Dead Poets Society (Robin Williams, Robert Sean Leonard)
Those who love Dead Poets Society love it a lot. An impartial viewer would see some of the film's flaws and remark on them, but as one who has loved this movie from the moment I first saw it about a dozen years ago, I suppose I should simply be up front and admit that my impartiality is jarbled. The movie thrills me every time I see it, it touches me every time I see it, and it motivates me every time I see it. I sought to read and write more poetry immediately after having seen this picture, and I am very glad I did. More importantly though, I began to look at the way the world works through a different set of eyes. High praise for a mere film? Perhaps, but I know a few friends who have said the same thing about it, so at least I know I'm not alone.
Over the years, I have read some pretty scathing reviews of the film, and for the most part they are fair critiques. After all, this is a Robin Williams vehicle, and that alone can often be a crapshoot, to say the least. One of the most common jabs is that the poetry hinted at in the title is read in portions but is never explored in the film; the students at "Hellton" academy never really show an enthusiasm for the poems, only for their unorthodox teacher. My response is that the film is only 126 minutes long (well, depending on which version you watch -- there is a longer, extended version available), and that the director Peter Weir is assuming that the students have enough time in class to learn from their teacher without having to depict this evident fact. By the end of the film, regardless of how much or how little knowledge they have about Walt Whitman, they have at least recognized the potential they each have to forge their own destiny, which is arguably the film's over-riding theme.
Since Dead Poets Society takes place in a prep school (circa 1959), this aforementioned recognition provides a richer dramatic involvement with the story. Williams is John Keating, the new English teacher who, on the first day, takes his class into the hallway to look at the vintage photos on the wall to remind them of their own mortality, and on the second day, he gets his class to rip the stuffy "how to read poetry" introduction from their textbooks. Naturally, by encouraging these offsprings of the well-to-do to think for themselves, he soon becomes the number one target for the headmasters and his peers. The boys have their share of conflict as well. Aspiring actor Neil (Robert Sean Leonard) must contend with a tyrannical father (Kurtwood Smith), his roommate Todd Anderson (Ethan Hawke) struggles to break free from a deep shyness stemmed by his neglectful parents, and the lovestruck Knox Overstreet (Josh Charles) desparately tries to win the affections of a woman from another school, who is "practically engaged" to the head of the football team.
Yeah, some of these plot points seem familiar, but they are handled with unbridled energy, formidable performances and careful dialogue. As the movie unfolds, we hear Keating's pearls of wisdom with growing clarity, until the culmination of its final scene, which remains one of my favourite cinematic endings ever. Directly preceded by a witchhunt scene ripe for debate, I dare not divulge its content, but can only say it will translate as thoroughly inspiring for some, and infinitely cheesy for others, depending on your personal involvement with the material.
