CONRACK!

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Actor Jon Voight brings a real life story to the big screen in my selection for our third movie this year for "Friday Movie Suggestion Night" in CONRACK. This is the true life story about Pat Conroy, the New York Times bestselling author who is responsible for writing The Prince of Tides (featured here last year on "Friday Movie Suggestion Night"), My Losing Season, and The Water is Wide (the inspiration for this film), amongst a wealth of books. Conroy is a graduate of the Citadel. Following graduation, he taught English in Beaufort, South Carolina, where he met and married a young woman with two children, a widow of the Vietnam War. He then accepted a job teaching a group of illiterate black children living in abject poverty who were regarded as a lost cause in a one-room schoolhouse on remote Daufuskie Island, South Carolina. Conrack finds that the children are neglected to the point of not realizing that there is a world outside their island. They develop their own language ("Conrack" is their way of pronouncing his name, Conroy) and, not surprisingly they have no motivation to learn anything. Conroy alternates between sheer frustration and an occasional jolt of unexpected humor over the nearly impossible odds placed on his shoulders. He was fired at the conclusion of his first year of teaching on the island for his "unconventional teaching practices", including his refusal to use corporal punishment on students, (which I personally became very familiar with as a student in public schools) and for his lack of respect for the school's administration. The late Hume Cronyn plays a masochistic school superintendent who retaliates at Conrack; he hates the teacher's methodology. Never mind that the children discover someone gives a damn about their wellbeing and they have discovered that learning can be fun! In what amounts to "constructive discharge", Conrack fights back and takes a stand on Pinciple over expediency. This is an excellent film for those who need a reaffirmation that we have many, many dedicated and fine teachers in America. It is anymore, a thankless job requiring Courage and Integrity and this film is all about that. The Cast: Jon Voight as Pat Conroy; Madge Sinclair as Mrs. Scott (school principal); Ruth Attaway as Edna; Gracia Lee as Mrs. Sellers; Jane Moreland as Mrs. Webster; Nancy Butler as Mrs. Ryder; Hume Cronyn as Mr. Skeffington (school superintendent); Martin Ritt: Director. The perseverance of the human spirit and how much can be achieved in even the worst circumstances is revealed here. WINNER: 1975 (WGA) Writer's Guild of America Award for Best Drama Adapted from Another Medium: Irving Ravetch and Harriet Frank Jr; BAFTA AWARDS: 1976: UN Award. I hope you enjoy it!

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In Memory of my former Philosophy Professor "Peter" Umbenhauer (October 25, 1938-November 16, 1997): BS in Economics, University of Dayton, MA in Philosophy, Ohio State University; Taught at The University of Cincinnati for 27 years with no absences and was at one time, my next door neighbor. He found the simplest joys of a person's conversation or life experience fascinating and he believed that each person was interesting and unique! He had a love of Classic Jazz and Music from the 20th Century Period and he would often hold our classes on "The Presocratics" on the lawn outside of Braunstein Hall in the Spring and Summer. A student of Wilhelm Reich, (one of the ostracized 12 disciples of Freud) Peter reached out to help others and cared deeply for his students unlike any professor I ever experienced at the 4 universities I attended during my Undergraduate Degree work. This film I dedicate to Peter's memory. He was my friend.