The Professor (2018)

Starring: Johnny Depp, Zoey Deutch, Danny Huston, and Ron Livingston
Grade: B 

The Professor proves that even on his deathbed, Johnny Depp is too damn cool for his own good.

Summary

English professor Richard Brown (Depp) is told he has stage four lung cancer. Since they caught it so late, the cancer has spread to his spine and adrenals. With treatment, he will live up to a year, possibly a year and a half. Without treatment, he’ll have six months. He decides to go without treatment. Richard goes to work at the university, but he starts to come to the realization of what’s going on. After audibly saying “Fuck” in a staff meeting, he walks into a pond on campus and starts screaming. The rest of the film follows the structure of a chapter book.

It begins with Chapter I: I Have Something to Say.

Richard has dinner with his wife Veronica (Rosemarie DeWitt) and his daughter Olivia (Odessa Young). Before he’s able to reveal his news of cancer to his family, Olivia takes this moment to tell her parents she’s gay. Richard reacts positively to Olivia’s relief, but Veronica passes it off as a phase and denies the thought. After Olivia leaves in a haste, Veronica tells Richard she’s having an affair with Richard’s boss Henry Wright (Livingston) who apparently has a third testicle.

For some reason, she brags about it too…

I’m talking about the testicle.

They both see that Richard doesn’t care, per usual, and she storms out of the room. Apparently, the night has decided for him on whether or not it was the right time to deliver his news of having cancer.

During his class the next day, he’s having trouble reacting to his students the same way he usually would during a discussion. He particularly gets annoyed with student Rose’s (Matreya Scarrwener) points on something in the reading being related to feminism. After having a student named Claire (Deutch) answer her ringing cell phone in front of the class, he has an epiphany. Having enough, Richard changes the entire structure of the class, telling everyone that if they don’t like it, they can leave right now and get a “C” grade. He kicks out anyone who’s studying business, if they’re wearing sweatpants, or if they’ve never read a book for their own pleasure. He’s dead serious too. After telling the rest of the students they’ll have to cover one book over the quarter and run their own class for a day, a lot more people leave. He finishes by saying they get a “B” if they teach the work’s importance, and they’ll get an “A” if they teach everyone something new. He then tells Rose that he doesn’t want any feminist or queer propaganda, mostly because it more than likely reminds him of the dysfunction of his family. Richard then cuts the class short to tell them he’s going to go on a drinking binge for the next 72 hours and is cancelling class, finally asking for them or anyone they know that sells marijuana to visit him in office hours.

He meets with friend and co-worker Peter Matthew (Huston) to discuss the possibility of taking a sabbatical next quarter for him to write the “next great American novel”. Peter knows he’s fucking around, so he admits he has cancer and he’s not getting the treatment. He doesn’t want to die working, so Peter agrees to make it happen because he “owes him”. Peter also agrees to not tell anyone. Elsewhere, we see Veronica talking with Henry at his place post-sex. Later, Richard doubles down on his not caring of Veronica cheating, but he tells her that he will now do the same. In fact, they come to an agreement that they can both do whatever they want, as long as they keep it from Olivia. They even share some of the pharmaceuticals that Richard has over some drinks in celebration. Soon after, Olivia comes home with her girlfriend Taylor (Kaitlyn Bernard) and is weirded out by her obviously intoxicated parents being overtly nice but also embarrassing. They leave. Afterwards, Richard and Veronica have some more fun together and before bed, she asks Richard if Olivia hates her, and he responds affirmatively, though he points out that’s she’s supposed to. Veronica insists she’s not a bad person, and Richard agrees with her.

Chapter II: Fuck it and Fuck it Right

During class, Richard goes through ice breakers with his students. He picks out Claire who says she’s from upstate New York and her uncle is the president of the school, Henry Wright. Richard openly admits his hatred for the man, and as she laughs, she admits she’s not a fan of him either. He then decides to take his class to the bar with him to further the discussion. After sending the annoying Rose to get more beer for the table, he stresses to everyone how important it is to live. Following this, he excuses himself to fuck the waitress in the bathroom and we get this three-way montage of Richard fucking the waitress, Veronica fucking Henry at a motel, and Olivia making out with Taylor.

Basically, this whole family is in shambles.

When he gets back, he gives Rose the book Moby Dick for her project and has another guy close out his tab.

The debauchery will continue on Richard’s quest to “live”, but time is still running out on his life and the reality will start to set in.

My Thoughts:

The Professor went under the radar in 2018 to very little fanfare, but I was thoroughly entertained by it. If you ever want to pick a random movie to watch on one of your binging sprees, this is one that will surprise you. The floppy-haired Johnny Depp is hilariously entertaining as collegiate English professor Richard Brown who is told he has cancer and will die in six months without treatment. Yes, this is a rather serious idea that we’re presented with, but what follows for two thirds of the film is very funny. After Richard finds out he’s going to die, he doesn’t give a fuck and acts like a maniac on his quest to finally “live” life. Think about it, no matter what, you’re dying in 6 months. Live it up! 

…and he does.

Think about the freedom felt in this situation. Obviously, it’s horrible to be told you only have six months to live, but now, this sense of imminent death is almost a relief. You can do whatever you want. You can say what you feel, try different things, and use this horrible inevitability to live life and make the most out of your final stretch on Earth. Why count down the days in a depressive state when you can try and have some fun while you still have the energy? Sure, when he’s close to his deathbed, he’ll slow down because he physically won’t be able to, but he wants to finish out the quarter, collect his earned money, and ride things out until he can’t anymore. This way when the time comes, he’ll be ready. If you knew your time was coming, how would you react? Well, this answer may be different for all of us but seeing the direction in which Richard takes things is ridiculously fun to watch. In classic Johnny Depp fashion, he’s drinking and fucking every chance he gets. He smokes and drinks with his class, let’s one of his male students give him a blowjob after he’s gifted pot brownies, and has no filter with anyone he talks to. Despite his lack of a filter, he still somehow manages to be the most charming person in the room. This is a feat only Depp himself (or Robert Downey Jr.) could get away with.

At the same time, he even has a battle of, “Who can piss off the other more”, with his cheating wife Vernoica. He never has an outburst with her, even if it’s warranted. He chooses to get at her with his seemingly careless attitude (though it’s more him giving up rather than him being careless) and digging quips, and it works every single time. In a way, it kind of reignites a final spark between them that ties up the loose ends of their failed relationship. It’s not a romantic spark but more of a reminder as to how they do care for each other no matter what.

Death can do this for even the worst of relationships.

Seeing Richard’s new lease on life attracts the last of his students. Not only is he entertaining as all hell, his refusal to conform to college’s norms shows how different he is as a teacher and as a person. They start to learn and students like Claire, who perks up as soon as she sees the change in Richard’s demeanor, seem to be inspired. Even Rose, a student that relates everything back to feminism somehow and is Richard’s least favorite student, is challenged by Richard to think past this mindset. He has her report be on Moby Dick to see if she can tap into this different outlook and find a new way of thinking. It works too, so though we see Richard messing around for most of the movie, we also see how he’s able to inspire and mold a few more minds in his final days as a professor. He tells them, “I beg you to not give in to mediocrity”. In a sea of rambling thoughts and quotes he spouts, a statement like this stands out. He wants everyone to achieve and experience more in life because he missed out on this himself. Richard knows how easy it is to settle for mediocrity, but he wants his parting words to them to be to strive for more. We see it with his daughter Olivia as well. Though he doesn’t necessarily relate to his daughter becoming a lesbian, he doesn’t think twice about it. He encourages her at every turn, tries to give advice (even when he’s in his most drunken of states), and will try his best to make her feel good when he’s very clearly not.

When interrupted with her news of being gay, he responds with relief because he “thought it was something bad”. It shows you how good of a parent he is and how close their relationship is compared to Olivia and her mother.

His advice is also a bit inspired by his path to death. When speaking to Veronica, he tells her that Olivia is in love. Veronica asks if Richard told her to be careful, but he plainly says, “No, I told her to enjoy herself”. It’s a powerful quote that not only shows the stark contrast between Richard, Veronica, and Olivia, but it also shows how context and how someone’s period in life can change their thoughts on a basic situation. Sure, he wants his daughter to be careful, but love is a tough concept to tackle. Is she actually in love, or is it that “first relationship” type of love? Truthfully, we know it’s the latter, as does Richard. Instead of him blasting the situation and saying it won’t last, he tries to understand that there’s no changing Olivia’s mind. If she’s in love, then that’s fine. Enjoy yourself! He’s not going to romanticize it either for Olivia because he loved his wife at one point, and their marriage is falling apart. Olivia knows it too, so you know she doesn’t want to hear that type of advice from her parents and their broken marriage. However, you can tell he also said for her to enjoy herself because of his new lease on life. It mirrors what he’s doing at that very moment. You just have to enjoy yourself. During one of his speeches later in the film, he talks about his regrets and not being able to experience life like he should’ve, so it makes sense as to why he tried to go crazy in these last few months to let loose. Why would he deny his daughter this type of fun that he regretted not having?

I understand Richard, and it’s hard not to love him no matter what he does in this film. He’s a true parent and his relationship with his daughter is very sweet, capped off with an emotional conversation in the climax of the film.

Other than the first class Richard teaches after he gets the cancer news, the best scene in the entire film is the standoff between a completely fearless Richard responding to the snobbish Henry Wright who’s about to reprimand him for noticeably making a mess of the university. Not only was it hysterical, but I wanted to start clapping afterwards because of Richard’s total shutout of the situation, telling him how he knows Henry is cheating on his own wife with his and how he has tenure, so he’s untouchable. He had Henry by the balls before he even walked in the room, and he knew it. You could feel it with the smallest detail of Richard’s confident walk into the room. He was practically asking for this confrontation just so he could show Henry who “the man” is.

That man is Richard Brown.

As soon as he walks in, and Henry tried to begin things with some bullshit, Bond villain-like speech about how men can learn a lot from fish as he feeds them, Richard immediately responds with the quip of, “That’s the most asinine thing I’ve ever heard”. The way he flows right into this with such a funny but sharp delivery is something you can’t practice. The Professor may not have had the publicity of Depp’s other films, but he does not phone this one in.

Zoey Deutch, an underrated favorite of mine, was an excellent choice to take the role of Claire. Deutch had very good chemistry with Depp as the young student enamored with Richard’s newfound unpredictability. I really wanted something to happen between Claire and Richard. It’s teased, but we sadly learn timing is everything. No matter the size of her role given in a film, Deutch manages to always shine with her warm personality and likable demeanor. I hope she continues to get larger and larger roles and gets some major big opportunities in the future. She deserves to be in the same conversation with actresses such as Florence Pugh and Janelle Monáe. She’s that talented. The Professor is only a taste of her abilities.

I didn’t think the chapter format was truly necessary, and the subtitles (I’m Really Going to Die, It’s Really Starting to Kick In, I Still Have Something to Say, The Time Has Come, etc.) get redundant. Additionally, as great as Depp’s performance is and how I loved how the students respond to his new way of teaching, I’ll admit that because of his drunken state in character, he does tend to ramble and say quite a few things that aren’t very specific nor earth-shattering words of wisdom. At times, his speeches can feel like pure improvisation by Depp just because of its structure and how it seems like he wanders aimlessly while thinking he’s saying something profound. Also, and I really hate to say it because I still enjoyed the film as whole, the narrative loses its momentum in the third act. The excitement that we become accustomed to in the first two thirds of the film is gone. Obviously, we have to face a more emotional third act because we know Richard inevitably has to get closer to his death. This is fine with me, but it wasn’t the grand finale worthy of the buildup. The emotion was there at points, but the film noticeably slowed down. The ending falls off the rails too. It doesn’t fit the tone of the scene before it and definitely doesn’t feel like the right finale for the character.

I have to ask what the church scene accomplished too. As a last-ditch effort to make them both feel better about this situation and maybe get some sense of inspiration, Richard and Peter go to this non-denominational church on campus after Richard has a fall. Richard stares and Peter tries to pray but is quickly interrupted. They both acknowledge they don’t “feel” anything, see the whole thing as failure, and leave. What did they expect to happen? First of all, they didn’t even try. Second of all, if they didn’t follow any religion before, the whole thing feels insincere, especially on Richard’s part. He’s the one that had the idea to go in the first place, but it’s like he thought it was a stupid idea as soon as they walked in. What was the point of this scene exactly? What did we learn about Richard? We don’t learn anything more than what we already knew.

Oh, he’s not religious? Well, he’s a dying, alcoholic professor at a big college, and his wife is cheating on him with his boss. Him not having faith doesn’t really surprise me at this point, especially with the way he’s been acting as soon as the news of his impending death was given to him.

This scene is another example of the third act losing steam.

The Professor is freeing. The idea of being free to do whatever because your death is inevitable is such an interesting concept, and The Professor really makes you think about things like, “What would you do in this situation?”. It’s thoroughly entertaining, and Johnny Depp is wickedly funny in the role, as well as emotional when he needs to be. He is fascinating to watch. You just want more and more of his fuckery in every scene because of how entertaining he is. Though the film has its issues here and there that stop it from achieving greatness, Depp is still that good to where I’d still recommend a viewing. Here, he proves he’s still got it and that he’s more than just a Disney pirate.