An isolated English teacher in pakistan falls in love with his student only to be kidnapped by the taliban, his only chance of winning his love and life back is to teach English in 10 days to Osama Bin laden’s successor.

Wow Thanks claude mclver. I have not started writing yet and was just exploring this idea and posted. You have given me a lot to think about.

Interesting idea. What I can't get over is why kidnap someone to make them teach English? (Perhaps Al Qaeda just wanted to shut down the school but when they find the teacher they realize they can put him to use?) What hope does the teacher (and audience) have that Al Qaeda won't just kill him when they are done with him?

There should be more jeopardy all around. What if the Al Qaeda leader wants someone to teach English to his daughter, which would make him a hypocrite and threaten his power. So it has to be done secretly, thus giving the teacher something of a bargaining chip. What if the daughter and the teacher THEN fall in love?

What if the teacher was really an undercover CIA operative? What if finding his soul mate was the last thing he expected. What if he thought finding the Al Qaeda leader was a suicide mission, but now he's got a reason to live and escape back to America (with the daughter of course).

As far as the ticking clock, I would only include it if you tell us the stakes. Like...
"An kidnapped American English teacher has 10 days to prep Al Qaeda's top leader for a speech that will change the world"

I think that you should retain the specific number of days. Like Jim Corona says, it does provide a ticking clock. More importantly though, it begs the question of why: why does he need to learn English in such a short time?
As to whether 10 days is too short, I feel this is something that should be answered in the script. In the pitch it does seem unreasonable, but perhaps that is the point?