90
Education becomes a portrait of a community disappointed by the country they came to with eagerness — and determined to make something of themselves, and their culture, in spite of it.
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What are critics saying?
92
McQueen and co-writer Alastair Siddons capture that sense that the children of immigrants often have of living with one foot in their adopted country and one in their parents’ homeland.
90
The Hollywood Reporter by David Rooney
It's short, sweet and effective, tying together the divergent threads of the decades-spanning Small Axe project on a note both poignant and personal.
83
This minuscule but affecting hourlong story is an extension of the “Small Axe” mission to fill a historical gap deserving of greater scrutiny, and achieves that goal by serving as a kind of education itself.
90
Screen Daily by Fionnuala Halligan
Education is aptly titled as a finale, as it describes the effect of the Small Axe series, but the word ‘open’ also comes to mind.
90
The New York Times by Jeannette Catsoulis
McQueen, who attended one of these schools, uses this small, hopeful story to illustrate how one generation, by means of an ingenious workaround to bigotry, fought to secure the future of the next.
75
Sandy is heartbreaking in the lead role, as his face registers surprise, then betrayal at the way the adults in his life—including, at times, his parents—fail him.
90
The brilliance of this particular episode is how it allows us to see ourselves in Kingsley and to consider the many unseen forces at play in our own socialization. For Black audiences, it confirms many of those invisible barriers. For white ones, it may lead them to question whether the myth of their “success” owes in part to keeping others back.
91
The Playlist by Robert Daniels
Education ends “Small Axe” on unsuspectingly grand terms. Yet the compact 63-minute coming-of-age film never loses its soft devoted touch. And McQueen, already an incredible filmmaker, shows another facet to his immense range.
63
It’s brief, but not so much to-the-point as wandering around it for an hour. And while it doesn’t spoil the effect of the whole, it does feel wanting as a finale. It’s the dullest “Small Axe” of the five.