William Forrester is a writer who, battling his own inner demons, has remained reclusive after writing a Pulitzer Prize winning novel some forty odd years earlier. Living alone in a changing neighborhood in the Bronx, he makes the acquaintance of Kamal, an intellectually gifted inner city kid, who plays street basketball, loves to write, and does both well.

A mentoring relationship springs between the two. Under Forrester's secret tutorship, Kamal blossoms. When Kamal's scholastic test scores come to the attention of a local prep school, school officials offer him a scholarship to attend and, if he chooses to do so, play basketball on the school team. The school also turns out to be William Forrester's alma mater, where he is revered and his prize winning novel is required reading.

There, Kamal encounters rank racism, all the more insidious because it is covert. F. Murray Abraham plays a teacher who is very similar to the character, Salieri, whom Abraham portrayed in the film "Amadeus". A failed writer who became a teacher, Abraham oozes racism as he contrives to destroy Kamal whom he accuses of plagirism, as he clearly believes him to be just another inner city, black basketball player who is incapable of anything more. He cannot seem to fathom that this kid could possibly write as well as he does, because he has Kamal stereotyped.

Yet, Kamal is actually all that he puports to be, a gifted writer who just also happens to play basketball. Truly scholarly, he shows up his teacher in class, only to further exacerbate his emnity. This teacher's dislike and covert racism manifests itself in the exclusion of Kamal's entry in the prestigious writing competition sponsored by the prep school. This situation comes to a head when the teacher's racism is exposed for what it is in a stunning, surprising climax.

Kamal, however, is not the only one to have a moment of redemption in the movie. Forrester, too, has that moment as he comes to grips with his past, the past that made him shut the world out for so long. It is his friendship with Kamal that illuminates his return to the very world from which he had withdrawn long ago.

This film is about a friendship that is borne out of a shared passion. It is about the old nurturing the young. It is about passing the baton from one generation to the next. It is a film the transcends age and race. It is a film for everyone.

The premise: MINOR SPOILER

The main character played by Rob Brown is an extraordinarily intelligent sixteen year old living in the South Bronx. As a dare, he is challenged to sneak into "the man in the window's" home and bring something out. Connery scares him out of his home, causing him to leave behind his book bag with all of his stories in it. After critiquing all of his work, Connery drops his book bag down on the street for him to recover. What follows from this point is the development of an unlikely relationship between two people from entirely different worlds. As Connery's character mentors Brown's character in his writing and during the young mans transition from an inner city school to a private school and Brown's character helps to bring Forrester out of his agoraphobic shell. {ssintrepid}

The movie invokes the directorial talents of Gus Van Sant, and there are a few obvious parallels between it and "Good Will Hunting," also directed by Van Sant. To SOME extent, Jamal is the liberal arts counterpart to the math/science extraordinaire that Matt Damon played in "Hunting." However, while he is precocious, Jamal is not quite the "giant among giants" type of genius depicted in Damon's persona.

However, what Jamal is is a young, gifted youth who has a whole lot of potential. The one thing he lacked all his life was intellectual direction. He is well-read, but never had any one to help him hone his writing skills. After stumbling across a one-hit-wonder author (Forrester never attempted to publish a 2nd book), he comes to understand that he has found the catalyst for his future success as a serious writer.

This film succeeds brilliantly in its presentation of liberal arts as being an under-used nexus between societies, cultures and socio-economic classes. What keeps coming back again & again throughout the film is just how uniquely human the art of literature is. The fact that Jamal is an athelete as well as a scholar is a refreshing touch, especially considering how most Hollywood movies portray intellectuals as being stereotypical "nerds."

The one factor which precluded my giving this movie 5 stars was its articulation of the relationship between Jamal and Claire. It was obvious that both characters wanted a romance with the other, but the relationship never really went anywhere. By the end of the movie, it seems that the writers forgot about her entirely. Don't get me wrong: I am not asking for a cheesy love scene, or even a kiss. I would have just liked to know what happened. Claire's disappearance from the movie was a bit odd, and it left the story incomplete.

Other than that aspect, this is a worthwhile DVD to buy. Connery's performance, as usual, is breath-taking. In fact, his depiction of an aging author made me think of Hemingway in his later years.