Television Reviews : ‘Evil in Clear River’

If someone expresses the opinion that the Holocaust never happened and that there’s a Jewish conspiracy to take over the world, should that person be fired, publicly censured, or even jailed? What if that person is a teacher who’s passing these opinions on to students? Or the mayor of a small town who’s unashamed about his views?

In “Evil in Clear River” (9 tonight on Channels 7, 3, 10 and 42), Pete Suvak is both, and this “ABC Monday Night Movie” portrays the attempt of one woman to suppress the teacher/mayor’s anti-Semitic statements.

This “fictionalized drama suggested by real events” is as problematic as its subject. The two-hour film is well-acted (especially by Lindsay Wagner in the part of crusading mother Kate McKinnon) and smoothly directed (by Karen Arthur, whose previous TV-movie credits include “The Rape of Richard Beck”).

Yet the film is unsettling for both some right and some wrong reasons: It skirts the issues and displays a moral ambivalence that seems not so much deliberate as a result of a Swiss-cheese script.

“Evil in Clear River” presents some intriguing questions about teacher rights, freedom of speech and the “it-can’t-happen-here” possibilities of town folk who avert their eyes from the fascist tendencies of a charismatic leader. On the other hand, the movie throws a lot of irksome questions: Why aren’t we given some insight into what makes Suvak (played by Randy Quaid) tick? Why do the kids in his classroom apparently swallow his warped view of history unanimously ?

Even though the elements never quite jell, “Evil in Clear River” is well worth a look, if only for Wagner’s performance and for its usefulness as a conversation starter. One more thing: This may be the only film to ever address anti-Semitism without showing a single Jewish character.