THE SCHOOL OF MANIPULATIVE TV WRITING NOW IN SESSION.

Byline: David Kronke Television Critic

A lot of us have seen enough dedicated, crusading-teacher movies to last the rest of our days and are wondering when Hollywood will begin making films about mediocre burned-out teachers. But if you think about it, the crusading-teacher movie is just the mediocre-teacher film in reverse.

After all, there's usually only one noble educator. And then, there are all those who warn him/her, ``Don't make waves,'' or, ``We're just here to process these kids to the next grade,'' or, ``The odds are too stacked against us.''

Which brings us to ``The Ron Clark Story,'' a film ``inspired'' by a true story. Matthew Perry stars as Clark, who left a cozy job in North Carolina to inspire underachievers at a Harlem grade school.

A job plops into Ron's lap when he wanders into an altercation outside a school - ``You can have the little bastards,'' the ex-teacher growls before escaping. Ron requests the school's toughest class, with the lowest test scores in the city. Even one of his students refers to her classmates as ``losers.''

Naturally, to say things don't go well at first is to underestimate the traditional narrative arc of this sort of film. His pupils find him a joke; one takes bets on how long he'll last. For the requisite brief moment, he does give up.

Soon, however, Ron wins the kids over, particularly (and unconvincingly) when he performs a rap song listing all the U.S. presidents. Perry frankly looks ridiculous doing it, but his charges adore it. Even when he collapses in class from pneumonia, his homemade videotapes enrapture his hardscrabble class.

The obligatory naysayer's role here goes to Principal Turner (Ernie Hudson), who, of course, is won over by Ron's never-say-die charisma. (In the film, we meet only one other teacher in the entire school, who delivers a mere two lines).

Ron even manages a chaste friendship with an aspiring actress (Melissa De Sousa).

And, of course, no film of this nature is complete without the line, ``You are learning things that are far more valuable than anything you can get in a book.''

The film, it almost goes without saying, is shamelessly manipulative, but does it have any larger messages about our educational system? Consider: An utterly dedicated teacher who has no outside life manages to change the fortunes of his students. But what about students whose teachers actually have friends and families?

David Kronke, [phone]

david.kronke(at)dailynews.com

THE RON CLARK STORY - Two and one half stars

What: A teacher inspires hard-luck Harlem students. ``Inspired'' by a true story.

Where: TNT.

When: 8, 10 and midnight tonight; 10 p.m. and midnight Thursday; noon Saturday, 9 a.m. and 11:30 p.m. Aug. 27.

In a nutshell: Manipulative, but not ineffective.

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Photo:

Matthew Perry portrays the schoolteacher who took on the challenge of educating Harlem's most incorrigible students, in ``The Ron Clark Story,'' 8 tonight on TNT.