| Finding Forrester | |
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original film poster |
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| Directed by | Gus Van Sant |
| Produced by | Sean Connery Laurence Mark |
| Written by | Mike Rich |
| Starring | Sean Connery Rob Brown F. Murray Abraham Anna Paquin, April Grace Naturi Naughton |
| Cinematography | Harris Savides |
| Editing by | Valdís Óskarsdóttir |
| Distributed by | Columbia Pictures |
| Release date(s) | December 19, 2000 |
| Running time | 136 minutes |
| Country | United States |
| Language | English |
| Budget | Unknown |
| Box office | $80,701,064[1] |
Finding Forrester is a 2000 American drama film written by Mike Rich and directed by Gus Van Sant. A black American teenager, Jamal Wallace (Rob Brown), is invited into a prestigious private high school. By chance, Jamal befriends a reclusive writer, William Forrester (Sean Connery), through whom he refines his natural talent for writing and comes to terms with his identity. Anna Paquin, F. Murray Abraham, Michael Pitt, April Grace, Naturi Naughton and Busta Rhymes star in supporting roles. Connery also served as one of the film's producers. The premise of Forrester being an author who gains world fame from a hugely popular book but then stops publishing to retreat into a reclusive life has strong similarities to J. D. Salinger's career.
A particular line that Connery's character utters, "You're the man now, dog", was the inspiration for the Internet memetic site YTMND.com.
Contents |
The film opens with 16-year-old Jamal Wallace (Rob Brown) sleeping in his bedroom, which is stacked with books, and then jumping up to go meet his friends on the basketball court. Reclusive writer William Forrester lives on the top floor of the building across from the schoolyard where Jamal and his friends play basketball, and they regularly notice him watching them from his window, although they never see his face, and they refer to him simply as 'The Window'. One day after school, one of the boys challenges Jamal to sneak into the apartment. Jamal accepts the challenge and sneaks in through the window, but is surprised by the recluse and flees, leaving his backpack. Later, Jamal confronts a man who occasionally delivers supplies to the apartment and displays his gifted intellect discussing the man's BMW car. After the man leaves, Jamal's backpack is dropped to the street. Jamal finds the man read his journals and made editorial notes in it. Jamal requests the man read more of his writings, but is told to begin with 5,000 words on why he should "stay the fuck out of my home", which Jamal completes.
Jamal and Forrester grow closer as Jamal's writing in class improves. Eventually Jamal convinces Forrester to go out of the apartment and attend a game at Madison Square Garden, but Forrester cannot handle the crowds and has a severe anxiety attack. After leaving the game, Jamal takes him to see Yankee Stadium as a surprise. He and Forrester go out on the field to the pitcher's mound, where he tells Jamal about his family, specifically his brother's alcoholism and William's minor role that led to his death. He also explains how the subsequent deaths of his parents soon after affected him and led to his becoming a recluse. As part of Jamal's tutelage, Forrester gives him some of his own private essays to rewrite, with the condition that Jamal is never to show any of this work to anyone. When a prestigious writing contest requires some of Jamal's best work, he falls back on a particular piece of Forrester's that he re-wrote and submits it as his own, not realizing it was one of Forrester's few published works. Jamal's literary professor, Crawford, finds the parallels with Forrester's piece published in 1960 and brings Jamal up on plagiarism charges. Jamal must either admit Forrester's influence on his work or prove he had Forrester's permission to use his material. He refuses to do either, so that he may keep his promise to Forrester, thus eliminating his entry from the competition and endangering his standing at the school.
Jamal tells Forrester what he has done and asks him to defend him, but Forrester is angry at Jamal for breaking his promise and refuses. Jamal then accuses Forrester of being scared and selfish for not helping him. Jamal is then told by the school that they value his contributions in basketball, and agree that they will drop the plagiarism charges if he wins them the state championship. Jamal comes to realize his intellectual gifts have less to do with remaining at the school than his ability on the basketball court, and possibly deliberately misses two free throw shots at the end of the game, costing the team the championship. Immediately following the game, Jamal proceeds to the library and writes a letter to William. Later that night, Jamal's letter is found by his brother Terrell (Busta Rhymes) who personally delivers it to William and laments Jamal's bright future about to be taken away from him.
When the literary contest is held, the contestants read their own work. Despite discouragement, Jamal attends the competition - signalling his intent to continue at the school. During the readings, Forrester appears, announces himself and receives permission to read an essay that draws loud applause from the students. As Crawford is praising the work, Forrester reveals the essay he'd just read was written by Jamal. He goes on to explain that Jamal had written the contest essay—using the published title and first paragraph—with permission and that Jamal's silence was due to honoring the promise he'd made to Forrester. Crawford adamantly states that this will not change any of the board's decisions. The board overrules him and drops the plagiarism charges, readmitting Jamal's entry to the competition. After the competition, Forrester thanks Jamal for his friendship and tells him of his desire to return to his homeland of Scotland. Before departing, Forrester asks Jamal if he missed on purpose, to which Jamal responds with, "that's not exactly a 'soup' question"—repeating to Forrester the response that Jamal received to personal questions he had asked. A 'soup' question is one that provides the questioner with useful information (i.e. 'How do you make this soup?') as opposed to one meant purely to satisfy one's curiosity.
One year later, Jamal is in his senior year and is a successful student with many enrollment offers from prestigious universities. Forrester's attorney (Matt Damon) schedules a meeting with Jamal, and reveals that Forrester has died of cancer. Jamal learns that Forrester was terminally ill while they knew each other. In accordance with Forrester's will, Jamal is given a package, keys to his apartment, and a letter, in which Forrester thanks Jamal for helping him rekindle his desire to live. The package contains the manuscript for Forrester's second novel, called Sunset, for which Jamal is to write the foreword.
New York poet Geoffrey Cruickshank-Hagenbuckle provided several notebooks' worth of intense handwriting to portray Forrester's work in the film. Principal photography was shot entirely in Manhattan, the Bronx, and Brooklyn (many Mailor Academy scenes were filmed at Regis High School on the Upper East Side of Manhattan), with some scenery and pick-up shots made in suburban Toronto, Ontario during post-production. Parts of the film were also shot in Hamilton, Ontario, Canada.[2]
Matt Damon makes a brief cameo appearance near the end of the film.
When Finding Forrester opened in December 2000, it received mostly positive reviews. It garnered two thumbs up from Roger Ebert and Richard Roeper. Roeper considered it one of the 10 best films of the year. Rotten Tomatoes reported that 74% of critics gave the film a positive review, based on a sample of 123 reviews.[3]
The film received limited release on December 22, 2000 in 200 theaters, grossing USD $701,207 in the opening weekend. It later received commercial release where it opened at #1 in 2002 theaters, grossing $11,112,139 in the opening weekend. It went on to gross $51,804,714 in the United States and Canada and $28,245,050 elsewhere for a worldwide total of $80,049,764.[1]
One of the tracks that appears in the film and is not on the soundtrack is the one played during of the Bike Ride that Forrester takes. The song is from Schulwerk by Carl Orff (more specifically the "Gassenhauer" track) it was arranged and produced by Bill Brown.[4]
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