Review of My Tutor (1983) by Paul D — 18 Feb 2012

There were no shortage of movies like "My Tutor" in the '80's, and many of them had the same common theme of young men being seduced by older and willing women to placate young men's fantasies everywhere. This one ups the ante some by having the woman in question be a teacher, something that was illegal and immoral at the time of its release but would be tolerated even less today considering how many times that has happened in current events.

The film is considerably less vulgar than a lot that came out at the time, even though it does throw in a lengthy and completely unnecessary backstory about Matt Lattanzi and his buddy trying to lose their virginity. That was obviously meant to please fans of these types of comedies. The essential story involved Lattanzi falling for his French tutor, played by Caren Kaye, and despite the tawdry nature of the story it is handled with a surprising amount of sophistication and tact. That makes the whole thing a little easier to swallow. In fact, the film is a lot more a love story than a typical teen sex comedy, but in the same respect it never aspires to be anything more than drive-in fodder.

The boy's crazy, sex-starved antics aren't funny, and the one amusing thing in the movie that I did enjoy was the hired help pandering to Lattanzi's mother even though they speak perfect English and are making plans to attend college. That could have been played up more. As it stands, "My Tutor" doesn't rank with the worst of them, but it doesn't rank much higher. It only has its mind in the gutter about half the time.