DEAD POETS SOCIETY 3 страница

NEIL

Hey, you coming to the study group tonight?

TODD

Uh, no, no I, uh, I've got some history I

wanna do.

NEIL

Suit yourself.

INT. TODD'S ROOM - EVENING

Todd is seated at his desk. He scrawls " CARPE DIEM" across a blank page of his notebook. He looks at it for a few moments before crumpling it up and opening up his Chemistry book.

INT. ENTRANCEWAY - NIGHT

Hager comes down the stairs. Knox is looking at one of the old class photos on the walls.

HAGER

Ready Overstreet?

Knox reluctantly follows after Dr. Hager.

KNOX

Ready to go sir.

EXT. ROAD - NIGHT

The car leaves Welton and drives towards the Danburry's house.

INT / EXT DANBURRY'S HOUSE - NIGHT

The doorbell rings.

MRS DANBURRY (O. S. )

Chet, can you get that?

CHET (O. S. )

I can't, Mom.

CHRIS (O. S. )

I'll get it.

The door opens and Knox is awe-struck by the beautiful girl (CHRIS) who has answered the door.

CHRIS

Can I help you?

Knox manages to break out of his daze.

KNOX

Hi. Knox Overstreet. Uh, Dr. Hager.

CHRIS

Hi.

KNOX

This is the Danburry's, right?

CHRIS

Are you here to see Chet?

KNOX

Mrs. Danburry?

Chris begins to laugh as Mrs. Danburry arrives behind her.

CHRIS

No.

MRS DANBURRY

Sorry. Thank you Chris. I'm Mrs. Danburry.

You must be Knox.

KNOX

Yes.

MRS DANBURRY

(to Dr. Hager)

Back by nine.

(to Knox)

Please come in.

CHET (O. S. )

Chris, come on, what are you doing?

CHRIS

Chet, I'm coming.

Knox enters the house, his mind still hung up on Chris as MR DANBURRY

comes out of the living room to meet him.

MR DANBURRY

Knox. How are you? Joe Danburry.

KNOX

Nice to meet you sir.

MR DANBURRY

Well he's the spitting image of his father,

isn't he. How is he? Come on in.

CHET (O. S. )

Chris!

KNOX

He's great. He just did a big case for GM.

CHRIS (O. S. )

I'm coming.

MR DANBURRY

I know where you're headed, like father

like son, huh?

INT. STUDENT LOUNGE - NIGHT

Several students are throwing darts at a small rubber skeleton hanging

from the bulletin board. Various students are studying and playing games.

Meeks and Pitts are sitting at one table working on their " hi-fi system".

Meeks is waving an antenna around with no luck. Pitts points out to him that he forgot to plug it in. Neil, Cameron, and Charlie are working on their trig homework.

CAMERON

Just replace these numbers here with " x",

for " x" and " y".

NEIL

Of course.

CAMERON

Of course, so what's the problem?

Charlie enters the room and closes the door behind him, leaning up

against it heavily.

CHARLIE

How was dinner?

KNOX

Huh?

CHARLIE

How was dinner?

KNOX

Terrible. Awful.

He leaves the door and sits down with the other boys.

CHARLIE

Why? What happened?

KNOX

Tonight, I met the most beautiful girl

in my entire life.

NEIL

Are you crazy? What's wrong with that?

KNOX

She's practically engaged. To Chet Danburry.

CHARLIE

That guy could eat a football.

PITTS

That's too bad.

KNOX

Too bad? It's worse than too bad Pitsie,

it's a tragedy. A girl this beautiful in

love with such a jerk.

PITTS

All the good ones go for jerks, you

know that.

CAMERON

Ahh, forget her. Open your trig book and

try and figure out problem five.

KNOX

I can't just forget her Cameron. And I

can't think about trig.

The radio Meeks and Pitts were working on begins letting out a high

pitched hum.

PITTS

We got it.

MEEKS

Holy cow.

Mr. Hager walks into the room.

HAGER

All right gentlemen, five minutes. Let's

go.

The students quickly pack up their gear and prepare to leave. Pitts tries to hide the radio in his lap. Charlie leans in close to Knox.

CHARLIE

Did you see her naked?

KNOX

Very funny Dalton.

HAGER

That wouldn't be a radio in your lap,

would it Mr. Pitts?

PITTS

No sir. Science experiment, radar.

Meeks holds up the antenna as if demonstrating it.

INT. KEATING'S CLASSROOM - DAY

Keating sits at his desk at the front of the classroom and opens up one of his books.

KEATING

Gentlemen, open your text to page

twenty-one of the introduction. Mr.

Perry, will you read the opening

paragraph of the preface, entitled

" Understanding Poetry"?

NEIL

Understanding Poetry, by Dr. J. Evans

Pritchard, Ph. D. To fully understand

poetry, we must first be fluent with

its meter, rhyme, and figures of speech.

Then ask two questions: One, how artfully

has the objective of the poem been

rendered, and two, how important is that

objective. Question one rates the poem's

perfection, question two rates its

importance. And once these questions have

been answered, determining a poem's

greatest becomes a relatively simple

matter.

Keating gets up from his desk and prepares to draw on the chalk board.

NEIL

If the poem's score for perfection is

plotted along the horizontal of a graph,

and its importance is plotted on the

vertical, then calculating the total

area of the poem yields the measure of

its greatness.

Keating draws a corresponding graph on the board and the students

dutifully copy it down.

NEIL

A sonnet by Byron may score high on the

vertical, but only average on the

horizontal. A Shakespearean sonnet, on

the other hand, would score high both

horizontally and vertically, yielding a

massive total area, thereby revealing the

poem to be truly great. As you proceed

through the poetry in this book, practice

this rating method. As your ability to

evaluate poems in this matter grows, so

will - so will your enjoyment and

understanding of poetry.

Neil sets the book down and takes off his glasses. The student sitting

across from him is discretely trying to eat. Keating turns away from

the chalkboard with a smile.

KEATING

Excrement. That's what I think of Mr. J.

Evans Pritchard. We're not laying pipe,

we're talking about poetry.

Cameron looks down at the graph he copied into his notes and quickly

scribbles it out.

KEATING

I mean, how can you describe poetry like

American Bandstand? I like Byron, I give

him a 42, but I can't dance to it.

Charlie suddenly appear to become interested in the class.

KEATING

Now I want you to rip out that page.

The students look at Keating as if he has just gone mad.

KEATING

Go on, rip out the entire page. You heard

me, rip it out. Rip it out!

Charlie looks around at the others. He then looks down at his own notes, which consists of drawing breasts.

KEATING

Go on, rip it out.

Charlie rips the page out and holds it up.

KEATING

Thank you Mr. Dalton. Gentlemen, tell you

what, don't just tear out that page, tear

out the entire introduction. I want it

gone, history. Leave nothing of it. Rip

it out. Rip! Begone J. Evans Pritchard,

Ph. D. Rip, shred, tear. Rip it out. I

want to hear nothing but ripping of Mr.

Pritchard.

Meeks looks around reluctantly and then finally begins tearing out pages.

KEATING

We'll perforate it, put it on a roll.

Keating sees Cameron still hesitating.

KEATING

It's not the bible, you're not going to

go to hell for this. Go on, make a clean

tear, I want nothing left of it.

Keating goes over to his room. Cameron turns around to Neil.

CAMERON

We shouldn't be doing this.

NEIL

Rip, rip, rip!

Neil makes Cameron turn back around.

KEATING (O. S. )

Rip it out, rip!

From outside the classroom, Mr. McAllister hears all the noise and sees all the students ripping out the pages. He bursts into the room.

MCALLISTER

What the hell is going on here?

The boys all turn around in shock. Charlie stuffs a crumpled page into his mouth. Keating emerges from his room with a waste paper basket.

KEATING

I don't hear enough rips.

MCALLISTER

Mr. Keating.

KEATING

Mr. McAllister.

MCALLISTER

I'm sorry, I- I didn't know you were

here.

KEATING

I am.

MCALLISTER

Ahh, so you are. Excuse me.

Mr. McAllister slowly backs out of the classroom.

KEATING

Keep ripping gentlemen. This is a battle,

a war. And the casualties could be your

hearts and souls.

Keating holds out the basket to Charlie who spits out a wad of paper.

KEATING

Thank you Mr. Dalton. Armies of academics

going forward, measuring poetry. No, we

will not have that here. No more of Mr.

J. Evans Pritchard. Now in my class you

will learn to think for yourselves again.

You will learn to savor words and language.

No matter what anybody tells you, words and

ideas can change the world. I see that look

in Mr. Pitt's eye, like nineteenth century

literature has nothing to do with going to

business school or medical school. Right?

Maybe. Mr. Hopkins, you may agree with him,

thinking " Yes, we should simply study our

Mr. Pritchard and learn our rhyme and meter

and go quietly about the business of

achieving other ambitions. " I have a little

secret for ya. Huddle up. Huddle up!

The boys get up from their seats and gather around Keating in the center of the class.

KEATING

We don't read and write poetry because

it's cute. We read and write poetry

because we are members of the human race.

And the human race is filled with passion.

Medicine, law, business, engineering,

these are all noble pursuits, and necessary

to sustain life. But poetry, beauty,

romance, love, these are what we stay alive

for. To quote from Whitman: " O me, o life

of the questions of these recurring, of the

endless trains of the faithless, of cities

filled with the foolish. What good amid

these, o me, o life? Answer: that you are

here. That life exists, and identity.

That the powerful play goes on, and you

may contribute a verse. That the powerful

play goes on and you may contribute a verse.

Keating looks up at Todd.

Keating

What will your verse be?

INT. HEAD OF CAFETERIA - DAY

The cafeteria is filled with students and teachers standing before the tables saying grace.

ALL