My review on the movie Lean on me (1989)

 This documentary of a true event, directed by John D. Avildson, is set against the backdrop of “Eastside High School, an used-to-be Honorable educational institution and the challenges a Principal had to face to bring it to its usual glory. Now this movie directed by the famous Avildson, who had directed the Blockbuster Rocky (boxing) series did not lose his touch with this one as well. This movie had all the elements, a Avildson directed film has, a small start for the protagonist, a need for improvement, the hero’s efforts, a kinda dragging but still entertaining mid part showcasing the hero’s improvement, a series of bad twists in the second half to increase the tension, finally a big public showdown, showing the support people have towards the hero and his success. This method of Avildson worked awesomely for his previous hits, but for a true story based documentary, it did not suit well. His methods needed a powerful antagonist like Apollo Creed in Rocky I, and it worked well for the movie but this event lacked a powerful antagonist, so I wish the director could have, kind of deviated from his methods to suit the story better. But the end product was more than satisfactory for me and that’s all that matters. 

And the music director was the same person as for Rocky I and his style had shown through here too but unlike the director’s methods, his methods suited the scenes just fine. The punk rock guitar bgm to showcase the chaos, the mostly black students caused, was amazing. The renewed energy in the new high pitched school song also was pleasant to the ears and along with brilliant performance of Morgan Freeman, it delivered the unusual commercialism in the song amazingly well.

The screenplay was written well as well and some of the themes shown in the beginning were exceptionally good and was well-conveyed by the director. The part that stood out to me was the scene in the beginning which was meant as a A day at Ruined Eastwood High School. At the end of that scene, a hoodlum would lock a student inside a locker and as the camera reverses and shows the state of the empty school hall at the end of the day, with the screams of the locked student “Help me” in the background made it seem like the school itself was begging somebody to help it recover to its usual glory.

Morgan Freeman, amazingly played his part as a radicalist, and an honest to good but exceptionally strict and also compassionate principal. He had balanced all sides of his character really well. While I do get that this is a story of that school and not that particular person, I wish they had shown more of that young “Crazy Joe” Clark as a radical teacher in action and what exactly made him crazy and why his colleagues and the authorities hated him so much. But they had showcased well why the teachers hated him after he became the principal of Eastside High. He was a dictator to the teachers and had his own share of troubles initially with the teachers, punishing some of his good teachers, and even dismissing one. But as usual in Avildson’s way, he realizes it due to the help of a very good friend. The supporting role of Dr. Napier and the Vice-principal were showcased well.

Director Avildson, while stuck to his own methods, did three awesome things in my opinion, one was not tampering with the image of the antagonist, which, in this story, was just an angry mother of a black hoodlum who was also expelled by principal Clark. To increase the protagonist’s image, if he had tampered with the mom’s image anymore, the film would have lost its touch on reality. Secondly, his showcase of the spoiled school was good since it actually explained not only why principal Clark was needed but also explained some of his crazy behavior. Third was the reaction of the students that he showed constantly in every scene. It not only made us remember it was happening in a school, it also made it much more realistic. The school girl character was also a nice touch to the film. 

All-in-all, in my opinion, it was a very good movie.

Name: Jai Karaneesh Sundar

Reg.no : 2022506020 

Dept: Information Technology(I.T.)