Arguably the greatest legacy of Bill Clinton's time in the White House is that fellatio jokes entered the mainstream. It's damn near impossible these days to find an American comedy that doesn't include a sniggering blow-job reference in the first five minutes, and the new Cameron Diaz comedy "Bad Teacher" is no exception. Of course, such jokes have become like the canary-in-the-coal-mine of Hollywood comedies: Encounter one early on and you know it's going to be a long two hours.
Taking its lead from Terry Zwigoff's "Bad Santa," "Bad Teacher" imagines another hopelessly flawed adult serving as the worst possible role model for the kids in her care. Diaz plays Elizabeth Halsey, a junior high school teacher who, as the tag-line puts it, doesn't give an "F." Oh, she's bad: She drinks in class, she smokes weed, and her life goal is to raise the money to get the breast implants that will help her land a sugar-daddy husband and the nonworking lifestyle she aspires to.
She'd have had good luck at the Roppongi Hills Heartland bar back before 2008's Lehman Shock, but these days, what's a gold-digger to do? Elizabeth isn't exactly happy to still be stuck in a classroom — her lesson plan consists of showing the kids movies while she sleeps off her hangover — but fortunately there's a new teacher in town (Justin Timberlake), and he's a hottie who's also a trust-fund kid. The downside is that he's a dweeby liberal who has his eye set on Amy Squirrel (Lucy Punch), the overly enthusiastic, holier-than-thou teacher who hates everything Elizabeth stands for. There's also a perfectly nice gym teacher (Jason Segel, "The Muppets") who casually pursues Elizabeth, but she considers herself a cut above.