Conrack

I not only consider this to be the best film that Jon Voight (Midnight Cowboy, Coming Home) has ever done, but a real tribute to teachers.

Despite incredible odds, Pat Conroy (Voight) managed to reach a group of students and bring them from nowhere to a basic literacy and awareness of the world. His methods made be criticized by bureaucratic dinosaurs like Mr. Skeffington (Hume Cronyn), but teachers like Conroy will always be winners.

Voight really showed that he had a love for teaching and that it was a natural high for him. He didn't overplay the role, and I found him to be totally believable. Voight is Conrack.

Besides a love of teaching, we also see another important point in this film. No matter how good you are at your job, if you rock the boat, the bureaucrats will get you.

Not a lot of people have seen this one. It's like a lot of other films about teachers in an uphill struggle against apathetic or difficult students. They all seem to be set in inner-city environments, but "Conrack" has a different approach - it takes you down south, out to an isolated island just off the coast of South Carolina. It helps that this is a true story (or as true as a film adapted from a book adapted from real life can be).

Martin Ritt was a very good director, known mainly for "Hud", which he did about ten years prior. Jon Voight has never been more charismatic than this, he's like a shining beacon of inspiration throughout the film. You really believe that he believes every word he is saying, and that adds a ton of weight to his character. I really enjoyed Hume Cronyn here, he's somehow mischievous without being friendly, serious and a little bit mean. It's a great characterization.

The passion in Voight's sparkling eyes seems to be more than what carries the film. It's a great story, and a fantastic reflection of Pat Conroy's writing. The story is powerful, convincing, and exceptionally inspiring.

I have also watched "Conrack" several times in the past few years and I believe it is the best movie out there about actual classroom teaching. We have "To Sir, With Love", "Blackboard Jungle" and "Mr Holland's Opus", but this film spends most of its time in class with the students.

We get to see Conroy struggle with the system, the absence of facilities and resources as well as the initial lack of desire among his charges. How he brings his "babies" out of their shells and creates a learning environment is simply magical. The awkwardness of those first lessons is all too real. This movie is pure teaching!

Another realistic education film that comes to mind is "Stand and Deliver."

Check out first few minutes of "Conrack" and you'll be hooked. Watch for it on Fox Movie Channel as they often show the letterbox version.

Martin Ritt seems to be a director who was always interested in social issues (as the son of immigrants, he had every incentive to be so, especially since he was blacklisted in the '50s). "Conrack" is based on Pat Conroy's novel "The Water is Wide", about his own experience in 1969 teaching a school of impoverished black children about the outside world, much to the chagrin of the right-wing superintendent (Hume Cronyn). What added to the movie's strength was the cultural and historical context: Conroy (Jon Voight) frustratedly tells another teacher how many of the children don't know about Paul Newman, Sidney Poitier, the Vietnam War, or even where Vietnam is. He proceeds to enlighten them about all these factors.

Somewhere, I read a complaint that when Conroy played music for the children, he only played white music. The truth is, you can't blame the movie for that; it was based on Conroy's real experience. Either way, the movie's a real gem.

I first saw this film when I was in the 8th grade and I remember that it had a profound affect on me then. I saw in again about a year ago (I am now 29) and it still moved me in similar ways. This is a great movie that personifies the struggle of "principle vs. pragmistism". Voight's character is the idealist teacher that won't give in to any psuedo-racist leanings of the Superintendent, Mr. Skeffington. That story also personifies the struggle of how older people often resist change, and more specifically, cultural change. Often at the expense of children. When these battles finally come to a boil, Pat Conroy loses and pragmatism reigns triumphant. Or does it? The children that he has to leave are better off for knowing him, more exposed to the "real" world and to classical music. The other teacher at the school gained respect for him and he learned much about himself. A great film with a heart-breaking ending. I recomend that anyone who enjoyed the film to read the book, "The Water is Wide", by Pat Conroy. It will stay with you!