To Be and to Have

Can a film about education move you to tears? Of course it can, as is evidenced in this award-winning documentary about a school year, that was beloved by audiences in France and is sure to speak to the hearts of all. The young students in the class steal the show.

Synopsis

In rural France, schoolteacher Georges Lopez educates 12 children, whose ages range from 4 to 11 years old. Over the course of a year, the soon-to-retire Lopez instructs them all in one small classroom with the traditional tools of French teaching: rote repetition and the dictation of literary passages for copying. As the seasons pass, Lopez must keep his students disciplined while preparing the older children for the exams that will determine their educational future.