“Oh Captain, My Captain” were words immortalized in the poem by Walt Whitman.
This poem was written as sort of an elegiac rendition after the assassination of the then President Abraham Lincoln. It signifies how America was left without a guiding light after his demise.
The penultimate sequence in ‘Dead poets society’ echoes the same profound sentiment with the same profound lines.
This movie, directed by Peter Weir and starring Robin Williams, that won the Academy Award for best original screenplay, is for anyone who bears association with the written word. This is a movie about a teacher who comes to teach a group of young, enthusiastic boys and employs a different perspective in his teaching. He delves into the depth of poetry and deploys unconventional methods – all to the students’ amazement.
He teaches them to question every accepted norm, and in the process earns the ire of a lot of people, and the movie in turn does the same – questions norms of validation, acceptance and explores every fallacy of the human experience.
Dead Poet’s society encompasses a wide spectrum of human emotions so brilliantly – that one shudders to pen it down for the fear of not being able to do justice to it.
There is a platitude I associate with this film, one that is befitting to describe the experience that is this movie – “Life beats down and crushes the soul, and Art reminds you that you have one” .
Also Read – Robin Williams – Yays of his career
This is perhaps one of the most sublime works of cinema ever created. I have refrained from giving away much of the plot, for the fear of ruining this experience for you- but if you haven’t – one must not miss this movie. And once you do, come back to this piece of text and you will realise.
Carpe Diem. (Seize the day)