The expertly photographed, edited, acted, and directed Monsieur Lazhar is about two inhabitants of the city of Montreal. What do I mean by inhabitants? Post-national, post-neoliberal, globalized urban subjects. One of the subjects is an immigrant from Algeria, Bachir Lazhar (Mohamed Fellag), who takes a job as a replacement teacher in an elementary school after the original teacher commits suicide. The other subject is a French Canadian girl, Alice L'Écuyer (Sophie Nélisse), a student in his class.

So is this film about an immigrant teaching a young white Canadian student about how all Arabs are not terrorists? No, nothing of the sort. Indeed, Lazhar is not a great teacher, and he is a bit too academic and snobbish for his young and often bored pupils. If the film is not about the education of an ignorant Canadian white girl, what is it about? Inhabitants. Meaning, subjects in a world that is no longer anchored by national narratives. These are simply drifting urban strangers who find that somehow, for some unknown reason, they connect. One stranger understands the other stranger's soul. No words need be said; no promises need be made. She knows him; he knows her. Though coming from different parts of the world, they are made of something that's similar. And we may never learn what this something is.

This wonderful film, however, has one flaw—a plot twist that happens in its last 15 or so minutes. If not for this utterly unnecessary plot twist, Monsieur Lazhar would have been a front-runner for my film of the year.