'The Penguin Lessons' Review: Fighting fascism with a friend from the Arctic Circle

Peter Cattaneo's take on the 2016 memoir of the same name doesn't do much to separate itself from the pack of other stories like it, but you gotta admit: that penguin is pretty damn cute

The most surprising thing to learn about Peter Cattaneo’s The Penguin Lessons (2025) was the fact that it’s PG-13. When the classic green MPAA rating slide preceding the trailer played a few weeks ago, I was fascinated as to what could be in this feel-good biopic about a melancholy British teacher begrudgingly saving a dying penguin from an oil slick, only for the penguin to immediately befriend him. It’s surprising to think there’d be anything in it that’d be objectionable to anyone over 8 years old. However, Mr. Popper’s Penguins (2011) this is not.

The reality is that The Penguin Lessons is a few different movies crammed into one. It’s equal parts an inspiring melodrama, a hiding a pet facade against the school’s strict Headmaster (Jonathan Pryce), a slow admission of grief, and a commentary on Argentina’s fascist regime, not unlike last year’s I’m Still Here (2024). Because of this, it’s easy to think that The Penguin Lessons is a simple, cutesy animal picture and nothing more, which is how it’s being marketed. However, the fact that the film takes such a multifaceted approach to its storytelling works for and against its efforts. On one hand, it’s nice to see a film be so ambitious with balancing its many arcs as a means of avoiding stale storytelling. On the other hand, The Penguin Lessons doesn’t do much to subvert expectations either and often rides the rails of similar, unoriginal films that came before it. The deciding factor? It depends how much you’re won over by the film’s pint-sized costar.

The Penguin Lessons follows Tom Michell (Steve Coogan), a pensive English-language professor who accepts a position at a school in Argentina in 1976, following the military coup d’ état that overthrew Isabel Perón’s presidency. Michell has a difficult time connecting with anyone at the school, whether it be his coworkers, the maids who clean his hotel room, or his students divided by the country’s political strife. The closest thing to an emotion that Michell unravels is when he meets a woman at a party his first weekend in Argentina. As the two stroll along the beach, bonding as the sun rises, they come across a penguin in an oil slick. Tom is hesitant, but his date insists they help the penguin. After the two clean up the penguin, they part ways, with the penguin still in Tom’s hotel room. Despite his attempts to return the penguin, he continues to follow him wherever he goes, as Tom realizes he now has a pet.

The penguin, known first as Peter and eventually named Juan Santiago by his maid’s daughter, quickly makes an impression on everyone in his life as Tom does everything in his power to get rid of him, while simultaneously hiding him from the school. However, it’s hard to keep him a secret when everyone around Tom has instant affection for the creature, allowing him to slowly become a conversation starter. What starts as an accidental reveal to the school’s housekeepers, the daughter of which militarizes him in the face of Argentina’s fascist regime, turns into a very intentional means of motivating his class of students to engage with the material.

The Penguin Lessons doesn’t have many unique strengths as a film, as its plot attempts to juggle too many plot points, all to the tune of standard, milquetoast filmmaking from director Peter Cattaneo (The Full Monty (1997), The Rocker (2008)). However, despite its shortcomings, there’s something subtly charming about the relationship between Tom and the penguin that allows the film to build to an emotional final 20 minutes when the film’s plot lines ultimately intersect. Tom’s companionship with the animal works as a charming metaphor for how our relationships with animals can relate back to our lives with others, as he does with his housekeeper’s daughter and ultimate response to the school’s passive approach to the country’s geopolitical climate. The Penguin Lessons provides an authentic, well-structured approach to how an act of simple kindness can ultimately make a world of difference to those around us. In spite of its shortcomings and lack of a vibrant personality, The Penguin Lessons ultimately has its heart in the right place enough to modestly recommend. Depending on your children’s ability to handle two f-bombs and some minor suggestive themes, they might enjoy it as well.

B

Feature image credit to Sony Pictures Classics to CultureMap