The reviewer who stated this was about 'thicko' schoolkids is clearly a tadge 'thick' him/her self as clearly he/she was perusing something totally different; maybe it was their usual daily read of The Beano or Comic Cuts or The Telegraph... This superbly directed film is actually about kids who stood up for themselves and refused to be beaten on their bottoms by perverted teachers who appear to get some kick from bullying people smaller than themselves... and Jim Broadbent is brilliant as the radical teacher intent on putting The System to rights... the camera-work and direction is masterful (the opening scene of kids being ;herded and patrolled as though they are fenced cattle is little short of superb) but the real heroes are the kids... they made me feel proud!

This shows what comprehensive schools were really like in the 80s. Forget the unrealistic Grange Hill with the goodlooking cast of rough but good hearted working class kids, Birth of a nation shows the disturbing truth. Class after class of ugly, aggressive teenagers. Thick, hateful savages with speech impediments. It felt like I was watching a documentary.

Birth of a nation was clearly made as a piece of political properganda that focuses on how corporal punishment doesn't work. And how qualifications in comprehensive schools are worthless because there are no jobs for unemployable thickos who spend their days smoking behind the bikeshed and extorting money from younger children.

Thank God for smartphones and zero hour contracts, because apparently bored school leavers who couldn't get jobs in those days would hang around outside the school gates to be antisocial. What saddos. Wouldn't they be happier at home in front of the TV?

Jim Broadbent (aka Roy Slater in OFAH) was believable as a teacher because he was so ugly. But I found some of the messages in this film bizarre. Like how one of the teachers pulled his pants down on school grounds while looking at a poster of a naked women and then proceeded to wear a thong. Were they insinuating he's gay and getting off on spanking the boys?

Despite how miserable and bleak it was, I actually enjoyed watching it because I felt like I was watching something real, not the fake, sugar-coated, rubbish that tries to cover up reality.