The uncomfortable family reunion at Nig's funeral sparks a confrontation with second son, Sonny, and sets Jake and Sonny on a downward spiral.

A Teacher's Crime

A Teacher's Crime

Carrie is an attractive high school history teacher who one day decides to help a troubled student, taking an special interest for him, unaware of the ruthless and perverse scheme masterminded for her.

Mera Naam Hai Mohabbat

This film's story is based upon the famous romance novel 'Love Story' by the American writer Erich Segal.

The Wren

The Wren

Feride is a young girl who lost her family as a child and was educated in a French school. A fearless climber of trees and an endless source of pranks, Feride's mischievousness earns her the nickname "Çalıkuşu" (Wren). The sudden discovery of betrayal causes her to defy all social expectations. She runs away on her own to teach in the Anatolian backcountry. But it is not so easy to escape a broken heart.

Crooked Earth

Crooked Earth

Will Bastion returns home from the army after an absence of 20 years to bury his father, the former chief of thee Maori tribe, Ngati Kaipuku. The eldest son, he is reluctant to inherit his fathers role, so it is taken more willingly by his younger brother, Kahu. Kahu is the leader of a band of drug dealers and trouble-makers who ride horses through the middle of town, wrecking peoples gardens. Under the guise of refusal of a land settlement, Kahu makes a large marijuana deal with some murdering city folk. Will must choose between loyalty for his brother and his father, Maori tradition, and contemporary financial issues.

Belum Ada Judul

Belum Ada Judul

Umar Bakri, a respected high school teacher, faces public outrage after a video of him slapping a student goes viral. Despite pressure to explain, he remains silent to protect a secret that could ruin his students' futures. A touching drama about sacrifice, morality, and a teacher’s unwavering dedication.

The Promised Land

The Promised Land

At the turn of the century, Lodz, Poland, was a quick-paced manufacturing center for textiles, replete with cutthroat industrialists and unsafe working conditions. Three young friends, a Pole, a Jew, and a German, pool their money together to build a factory.

Once Were Warriors

Once Were Warriors

In a violent relationship, it takes a mother’s strength to save herself and her children from the man she loved. Once Were Warriors is a violent love story set against a contemporary urban backdrop.

The Tender Age

The Tender Age

Twenty-year-old Henri Rebecque wants to make his dream come true: to bring Benjamin Constant's Adolphe to the screen in amateur format. Armed with a sixteen-millimeter camera and a team of friends, Henri embarks on this adventure, playing the role of Adolphe himself. Despite all the warnings, he lived through the passion and ordeal of the novel's hero, right to the end. Different times and circumstances will not change this.

In the Navel of the Sea

In the Navel of the Sea

In a remote fishing island in the '50s, Pepito grows up learning the trade of his mother, Rosa, the only midwife capable of delivering the newborn babies of their community. At first, the young son doesn't mind the unusual arrangement, but as he grows older, he begins to resist the role traditionally meant only for women. In time, Pepito's coming of age intersects with the lives of the other islanders, whose beliefs and struggles become critical impetus to his maturity.

Recommended Movies

The Ron Clark Story

The Ron Clark Story

Passionate and innovative teacher Ron Clark leaves his small hometown to teach in one of Harlem's toughest schools. But to break through to the students, he must use unconventional methods, including his ground-breaking classroom rules, to help them reach their potential. Based on a true story.

Only the Strong

Only the Strong

Former Green Beret Louis Stevens returns to his hometown of Miami after completing military service in Brazil, only to learn that his old high school has become a haven for gangs and drug dealers. After Stevens uses his capoeira skills to kick several drug dealers off of the school property, Kerrigan, one of Stevens' old teachers, sees the impact that Stevens has on the students. Kerrigan gives him the task of teaching Capoeira to a handful of the worst at-risk students at the school.

The Nest

The Nest

Rory is an ambitious entrepreneur who brings his American wife and kids to his native country, England, to explore new business opportunities. After abandoning the sanctuary of their safe American suburban surroundings, the family is plunged into the despair of an archaic '80s Britain and their unaffordable new life in an English manor house threatens to destroy the family.

The Convert

The Convert

Munro, a soldier turned lay preacher, comes to New Zealand to minister to the first British colonists, but he is converted by the powerful chief Maianui to serve a different purpose.

Goodbye June

Goodbye June

Four siblings' lives change drastically when their ailing mother takes a turn for the worse over the holiday season.

Dangerous Minds

Dangerous Minds

Former Marine Louanne Johnson lands a gig teaching in a pilot program for bright but underachieving teens at a notorious inner-city high school. After having a terrible first day, she decides she must throw decorum to the wind. When Johnson returns to the classroom, she does so armed with a no-nonsense attitude informed by her military training and a fearless determination to better the lives of her students -- no matter what the cost.

Bastard Out of Carolina

Bastard Out of Carolina

A poor, struggling South Carolinian mother and daughter face painful choices with their resolve and pride. Bone, the eldest daughter, and Anney her tired mother, grow both closer and farther apart: Anney sees Glen as her last chance.

Skin

Skin

Based on the true story of a black girl who was born to two white Afrikaner parents in South Africa during the apartheid era.

Detachment

Detachment

A chronicle of three weeks in the lives of several high school teachers, administrators and students through the eyes of substitute teacher, Henry Barthes. Henry roams from school to school, imparting modes of knowledge, but never staying long enough to form any semblance of sentient attachment.

Call Me Crazy: A Five Film

Call Me Crazy: A Five Film

A psychotherapist helps a law student cope with schizophrenia in one of five interconnected tales dealing with mental illness.

Starving in Suburbia

Starving in Suburbia

When seventeen-year-old Hannah stumbles upon a website about Thinspiration--an online community devoted to anorexia as a life choice--she becomes an obsessive follower of the site founder, ButterflyAna. By the time Hannah's family realizes what is happening and get Hannah the help she needs, the disease has fully taken hold and Hannah is refusing to eat. Will this family be able to exorcise the demon of anorexia from their lives?

Steve

Steve

Over one intense day, the devoted head teacher of a last-chance reform school strives to keep his students in line while facing pressures of his own.

Strange Weather

Strange Weather

Years after her son's suicide, a woman longs to confront both the past and a friend of his who took his business idea.

Girl in the Box

Girl in the Box

The true story of 20-year-old Colleen Stan, a hitchhiking woman abducted by a young couple and held captive for seven years, during which time she's tortured and forced to live as a slave to her captors.

Sergio

Sergio

A sweeping drama set in the chaotic aftermath of the US invasion of Iraq, where the life of top UN diplomat Brazilian Sérgio Vieira de Mello hangs in the balance during the most treacherous mission of his career.

Here

Here

An odyssey through time and memory, centered on a place in New Jersey where—from wilderness, and then, later, from a home—love, loss, struggle, hope and legacy play out between couples and families over generations.

Last Ride

Last Ride

A young boy travels across Australia with his father, who's wanted by the law.

The Young One

The Young One

A jazz musician seeks refuge from a lynch mob on a remote island, where he meets a hostile game warden and the young object of his attentions.

The Safety of Objects

The Safety of Objects

In a suburban landscape, the lives of several families interlace with loss, despair and personal crisis. Esther Gold has lost focus on all but caring for her comatose son, Paul, and neglects her daughter and husband. Lawyer Jim Train is devoted to his career, not his family. Helen Christianson wants to find a new spark in life, while Annette Jennings tries to rebuild hers.

Salomé

Salomé

After the lewd and frenetic Dance of the Seven Veils, and with the solemn pledge from the very lips of Herod himself that she could have whatever her heart desires up to half his kingdom, wanton and proud young Salomé comes before her king with an unreasonable demand. Beguiled by John the Baptist, and then scorned for the sake of his god, lascivious Salomé—encouraged by her mother, the vindictive, Herodias—commands that John be executed and his head delivered on a silver platter.