MR. HOLLAND'S OPUS (28)

Directed by: Stephen Herek

Starring: Richard Dreyfuss, Glenne Headly, William H. Macy

The Pitch: The life and career of a high-school music teacher in a small town, from the early 60s to the present.

Theo Sez: A wholly synthetic update of GOODBYE MR. CHIPS, also aiming for many of the buttons pushed by FORREST GUMP (three decades of a changing America, a pop version of history where John Lennon's death comes off as the most momentous single event of the past 30 years). Unlike Mr. Chips, however, the "inspirational" teacher here has no particular obstacles in the path to becoming a much-loved figure - there's some suggestion that he initially resents teaching but really, once he gets past the intrusive and uptight System, he has little trouble connecting with his students (not least because, for a professional musician, he has a surprising disdain for technique and a dismaying enthusiasm for easily-digestible mantras, of the Music-is-about-having-fun variety). Even his most painful personal problem - his troubled relationship with his hearing-impaired son - is resolved in "inspirational" manner, by singing Lennon's "Beautiful Boy" to him across a packed auditorium. It all makes for an oddly self-congratulatory movie - even the inevitable climactic send-off for Mr. Holland at the end of his career (the ultimate in foolproof lump-in-the-throat moments) doesn't feel particularly earned, nor is it convincing when it sums him up as ostensibly a failure: all we've seen has been a catalogue of his successes. Perhaps it was felt that real drama, with its complexities and its possibility of pain and suffering, would've interfered with the film's "heartwarming" vibe.