Dead Poets Society Page #9

Students study. Neil sits near Todd.

NEIL:

(hushed voice)

Listen, I'm inviting you. You can't

expect everybody to think of you all the

time. Nobody knows you.

TODD:

Thanks but it's not a question of that.

NEIL:

What is it then?

TODD:

I... I just don't want to come.

NEIL:

But why? Don't you understand what

Keating is saying? Don't you want to do

something about it?

TODD:

Yes. But

NEIL:

Put what? Goddamn it, tell me.

TODD:

I don't want to read.

NEIL:

What?

TODD:

Keating said everybody took turns

reading. I don't want to do it.

NEIL:

God, you really have a problem, don't

you? How can it hurt you to read? I

mean isn't that what this is all about?

Expressing yourself?

31 INT. THE DORM - LATE NIGHT 31

Old Dr. Hager, the resident dorm marshal, putters in his

room, door ajar, making tea. Neil, Charlie, Knox, Meeks,

Pitts, Cameron, and Todd sneak silently past his door and out.

32 EXT. THE WELTON CAMPUS - NIGHT 32

The school hunting dog comes up and growls at the boys. Pitts

slips the dog a piece of food and it goes away.

33 EXT. THE SCHOOL GROUNDS - NIGHT 33

The stars are out and the wind is blowing. A SERIES of SHOTS

show the boys crossing the campus. They reach a stone wall

with an old iron gate that is chained shut. The boys squeeze

through the gate and disappear into the woods beyond.

34 EXT. THE WELTON WOODS AND STREAM - NIGHT 34

The boys make their way through the eerie forest searching

for the cave. They reach the bank of the stream and begin

looking for an appropriate spot amongst the tree roots and

erosion. Charlie suddenly looms out of the cave entrance.

CHARLIE:

Yaa, I'm a dead poet!

MEEKS:

(frightened)

Ahh!

(then recovering)

Eat it, Dalton!

CHARLIE:

This is it.

SHORT DISSOLVE TO:

34A INT. THE CAVE - A BIT LATER 34A

A newly lit fire comes to life The boys huddle around the

flames.

NEIL:

I hereby reconvene the Welton Chapter of

the Dead Poets Society. These meetings

will be conducted by myself and by the

rest of the new initiates now present.

Todd Anderson, because he prefers not to

read, will keep minutes of the meetings.

Todd is unhappy with this role but he tries not to show it.

NEIL (CONT'D)

I will now read the traditional opening

message from society member Henry David

Thoreau.

Neil opens Keating's copy of Thoreau's Walden, and reads.

NEIL (CONT'D)

I went to the woods because I wanted to

live deliberately."

(skips thru the text)

I wanted to live deep and suck out all

the marrow of life!"

CHARLIE:

All right. I'll second that.

NEIL:

To put the rout all that was not life.

(skips thru the text)

And not, when I came to die, discover

that I had not lived. Pledge Overstreet.

Knox steps up. Neil hands him Walden. Knox flips thru the

book until he finds another underlined passage. He reads.

KNOX:

The millions are awake enough for

Physical labor; but only one in a million

is awake enough for effective

intellectual exertion, only one in a

hundred millions to a poetic or divine

life. To be awake is to be alive.

CHARLIE:

Hey, this is great.

Knox hands the bock to Cameron. Cameron reads.

CAMERON:

If one advances confidently in the

direction of his dreams and endeavors to

live the life which he has imagined, he

will meet with a success unexpected in

common hours.

KNOX:

Yes! I want success with Chris!

Cameron hands the book to Todd. Todd holds the book, frozen.

Before the others notice Todd's fear, Neil takes the book from

Todd and hands it to Meeks.

MEEKS:

If you have built castles in the air,

your work need not be lost. That is

where they should be. Now put

foundations under them.

NEIL:

God, I want to do everything! I'm going

to explode.

Neil looks imbued with the desire to break out of his mold.

He slams the palms of his hands together with an expression of

determination. Charlie opens a book he brought and flips

through it.

CHARLIE:

Listen to this:
Out of the night that

covers me, Black as the Pit from pole to

pole, I thank whatever gods may be for my

unconquerable soul!"

PULL BACK from this small band of boys standing huddled in

the night. Something is swirling their heads, something alive

and exciting like the wind and the swaying trees that surround

them. Charlie raises his hands in the air.

CHARLIE (CONT'D)

I here and now commit myself to daring!

DISSOLVE TO:

35 INT. KEATING'S CLASSROOM - DAY 35

KEATING:

So avoid using the word 'very' because

it's lazy. A man is not very tired, he

is exhausted. Don't use very sad, use

morose. Language was invented for one

reason, boys--to woo women--and, in that

endeavor, laziness will not do. It also

won't do in your essays.

The class laughs appreciatively. Keating closes his book,

then walks over and raises a map that covers the blackboard in

the front of the room. On the board is a quote, which Keating

reads aloud:

KEATING (CONT'D)

Creeds and schools in abeyance I

permit to speak at every hazard, Nature

without check, with original energy. --

Walt Whitman. Ah, but the difficulty of

ignoring those creeds and schools,

conditioned as we are by our parents, our

traditions, by the modern age. How do

we, like Whitman, permit our own true

natures to speak? How do we strip

ourselves of prejudices, habits,

influences? The answer, my dear lads, is

that we must constantly endeavor to find

a new point of view.

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