Dangerous Minds

How can you thank someone who's taken you from a near-masterpiece to a contemptible piece of Hollywood schlock? Director John N. Smith, who helmed last year's masterly THE BOYS OF ST. VINCENT, is reduced to carrying Michelle Pfeiffer's baggage in this assembly-line star vehicle. It's a perfunctory amalgam of every urban high school melodrama you've ever seen -- BLACKBOARD JUNGLE, UP THE DOWN STAIRCASE, TO SIR WITH LOVE etc. -- with Pfeiffer as your basic ultrafeminine ex-Marine trying to instill a love of learning in her superficially thuggish students. This she accomplishes by wearing leather, talking tough and parsing Bob Dylan lyrics instead of Shakespeare (alth...