As good as the book itself.
Killing Mr. Griffin is an amazing movie that keeps you wondering up until the very end. The movie is as good as the book itself!!

Amy Jo
The movie is awesome as far as tv movies go. Amy Jo was amazing, definitely proved how talented she is...a definite plus for amy jo fans! The character she played was a good girl seeking popularity and the attention of her crash that most of us can relate too, so when she gets the chance despite the fact it involves a joke gone wrong, she she goes for it. Soon she becomes driven by guilt when her teacher ends up dead from the practical joke she took place in. Movie is much better than my description and acting is pretty good, but Amy Jo steals the spot light.

Killing your teacher, even accidentally, is not a smart move, boys and girls
I had to remind myself that I checked out "Killing Mr. Griffin" because Michelle Williams was in it and I had thrown all of her movies that I had not seen into my queue because she has done some fairly interesting Independent films since "Dawons's Creek." However, this made for television movie predates those dates. It was not really at the top of the queue, but I have a lot of movies on short, long and very long wait ahead of it and was looking for a horror film for Saturday night and this is what arrived.

The heroine of the film turns out to be Susan McConnell (Amy Jo Johnson, from "Felicity"), who used to be the favorite student of Mr. John Griffin (Jay Thomas), her English teacher. But her approaching senior year, boys, or other indeterminate issues related to teenage angst have set her back. The class is discussing and reading aloud Shakespeare's "Tragedy of Julius Caesar" and Amy's reading of the title role at the start of the assassination scene lacks the arrogance that Mr. Griffin demands. A few harsh words from the teacher send Amy back to her seat in tears. It is after this point that we learn that Amy is one of his better students. This is a surprise because the way he treats her is indistinguishable from the way he treats Mark Kinney (Scott Bairstow), a student with arrogance oozing from every pore who does not like being forced to apologize to his teacher before the class.

Mark exercises the divine right of the Big Man on Campus to take down the teacher who pointedly asks him, "Has anybody ever told you 'no' and really meant it?" So he gathers his small group of fans and gets them to go along with what he describes as a prank: they will kidnap Mr. Griffin, humiliate him the way he has humiliated them, get him to beg and videotape it. Either Griffin will treat them right, or the video will makes its way around the school. Mark gets his best bud Dave Ruggles (Mario López) to get Susan to be part of the plot. She does not want to, but changes her mind when she is the target of the teacher's barbs. Susan delivers the teacher to the trap, but when he is attacked his first words are for her to run to safety and her second thoughts kick in at that point. We are encouraged to have such thoughts about Mr. Griffin when he chats with his wife about what he is trying to accomplish in the classroom, but when class is in session he just seems like an angry burnout who is incapable of making a connection of convincing his students that he cares about either them or the material. Just film one of his classes and the principal is going to show this guy the door.

Short version of what happens at that point is that Mr. Griffin ends up dead and the only people who do not know who did it and how it ended up happening are the characters in this movie. So Susan and her classmates think they are in a mystery, when this 1997 television movie is just another teenage horror show. Susan ignores several obvious clues until she finally finds proof positive. Does this mean that the film will try to overstep its limitations to come up with an important or at least intrinsically interesting way of turning the tables? No it does not, and if you have not agreed to with this rating by that point then the coda provided by Susan's father will certainly have you reaching for your remote to at least spare you from wasting time on the credits.

No closed caption or english subtiles.
I am not happy with that dvd cause it says has closed caption and english subtiles on dvd but i put that dvd in player and it has no closed caption or english subtiles, It is not fair for deaf or hard of hearing people. That dvd looks good but no closed caption or english subtiles. U need to put them for deaf people to watch that dvd. I put one star cause no closed caption.

Great page-to-screen adaptation
Lois Duncan's Killing Mr. Griffin was an interesting novel in its own right, but this made for television movie manages to improve on the original. Amy Jo Johnson, the pretty young actress many may recognize as the former Pink Power Ranger, stars as Susan McConnell. Susan is a good student, yet she is shy and awkward around the popular crowd. She is especially shy around Dave (former "Saved by the Bell" player Mario Lopez), the handsome jock she has a crush on. Mark, the leader of the group Dave hangs with, is bent on becoming student body president and the most popular guy in high school. After being humiliated by Mr. Griffin, the notoriously strict English teacher, Mark develops a plan to get revenge. They will kidnap Mr. Griffin as a prank to humiliate him as he has humiliated students. Susan is unwittingly sucked into the plan by her feelings for Dave and her desire to become popular. Dave is pressured into using Susan's obvious feelings for him to a nasty advantage. The plan to kidnap Griffin goes almost as planned...but then he dies unexpectedly, and things spin out of control. The climax of the film is better than that in the novel, with just enough suspense to keep viewers hooked. Overall, this movie was excellent, and serves as a grim reminder of what peer pressure is capable of. The only qualm I had was that it was not a theatrical release. Highly recommended.