Spare the Rod

A British Guianese engineer starts a job as a high school teacher in London’s East End, where his uninterested and delinquent pupils are in desperate need of attention and care.

Over one intense day, the devoted head teacher of a last-chance reform school strives to keep his students in line while facing pressures of his own.

Jealousy flares after the headmistress of an elite boarding school for girls becomes obsessed with a new student.

As London is submerged below floodwaters, a woman gives birth to her first child. Days later, she and her baby are forced to leave their home in search of safety. They head north through a newly dangerous country seeking refuge from place to place.

Passionate and innovative teacher Ron Clark leaves his small hometown to teach in one of Harlem's toughest schools. But to break through to the students, he must use unconventional methods, including his ground-breaking classroom rules, to help them reach their potential. Based on a true story.

A headstrong young teacher in a private school in 1930s Edinburgh ignores the curriculum and influences her impressionable 12-year-old charges with her over-romanticized worldview.

Orphaned in Africa as a child, Lilly escapes to England as a refugee, fleeing civil war in Ethiopia. Lost in this cold new world, Lilly embraces the immigrant community in London, attempting to reunite people with their scattered families. But as her friend Amina discovers, Lilly's mission isn't purely selfless: a passionate lost love affair is revealed.

London, 1953. Mr. Williams, a veteran civil servant, is an important cog within the city's bureaucracy as it struggles to rebuild in the aftermath of World War II. Buried under paperwork at the office and lonely at home, his life has long felt empty and meaningless. Then a devastating medical diagnosis forces him to take stock, and to try and grasp some fulfilment before it passes permanently beyond reach.

A day in the life of a group of troubled 15-year-olds growing up in west London.

Mike, a rough sleeper in London, is trapped in a cycle of self-destruction as he attempts to turn his life around. Along the way, he encounters unexpected chances for a fresh start.

The story of a young boy in the Midwest is told simultaneously with a tale about a young girl in New York from fifty years ago as they both seek the same mysterious connection.

When the young, attractive Joe Orton meets the older, more introverted Kenneth Halliwell at drama school, he befriends the kindred spirit and they start an affair. As Orton becomes more comfortable with his sexuality and starts to find success with his writing, Halliwell becomes increasingly alienated and jealous, ultimately tapping into a dangerous rage.