The Penguin Lessons (2024)

Argentina’s 1976 coup and a penguin in a hotel bathtub share the same movie, and they never quite learn to share the room. Steve Coogan plays Tom Michell, a drifting English teacher at an elite boys’ school who, on a trip to Uruguay, scrubs an oil-soaked penguin clean and then can’t get rid of it. Every time he tries to send it back to the sea, it waddles right back to him. He sneaks it onto campus, names it Juan Salvador, and suddenly a class that ignored him starts paying attention. Coogan is terrific, dry and prickly until the bird wears him down, and Jonathan Pryce plays the rule-bound headmaster who wants the bird gone. The darker story, about people being taken away under the new regime, is treated with care but kept at arm’s length, and critics noticed. A 6.9 because the penguin scenes are a delight and the history deserved more room. $373 says you end the night watching penguin videos and calling it research.

What works: Steve Coogan gives one of his warmest performances, and the penguin turns a cranky teacher and a bored classroom around without the movie getting syrupy.

What doesn’t: The real political terror outside the school gates gets folded in so gently that it sometimes feels like a backdrop for the bird.

Who it’s for: Steve Coogan fans, teachers who have lost a classroom and won it back, and anyone who would follow a penguin anywhere.