The Substitute
Unclear and Present Danger
Jamelle Bouie
4.7 • 660 Ratings
🗓️ 16 February 2024
⏱️ 63 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
For this week’s episode of the podcast, we watched the 1996 action thriller slash high school drama The Substitute, directed by Robert Mandel — a prolific television director — and starring Tom Berenger, Ernie Hudson, Diane Venora, Marc Anthony, Luis Guzmàn and William Forsythe.
In The Substitute, Berenger plays Jonathan Shale, a Vietnam veteran and mercenary who takes a break from the business of wet work after a botched operation in Cuba where several of his men were killed. He returns home to Miami to stay with his girlfriend, Jane Hetzko played by Venora, who is a teacher at a local, troubled high school.
Jane becomes a target of the largest and most dangerous gang at the school, Kings of Destruction, and its leader Juan, played by Anthony, directs his men to attack her. She is seriously injured and while in the hospital, Shale maneuvers to become her substitute. His plan? To take down the gang, which is using the school as essentially an open air drug market.
As he moves to confront Juan, Jonathan discovers that the gang is working with the school’s ambitious and corrupt principal, played by Ernie Hudson, to move and distribute ever larger shipments of drugs from foreign supplies. Eager for revenge after a friendly teacher is killed by Juan, Jonathan gathers his men to make an assault on the gang, its suppliers and their allies.
The tagline for The Substitute is “The most dangerous thing about school used to be the students.” You can watch The Substitute for free on Amazon Prime or on Tubi or Pluto or one of those services.
Our next episode will on Brian DePalma’s 1996 espionage thriller, Mission: Impossible.
Connor Lynch produced this episode. Artwork by Rachel Eck.
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Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | I want you on me. |
| 0:07.0 | Both of you, out! |
| 0:09.0 | What were his exact words? |
| 0:11.0 | That if I didn't back off, I'd wish I did. |
| 0:14.0 | I can't boot him out without definite proof of wrongdoing. |
| 0:16.0 | This guy is dangerous. |
| 0:18.0 | Oh, I've been so happy to see anybody in my whole life. |
| 0:21.7 | What's going on? |
| 0:22.2 | My students are trying to kill me. |
| 0:25.8 | My name's Smith. I'm her substitute. |
| 0:27.8 | Ha, Claudeville. I'm the principal. |
| 0:29.7 | Oh, good to meet you. |
| 0:30.7 | You're not one of our regular selves. |
| 0:32.6 | Yo, Freddy Kruger, knock it off. |
| 0:34.2 | It's not a manicure shop. |
| 0:41.3 | Who's the keys up in the. Yeah, you know. Oh. I'm in charge of this class. You ever been shot? |
| 0:45.3 | Mr. Whatever your name is? |
| 0:47.3 | Yeah, I'm in shot. |
| 0:49.3 | Who is he? |
| 0:51.3 | The other day I was talking and I just happened to glance back and weirdest thing happened. |
| 0:56.0 | What? |
| 0:57.0 | They were listening. |
... |
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