MovieChat Forums > Dead Poets Society (1989) Discussion > People talk about Neil. But Keating help...

People talk about Neil. But Keating helped the others, no?

posted 4 years ago by redban (5178)
4 replies | jump to latest

The ending saw all of them stand on the desks, defying the headmaster. Ethan Hawke’s character was the first to do it, a marked contrast from his diffidence from the beginning.

The ending implies that Keating had a significant, positive on all of them. Neil is the only one who didn’t get a positive end.

So Neil committed suicide, which some blame on Keating (though the argument is shaky here). But I think it’s almost undisputed that Keating has a big effect on the others. Therefore, Keating = good

[–] BourbonKing (5612) 4 years ago

Where did you get the notion that Keating drove Neil to suicide?

Neil's father killed his dream of becoming an actor. Neil chose death than to live a lie.

Keating was certainly blamed, but only the school elites and Neil's father blame Keating for what happened.

[–] redban (5178) 4 years ago

Not that Keating drove Neil to suicide. But that he mishandled Neil’s situation, created conditions that facilitated the suicide, didn’t do as much as he could’ve t to prevent it

See this topic -

https://moviechat.org/tt0097165/Dead-Poets-Society/58c74f316b51e905f6760d03/Keating-was-wrong-deserved-to-be-fired-and-should-never-teach-again

[–] BourbonKing (5612) 4 years ago

I don't recall Neil and Keating having a close enough bond for him to realize Neil's fragile state. I think the other thread was trying to extract credence from Robin Williams' other character in "Good Will Hunting" where he worked one-on-one with Will and actually dug deep into his psyche. Keating's role as an instructor at this school didn't give him the environment to be an individual life coach to each boy so he inspired them as a group when he had time with them.

[–] Owlwise (1488) 4 years ago

You said it perfectly. Keating knew his students as students, he liked them as individual people & could see the faces they showed to the world, as well as just a little bit beneath them as well … but he didn't have an in-depth relationship with them, certainly not enough to understand Neil's precarious situation. Given time, he might have understood that. But there wasn't enough time for that, sadly.

As for the OP, I'd definitely agree that he helped the boys overall, by encouraging them to stop & at least think about other possibilities they either hadn't considered, or else felt could be nothing but idle & impossible dreams. In that, he was indeed a good teacher.