Dead Poets Society
1989  PG  DRAMA  2h 8min
CAST— Robin Williams, Robert Sean Leonard, Ethan Hawke, Josh Charles, Gale Hansen, Dylan Kussman, Allelon Ruggiero, James Waterston, Norman Lloyd, Kurtwood Smith, Lara Flynn Boyle
MUSIC— Maurice Jarre  DIRECTOR— Peter Weir

     Robin Williams delivers a sterling performance in this unconventional teen drama with a supporting cast of young up-and-coming talent (well, they were young back in ’89). A prep school, filled to the rafters with the rich and privileged youth of 1959, has been a strict, by-the-book institution of boredom for a hundred years. The faculty soon acquires a new English teacher whose methods seem a bit unorthodox. He begins to instill in his seemingly passive students a passion for poetry, teaching them to look beyond the writing and to feel the images and words contained therein. He inspires a close-knit band of friends to form The Dead Poets Society, a club that meets secretly to discuss how poetry affects them, to read from the classics and even their own compositions. They become even stronger as friends and poetry opens brand new literary doors to them, all under the watchful gaze of their inspirational teacher. But the faculty soon begins to wonder if his teaching methods are, indeed, sound… Everything about this film comes from the heart, from the youthful exuberance of the school boys to the wonderful, Oscar-nominated performance by Williams. Film lovers, take notice. Carpe diem. Oscar-winner for Best Original Screenplay.
OUR RATING— ****