An unusual mixture of innocence and pomposity.
Kevin Kline tries his hand at a proper/snootier "Dead
Poet's Society." Though not quite the classic,
"Emperor's Club" still has its moments.
An interesting story with a pertinent
(cinematically unique) message, told fairly well and
scored to perfection, I found myself struggling to
put my finger on that elusive "missing thing."
I'm sure many will disagree, but I think it may be
the casting of Kline. Likable enough, he never quite
fills outs, never quite wraps us up into his
quandaries. Yes, we get it, we see his tribulations,
we even sympathize, but we never wholly crawl up on
screen with him and really "feel" them. I may be
wrong, this may be the fault of the character's
scripting or the direction. Whichever, it's too bad,
because this interesting character could have been
strongly compelling as an out of date relic, a noble,
yet out of touch philosopher grounded in intangible
ideology, for whom, not terribly unlike Socrates,
reality and principals clash. But in the case of this
film, that clash is much subtler.
Faced with the challenge of grading a noble effort
and wanting to cheer it on (as Mr. Hundert), I'm
afraid my deliberation between an "A-" and "B+"
yields a "B+."
Nicely filmed, well acted in general, with a
tremendously proud, engaging musical score, the
composer deserves the largest kudos! Jack Black would
have smartly fit the part of the older Bell, but Joel
Gretsch does a fine job too.
And both the "Senator Scene" and "Book Borrowing
Scene" as well as the last (sort of 4th) act deserve
high praise. If the rest of the film were so strongly
connected, this would have been an easy A.
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