mikel weisser

I work in a school that was totally struggling and considered hopeless, marked as "failing" and basically in the same position as Eastside High in Paterson, NJ, the subject and setting of "Lean on Me." "Lean on Me" is a very good, nearly great movie. But better than that it is the true story of a true hero who truly made a difference (http://www.joeclarkspeaker.com/index.html.)

Even if i wasn't a teacher, "Lean on Me" is a solidly recommendable film. Fine workmanship in depicting the underdog who deserves to win from the director of "Rocky." Justifably award winning acting by Morgan Freeman, well before he became a stereotype of himself. BUT, better than the traditional "movie-ishness" of the picture, the story is not only a story of hope, but it is a true and ongoing lesson that real commitment can create real change.

The whole process of the often startling and occasionally unpleasant shock and force necessary to rebuild a dangerously failing school is accurately portrayed. And so is the joyous feeling sensing the turn around taking place.

Even if you never learned anyone's name from the film, the story will inspire. Even if you think of none of the ideas of it, you cannot help but feel its heart.

Just finished reading a very lucid and well prepared argument against the redux version of the film released in 2001. I must admit, at the moment i am neither particularly lucid nor well prepared, but i found the redux version superior to the original release for several reasons, a few of which i suspect to be sound. Clarity. I am as much a fan of drug induced incoherence as anyone (a quick stroll through my other IMDbposted remarks should prove that); but the expanse of the redone film film with its little morality play Playboy bunny arc and Renoir homage French Plantation sequence adds so much moral weight to the vision that it is barely the same film. The 1979 version is like an acid trip, jumping from one great scene to the next where the mind spend much of its time trying to catch up. In the Redux version all scenes seem connected, everything makes sense, even if the sense is somewhat uglier than the original. To me the French plantation sequence is of paramount importance to establishing the gravity of the film as a grand indictment and not just a heady horror story with intellectual presumptions.

Sure, rent either, preferably both, but i believe if you do rent both you'll agree the extra clarity and gravity of the longer version was worth the 22 year wait.