MovieChat Forums > The Prime of Miss Jean Brodie (1969) Discussion > So Similar To Dead Poets Society?

So Similar To Dead Poets Society?

posted 15 years ago by Beck_Mill_00
4 replies | jump to latest

Very similar storylines...please don't read below if you haven't seen both wonderful films yet. And if that's the case, please do so, as they both truly are great, and then come back and discuss! :)

!!!POSSIBLE SPOILERS BELOW!!!

I'm a huge fan of both of these movies. Both great stories, both had excellent, organic acting, characters that I felt I could identify with, interesting conflicts, etc...

The similarities seem undeniable:

Both took place at a school for students of one gender.

Both had a lead character that the students liked, but the administration didn't.

Both had lead characters that the administrations then deemed dangerous, not just rebellious.

Both had lead characters that had relationships with a focused circle of students, although, I think we're to believe other students had, or would have had, such attentions.

Both leads were inspirational, in various ways, to their students.

Both leads were actively sought to be dismissed by their respective administrations over a period of time.

Both had students die while they were actively teaching.

Both were "betrayed" by students, and both by school administrators seeking out aid of students or other faculty members in doing so.

Both were fired by their respective schools as a culmination to the story.

What I think is interesting, though, is that both teachers were terminated for things that seemed quite indirect and arguable. Mary went off to a war area she knew would be dangerous, and Neil committed suicide. Both of these tragic kids willingly did these things of their own accord, but it's quite difficult to quantify how much of it was because of their own impressionability and how much of it was because of the teachers' influence.

Differences:

Where I do see differences, though, are between Jean Brodie and John Keating, themselves.

Miss Brodie and Mr. Keating are both energetic, and eccentric, and both were unorthodox educationally in trying to inspire their kids... but Miss Brodie struck me as being just as much histrionic as she was mentoring. Mr. Keating seemed more focused on getting the subject's message across, where Miss Brodie seemed intent on getting HER message across.

Miss Brodie, at first tried to combat her guilt, and Sandy, when they spoke, about Mary's death, with her romantic rant and calling Sandy "shallow." But later in that (brilliantly acted!) confrontation, look how conflicted Miss Brodie looked when Sandy asked her if she felt any guilt about Mary's fate...and how she paused and said "...No."

Mr. Keating, in a moment that still makes me cry to this day, (I'm such a baby!) broke down in tears after he heard about Neil's suicide. He seemed to feel much more guilt, and much more quickly, than Miss Brodie did.

Another striking difference for me, were the betrayals themselves.

In Dead Poets Society, it was a very active and open witch hunt at the end. Kids were literally brought in for questioning, and threatened with tough consequences if not giving the administration their desired answers. While in The Prime of Miss Jean Brodie, it was more clandestine, even though Jean was well aware of it...and it was more on just a secretive faculty whispering type of campaign.

I also find more irony in Sandy's betrayal, because of it. Mostly because the faculty never thought one of Jean's girls would betray her...but more so, because of why. Remember when Sandy forcefully said, about Mary, "...she appealed to your vanity!" While she might have been right, isn't that really why she, herself, threw Jean under the bus? Because of her own vanity, since that's where it all started? When Miss Brodie said she was instinctive, and would be a good spy, and having her portrait painted by artists wasn't in her future??

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"Shut your mouth when you talk to me!"

[–] scottsteaux63-735-780576 13 years ago

Now you mention it, I do see the similarities between John Keating and Jean Brodie, especially their level of dedication and their ability to inspire (or manipulate, depending on how you look at it) their students.

The main difference I see is that John Keating is really dedicated to improving the lives of the boys in his charge. When he encourages a student to pursue the passion for acting that he has discovered, he has no way of knowing that the cruelty of the boy's father is so great that the poor kid will end a suicide. As a matter of fact I always found that part of DPS the hardest to believe, since the father could hardly make the kid become a doctor by putting a gun to his head, you should excuse the expression. And I also found Keating's complete lack of fight at the end a tad hard to swallow.

The thing that leads to Brodie's demise, at least at Marcia Blaine School, is far more plausible. Mary Macgregor is established early on as a not terribly bright but extremely impressionable girl whose adoration of Miss Brodie is so complete that when the teacher comes back from a vacation in Spain singing the praises of Franco, she rushes off to join her brother, who she THINKS is fighting for Franco, but is in fact fighting for the Republicans. Headed for the wrong army, the girl dies in a train accident, never knowing the magnitude of her error.

Unlike Keating, Jean Brodie is not so much dedicated to her girls as she is dedicated to creating disciples. Whereas Keating genuinely encourages his boys to think for themselves, Brodie's agenda is quite different: she wants "her girls" to soak up everything she says without question. In the end it is this determination to create mini-Brodies that leads the one girl who sees right through her to go to the headmistress and "betray" Miss Brodie, who is summarily dismissed. Though it is hard to see her as totally defeated at the end; in the novel Jean Brodie was at least ten years older than she is here, and despite her stunned response to the revelation that Sandy has betrayed her, it is hard not to believe that this strong and self-confident woman will find her way back somehow.

Never mess with a middle-aged, Bipolar queen with AIDS and an attitude problem!
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[–] turkeycat 13 years ago

Without having done any research into the matter, it seems to me that Dead Poet's Society must be a film in direct response to Jean Brodie, even in the main character's name, 'John Keating' - John Keats' poem 'To Autumn' appears prominently in the Jean Brodie film.

But the 1968 film really seems to be more pertinient to its time than Dead Poet's Society does. Imagine in 1968 you go to the cinema and see a picture which concerns a free-thinking liberally-informed new-wave person battling with the forces of cultural conservatism - this really is a film speaking to the cultural context of the late-1960s. Interesting to note of course than the free-thinker ultimately loses her battle in Jean Brodie, but it sure sets out a stall for such people to have a go. A very interesting movie.

[–] ronfirv 13 years ago

Dead Poets Society may have been similar to TPoMJB, please!
DPS entirely missed the nuances of middle class snobbish Edinburgh of the 30's,which can not be repliacted in an America of the 60's.

[–] geoffrey-jackson 12 years ago

Yes, this film is similar to Dead Poets Society (1989).

I can also see the film being similar to All About Eve (1950) [http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0042192/] in that a protoge usurps their mentor.

It would have been wonderful play to see. Two excellent scenes would have been when Miss J.B. stands up for herself when the letter was found in the library book and when the Sandy similarly rips into Miss J.B. just before just before the "assassin" lines.

For the record, I rated this film 8/10.