Cheap The Emperor's Club (Widescreen Edition) (DVD) (Kevin Kline, Emile Hirsch) (Michael Hoffman) Price

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Customer Reviews of The Emperor's Club (Widescreen Edition)

Like Dead Poets, the movie is set in an elite prep school for boys. The school is steeped in tradition and the students will inevitably be the leaders of society. Using many clichéd techniques, Kevin Kline's character of William Hundert tries to inspire his students. Good teachers develop relationships with students over time, but this does not happen in The Emperor's Club. Mr. Hundert is revered much too soon. Sure, there are a few new teacher pranks, but they seem a bit unrealistic. Though Kline plays the role masterfully, his character is somewhat one dimensional, and the writers try to fix this situation. He has a love interest. The woman he eventually marries is the wife of a colleague. The two begin to fall in love just before she leaves for England. After a divorce she returns to marry Kline. What a surprise! It was either an attempt to give Kline a life outside of the school or to quell suspicions about the character's sexuality.

Still, there are strengths in the film. One character, Sedwedge Bell, played by Emile Hirsch, is a troubled youth who challenges Hundert. Naturally Hundert takes an interest in the young man. While he does reach the Bell, the young man is unwilling to change, and he remains this way even to adulthood. Kline's character also has to address ethical flaws in his judgment, which never really get resolved. These realistic situations could have made The Emperor's Club a wonderful film. Instead it is simply not bad.

For anyone who likes good acting and good stories
I think the constant but understandable comparisons to Dead Poets Society will hurt this movie, causing people to dismiss The Emperor's Club as a copy of a classic. Besides similar names, both films center around a charismatic teacher at a boys' school and focus heavily on tradition. However, the similarities end there. I love Dead Poets Society, but I hate to see this movie hurt by that one's popularity.

Kevin Kline plays Mr. Hundert, an extremely flawed but extremely dedicated and noble teacher. In his attempts at giving young men a love of history, he finds himself helping a student for the wrong reasons, and in the wrong ways.

The movie takes place in two different times, with a constantly changing cast. Kline is the only actor who appears all the way through it, with older actors replacing younger ones in certain roles. Some of the other characters come and go too quickly, and the movie probably should have been longer, so we could more fully understand and feel how all of these lives intersect with Mr. Hundert. Still, Kline's skillful study of a man constantly facing difficult choices makes up for the sometimes-rushed nature of the narrative.

I recommend The Emperor's Club for anyone who likes good acting and good stories, not just for fans of Dead Poets Society.

Reaches for greatness--and misses
Finally, someone makes a movie like Dead Poet's Society! Well, no, not exactly. I'm a sucker for Kevin Kline, and it's hard to argue with his performance--or Emile Hirsch's--in this film. But the script screws the actors. This isn't a terrible movie--it's a pleasant enough way to pass a few hours--but the promise of the obvious comparisons to the Robin Williams hit makes it a disappointment. And just wait for the whammy that hits ten minutes from the end--a total repeat of the plot from the first half of the movie. The lesson, apparently, is that some folks never learn from their mistakes. Including Hollywood folk who tag good actors with a bad script...