STOP comparing 'Emperor's Club' to 'Dead Poets Society'!

I am so tired of hearing people accuse "Emperor's Club" of being a rip-off. It isn't. Both movies are set in all-male boarding schools; the comparisons should stop there. Both are great films with completely different messages. "Dead Poets" is about a teacher's lasting influence on his students, but "Emperor's Club" is about the student's impact on the teacher. "Dead Poets" is about the Transcendentalist idea of seizing the day, whilst "Emperor's Club" is a film about honor and integrity.

There is SO much more to "Emperor's Club" than people give it credit for. It's a film about moral ambiguity, both in Hundert's exploration of Brutus' character in "Julius Caesar" and in his own semi-romantic relationship with a married woman. When Hundert literally "crosses the line" by changing Sedgewick's grade, it seems to be the right thing. He's giving Sedgewick a chance, right? Wrong, because it comes at another student's expense. The ends NEVER justify the means, EVER, because you can never know for sure what the ends will be. Years later, Sedgewick was still a jerk who was willing to cheat his way to the top.

However, this isn't a film about how Sedgewick was a jerk. Hundert himself is very flawed. On both of the "Mr. Julius Caesar" occasions, rather than publically call Sedgewick out, Hundert chooses to ask a question that he knows Sedgewick will miss. Isn't this, in and of itself, a form of cheating? Hundert takes full blame for not teaching Sedgewick about life's consequences: "I'm a teacher, Sedgewick ... I failed you as a teacher."

This movie is deep, very tightly written (with early lines coming back into play late into the film), and surprising in it's biggest, yet most realistic plot twist (Sedgewick didn't change, after all). It's a wonderful film.