Bad Teacher Definitely Not Good

Bad Teacher has one bad script, critics say—so bad that a good cast can’t make it work. If you’re feeling nasty, though, you may find a few laughs.

• In short, it’s “blandly, boringly bad,” writes Ann Hornaday in the Washington Post. “This fitfully funny but mostly dull misfire defines exactly where the line can be drawn between truly subversive humor and lazy cynicism.”

• “Whole chunks of the plot seem to have gone missing,” notes Roger Ebert in the Chicago Sun-Times, while “its bad person is neither bad enough [nor] likable enough.” And a dry-humping scene between Cameron Diaz and Justin Timberlake deserves an award for "worst sex scene ... [of] the decade."
• “The whole cast works hard, but there's only so much even A-list actors can do with a C-level script,” observes Elizabeth Weitzman in the New York Daily News. “They're stuck in a one-joke movie, and the title gives the punchline away.”
• Still, “to viewers sick of being force-fed inspirational lessons who are looking to mentally flip the bird at authority, this will hit the spot,” writes Luke Thompson for E! Online.

(More Cameron Diaz stories.)