The fleeting moment it is one of those films that everyone has seen at least once in their life: a film that has managed to enter the collective imagination to the point that some of its phrases have become commonly and widely used. Directed by Peter Weir and included by the American Film Institute in the classic of the most moving films in the history of the seventh art, The fleeting moment it is a coming-of-age story, a story of growth and friendship, which has not stopped moving the public since 9 June 1989.
The story is that of Professor Keating (played by an unforgettable Robin Williams), who at the end of the 1950s was hired to teach poetry in an elite boys’ college in Vermont, where there are fixed rules and secular dogmas. However, Keating’s teaching is revolutionary, it pushes his students to reflect rather than slavishly accept what is repeated to them by teachers bored with their role. Some of his new students, like Neil (Robert Sean Leonard), Todd (Ethan Hawke), Knox (Josh Charles) and Charlie (Gale Hansen), decide to found the secret group of the Sect of Extinct Poets. Meanwhile, Neil tries to start a career as an actor, but clashes with his father’s authority (Kurtwood Smith), who, indifferent to the boy’s passion, wants him to become a doctor. When tragedy looms on the horizon, the school principal decides to find someone responsible and Keating becomes the chosen target. On the occasion of thirty-five years since the release of the film which was a generational anthem, here is a collection of curiosities that, perhaps, you don’t know about the film with Robin Williams.
Dead Poets Society, all the curiosities about the film
As in reality
According to what is reported on the website of theInternet Movie Data Base, on the occasion of the film’s premiere in the United States, the actor Kurtwood Smith noticed a family approaching the viewing of the film. The father of this family unit had a dominant attitude towards his son, very reminiscent of the behavior that the character played by Smith has in the film. At the end of the evening, the actor noticed the same family again and saw that his father, who a couple of hours earlier had relied on his authority, was actually crying.
As it should have been
In the early stages of production The fleeting moment was to be directed by director Jeff Kanew and the role of Professor John Keating was to be Liam Neeson. However, when Peter Weir was permanently hired as director, the lead role passed to Robin Williams.
The quote in Friends
The fact that The fleeting moment has become a shared baggage of popular culture is also demonstrated by the fact that it has become a motif of quotation even in equally popular works. In fact, the film is also mentioned in an episode of Friends, although not in a flattering way. In the twenty-first episode of the first season the character of Monica (Courteney Cox) discovers that her credit card has been cloned. Determined to “catch” the thief, the girl finds herself becoming friends with her. And it is precisely the criminal who speaks badly of The fleeting moment, when she says that no one will give her the two hours of time she wasted watching a stupid and boring movie. Furthermore, regarding Neil’s character, the woman is equally critical, when she says that she could have simply waited until she was eighteen and left home.
Carpe Diem
One of the most famous scenes and lines in the film is that of Carpe Diem, the phrase that John Keating teaches his students to invite them to seize the day, live in the present and not be afraid to welcome opportunities. The quote was placed in 95th place in the ranking of the 100 best quotes in the history of cinema by theAmerican Film Institute.
The evocative moment and the scene in the snow
After tragedy strikes Neil’s character in the film, there is a scene in which a distraught Todd runs outside into the snow and cries so desperately that he feels sick to his stomach. According to the production’s initial indications, the scene was scheduled to take place inside the college. It was Peter Weir who, noticing that it had begun to snow, changed it storyboards and decided to shoot the scene directly on the snow. However, since the white blanket was already about to melt, the scene had to be done in just one take. Luckily Ethan Hawke succeeded.
Robin Williams’ photo
In a scene of The fleeting moment the protagonists show Professor Keating an old yearbook that shows the teacher in his youth. What is immortalized by the camera is a real photo of Robin Williams, taken when the future Hollywood actor attended Redwood High School in Larkspur, in the northern San Francisco bay area.
Fan Taylor Swift
Once again, in today’s pop culture you can trace the success that Peter Weir’s film achieved and the impact it had on many generations. The most recent case is the video for the song Fortnight by Taylor Swift, song contained in the album The tortured poets department (a title that already seems to recall the original title of the film, Dead Poets Society). In the video of the song, Taylor Swift wanted Ethan Hawke and Josh Charles, two of the protagonists of the film.
The “real” John Keating
While The fleeting moment is not at all inspired by a true story, Professor John Keating was “built” around a real teacher. As the site reports ColliderKeating is inspired by Samuel F. Pickering Jr., an English teacher had by the screenwriter of the film, Tom Schulman. A teacher that the screenwriter defined “charming, who loved his students, but who was also an iconoclast.” The teacher was then kicked out of the school, although the reasons behind this dismissal were never known. But the “mystery” was enough for the screenwriter to build a story around it.
The actor who didn’t want to audition
The actor Norman Lloyd, who plays Mr. Nolan in the film, was surprised, if not annoyed, to realize that the production was expecting him to audition to get the part. The actor said that he had worked on the series for six years With an open heart and that the producers could watch his work there and he refused to audition. Eventually, however, the producers told him that the film’s director, Peter Weir, was in the area and that he had never seen Lloyd’s series. Only at the end did the actor agree to audition like everyone else.
Robin Williams’ favorite movie
As you read above IMDB,
Robin Williams has always stated that The fleeting moment it was his favorite film of his career. Which also made Peter Weir the director he loved working with the most.
