Cinema Therapy — Charlyne Gelt, Ph.D.

Teacher's Lounge

“We must embrace difficulty and change if we are to create a fulfilling life for ourselves. If a boat is not rocking, it isn’t going anywhere.” — Yehuda Berg

The Teachers’ Lounge (German: Das Lehrerzimmer) is a 2023 German film directed by İlker Çatak, who co-wrote the screenplay with Johannes Duncker. In the film, we follow Carla Nowak (Leonie Benesch of “The Crown”), a junior high school teacher in her first job, teaching math and physical education. As a Polish émigré, she already feels a bit “different,” but she is idealistic (almost to a fault), tries to do the right thing, and throws herself into her new job, encouraging students to think critically and creatively, and open themselves to opposing perspectives.

As the film begins, there is tension in the air over an internal investigation into series of thefts in the school that have apparently been going on for quite a while. Carla, new and not yet as jaded as some of the older staff, finds herself being pulled into this theft drama, and she soon runs into the contradiction that, although the school setting seems very modern, it is quite emotionally toxic and rigid, built on “old school” traditional values. It professes zero tolerance regarding the thefts, which have now extended into the teachers' lounge where Carla witnesses an occurrence.

When one of Carla’s students is pulled out of classroom and accused of being the thief, Carla attends the meeting between school officials and the boy’s parents, who defend their son and say the accusation against him is “racist” (they are Turkish). Carla accepts this explanation at face value, and jumps to the boy’s defense. She then takes it upon herself to find out who the “real” thief is. She sets up a trap or “sting” using her laptop's camera, and her unattended wallet, to catch and then confront the culprit, who turns out to be a beloved school administrator. The administrator denies the accusation. After all, her face was never shown on the video, only her patterned sleeve, so “doubts” set in as Carla’s investigation becomes known, causing even more contention. Soon, Carla is caught between her ideals and school politics. The consequences of her actions threaten to break her.

It all gets even more complicated when it turns out that the accused administrator is the mother of one of Carla’s “gifted” students, Oscar, who, while able to solve mathematical problems, cannot solve personal problems or wrap his head around a solution to Carla’s accusation and his mother’s resultant dismissal for theft. He clings to defend his mother’s good character though facts prove otherwise. He vows to make Carla pay for accusing her, but he doesn’t specify what he intends to do about it. While Carla in theory believes that problems demand creative and factual solutions, that is not what happens here.

In the end, when the facts do not fit Oscar’s assumptions of his mother’s innocence, he and the students turn the tables on Carla. She becomes the outsider! They cling to their own set of assumptions. The whole situation in the movie is left somewhat up in the air. So many unanswered questions. It’s more like real life.

Psychological Implications — The Tensions of Everyday Life

One reviewer of The Teachers’ Lounge described the movie a “nerve-wracking thriller about everyday things, in which we watch realistic characters making bad decisions.” In so many ways, it’s a metaphor for everyday life. It’s about things we all experience going on around us, nothing is as simple as it at first appears. There is no black and white. No clear winners and losers. Everybody is both right and wrong, good and bad, pure and corrupt. What truth remains buried in shadow content? Carla teaches her students to think critically, to search for facts, beyond assumptions. Carla’s idealism becomes tarnished and is turned against her. The “real thief” is left hanging – uncertain. Life is full of doubts and uncertainties. How do we know when we have all the facts? Do the facts change to fit our beliefs?

The Teachers’ Lounge shows us the consequences of many of our beliefs, assumptions, and single-minded perspectives which may or may not be the truth. Emptying the teacher's coffee fund, cheating on a test, defying the truth. So many conflicts: personal, moral, how things are done and how they “should” be done. Carla seems to get a taste of the fact that this school is not a sanctuary from real life; it is real life.

Character is revealed when one must make a decision to either stand by, ponder the problem, or to find a solution and take action. Thus, the importance of the symbol of Oscar’s rubric cube (in the film) which serves as a metaphor for finding solutions to complex problems. Solving personal and moral problems is so much harder.

Conflicts offer opportunity for the growth of new thinking. What happens when there is a crisis? Finding and facing facts is what Carla Novak teaches her students, but she is unaware of school politics and the deep level of enmeshment that maintains the students’ and the teachers’ status quo! Survival mandates the continued enmeshment of each groups’ assumptions, holding on to strict “old school” rules of right v wrong, neglecting a search to find, then face the facts, in spite of the trauma underlying a cover-up. Peer group pressure rules this toxic school environment. Breaking through this “dysfunctional family” enmeshment results in inciting rebellion and independence.

What questions are being left unanswered on purpose?

Charlyne Gelt, Ph.D. (PSY22909) is a clinical psychologist who practices in Encino. She leads Women's Empowerment Groups that help women learn the tools to move beyond self-destructive relationship patterns. She may be reached at 818.501.4123 or cgelt@earthlink.net. Her office address is 16055 Ventura Blvd. #1129 Encino, CA 91436.