Product description
An extraordinary situation calls for an extraordinary leader. At strife-torn Eastside High School, that leader was Joe Clark. “Lean on Me” is the rousing, fact-based story of high school principal Joe Clark, who armed himself with a bullhorn and a Louisville Slugger and slammed the door on losers at Eastside High in Paterson, New Jersey. Brought in as a last hope to save the school, he chained the doors shut to keep troublemakers out and strivers in. Parents fought him. Teachers fought him. But lots of kids loved him. Clarke turned Eastside around, becoming a national symbol of tough-love education and appearing on the cover of “Time” magazine. Morgan Freeman electrifies as the hard-nosed and controversial educator Joe Clark. On the other side of the camera is Academy Award-winning director John G. Avildsen, a proven master of dynamic, action-filled audience pleasers. “If you students don’t succeed in life,” says Clark, “I want you to blame yourselves.” His message is simple: Don’t lean on excuses. Don’t lean on drugs, crime or anger. “Lean on Me”… and learn.
Amazon.com
Rocky director John Avildsen championed the briefly famous New Jersey high school principal Joe Clark in this upbeat 1989 drama. Morgan Freeman plays the tough-love educator who wields a baseball bat and bullhorn to keep discipline in his hallways and to motivate underachieving students to keep their acts together. After establishing Clark's controversial methods and showing him giving some punks the boot, Avildsen relies on the usual school-drama clichés to fill out the rest of the movie, including a challenge to Clark's philosophy from timid authorities. Freeman makes a strong impact as Clark, his dignity and integrity a sometimes awesome thing. Avildsen, however, is going for a Rocky-esque emotional crescendo. --Tom Keogh
- Is Discontinued By Manufacturer : No
- Package Dimensions : 7.32 x 4.19 x 1.12 inches; 6.13 ounces
- Release date : January 6, 1997
- Date First Available : December 7, 2006
- Actors : Freeman, Guillaume, Todd, North, T
- Studio : Warner Studios
