Humble, didactic and humane, this German documentary about a veteran teacher and his ‘foreign’ students was able to captivate, even if it draws out with more than three and a half hours of footage.

| Original Score: 3.5/5 | Feb 16, 2023

Absorbing and fascinating: one of the best recent documentaries about education. [Full review in Spanish]

| Original Score: 4/5 | Dec 20, 2022

At almost four hours in length, Mr. Bachmann and His Class is long, but its enormous characters and emotions more than fill the space, headed by an astonishingly charismatic and inspiring teacher in Dieter Bachmann.

| Original Score: 4/5 | Dec 12, 2022

This is not just a celebration of one man, but of all teachers who go above and beyond for the children in their care.

| Original Score: 4/5 | Dec 12, 2022

Stirring, unsentimental and an immersive pleasure from end to end.

| Original Score: 4/5 | Dec 9, 2022

Maria Speth’s immersive technique is rewarding in its own right, carving out a space for intimacy between teacher, students, film-maker and viewers that’s respectful, remarkable and rewarding.

| Original Score: 4/5 | Dec 8, 2022

Bachmann’s unusual methods rub up against the often-harsh realities his pupils find themselves in, but the importance of the work he’s doing can’t be understated.

| Dec 7, 2022

Yes, it can sometimes be dull – as dull as any school day – but also riveting and quietly passionate.

| Original Score: 4/5 | Dec 6, 2022

While the film is celebratory, it’s not myopically utopian...

| Nov 22, 2022

With an overwhelming sensibility that envelops us in the short three and a half hours, Maria Speth comprehensively portrays life inside a classroom full of teenagers. [Full review in Spanish]

| Jun 16, 2022

Even at more than three and a half hours, the fly-on-the-wall documentary Speth has culled from her time in the classroom is the opposite of tedious.

| Feb 21, 2022

All immigrant kids strive to transcend the socio-economic barriers and make better lives for themselves; all are struggling in figuring out what constitutes a home... and what a home means.

| Aug 18, 2021

As understandable as Speth's insistence on the extended length and the 'real-time' process can be, it's a strategy that isn't always effective or of benefit to the film.

| Jun 6, 2021

It's impossible to imagine that a documentary would be able to hold you in thrall for its 3 hours 37 minutes long duration. But Maria Speth's Herr Bachmann und seine Klasse manages to accomplish exactly that.

| May 21, 2021

The documentary exists within the very restricted pantheon of films that successfully reap the cinematic potential of pedagogy.

| Original Score: 4/4 | Mar 31, 2021

Patiently observed and deeply heartfelt.

| Original Score: B+ | Mar 17, 2021

A masterful and rightly adoring if overlong look at an inspirational teacher in the working-class German town of Stadtallendorf

| Mar 12, 2021

Mr Bachmann and His Class is extraordinarily life-affirming and has high hopes for a globalised, integrated next generation. The world could take note of one teacher's work.

| Original Score: 4/5 | Mar 8, 2021

Just might restore your faith in humanity.

| Mar 8, 2021

The movie's vérité approach may leave itself open to interpretation, but it's hard not to feel we're seeing the first rays of a better world about to dawn.

| Original Score: B+ | Mar 6, 2021