With Honors

Plot synopsis:
Monty Kessler, an honors student in the Government program at Harvard University, rooms with art student Courtney Blumenthal, radio DJ and trust fund child Everett Calloway, and neurotic pre-med student Jeff Hawkes. Monty is the pet project of Professor Pitkannan, a Nobel Laureate and government cynic.
While working on his thesis, Monty loses his work when his computer crashes. As he leaves to make copies of his sole printed version, he breaks his ankle and drops his thesis down a steam vent and into the boiler room of Widener Library, where he sees a disheveled man reading it, then burning the thesis page by page. The homeless man demands compensation for not burning it. Monty calls the university police, who arrest the man, but the thesis is missing.
In his court appearance, the man's name is revealed to be Simon B. Wilder. After convincing the judge to dismiss the charges against him, he is then held on contempt. Monty pays Simon's fine to get his thesis back. Although Simon blames Monty for getting him kicked out of the library, the two of them work out a deal: Simon will give one page for each service Monty provides. Simon takes up residence in Everett's broken-down van in the backyard of Monty's house. Confronted by his roommates, Monty assures them he will get Simon out quickly.
Simon mentors Monty, and the two become close friends. Monty discusses his absentee father, and Simon responds by showing him his collection of "memories", a bag of stones, each of which reminds him of a specific memory. With time, some of the roommates appreciate Simon's presence. Courtney appreciates the new, gentler Monty, and Everett agrees to exchange wine for Simon's fixing the van. Jeff, however, resents paying for extra food and fears the possible reactions of his visiting parents. On a particularly cold night, Jeff rejects Monty's request for Simon to sleep in the cellar, threatening to move out with his share of the rent. When Monty lies to Simon, Simon sees through his deception and leaves.
After the others leave for Christmas break, Simon sends a homeless friend to deliver the rest of the thesis and a philosophical message. The friend tells Monty that Simon does not want to see him but gives Monty his location; Monty finds Simon in the street, wheezing and coughing. Monty takes Simon home and tells him he can stay there as long as he likes. Simon tells Monty he has asbestosis from his days in the Merchant Marines. Touched by Monty's courtesy, Simon agrees to accept government benefits to pay his way. Simon is shocked when Monty throws out his old thesis and writes a new one.
As the roommates return, Monty introduces Simon as their new housemate, but Jeff threatens to leave again; eventually, the two reconcile. While writing his own obituary, Simon reveals to Monty that he left his own family. Though angry, Monty forgives him and brings Simon to the biggest party of the year on campus. As the two watch Courtney dance, Simon recognizes that Monty loves her; following Simon's advice, Monty pursues Courtney, and the two kiss.
Late that night, Monty and Courtney find Simon collapsed in the hallway. Monty agrees to take Simon to see his long-lost son, Frank, even though it will mean missing his thesis deadline. The entire household sets off on a road trip. Monty convinces Frank to meet with Simon, and Frank berates Simon for leaving. When Frank's daughter approaches, Frank tells her that Simon is nobody and leaves. Simon breaks down and grabs a stone for a "memory". Simon expresses his desire to die alone, but Monty convinces him to return home with them; they take turns reading poetry to him before he dies. The four friends bury Simon in a cemetery, reading Simon's final obituary.
Monty meets with Professor Pitkannan. While Pitkannan disagrees with Monty's thesis and new approach to government, he appreciates his beliefs and effort. He regrets that because Monty turned his paper in late, he could not graduate summa cum laude. At the graduation ceremony, Monty grabs a stone for his own "memory".

Tags: feel-good

Review:
Frank was most moved by the film and I take that as the highest possible accolade.In a day and age when so few of us put anything aside as a cushion against hard times, lots of people are one paycheck away from being as homeless as Joe Pesci was here.
Incredibly he accepts the deal.More incredibly the two of them form a unique bond and Pesci goes to live with Fraser and his roommates, Moira Kelly, Patrick Dempsey and Josh Hamilton.
Brendan, Joe, and the rest of the cast, this film deeply moved him, good job folks..
"With Honors" means so much to me...it takes on an issue - homelessness - that most film studios won't touch with a ten-foot pole.
It's amazing that someone could make a film largely about a homeless man into a commercially acceptable film without sugar-coating the issue, but they did it.Stellar performances abound here, including Joe Pesci, Brendan Fraser, Josh Hamilton, and the spectacular Moira Kelly.
With a great performance by the priceless Gore Vidal - who's also in another of my favorite films, "Bob Roberts."There are also some nice shots of the Harvard University campus, and the film accurately re-creates the turmoil, joy, and passion and the hundred other emotions that come with college life..
I´m one of those people who knows what to expect from a movie and the best part of it is that you can be surprised."With Honors" is certainly one of my favorite little movies so far.
I stopped by Blockbuster and decided I´d watch old movies and simple ones, so I got what I wanted but it was more than satisfying.I love Joe Pesci and as surreal and unreal as his bum version was, you can´t help loving the guy.
There was something very ´common place´ (the poor but incredibly wise man that is) about it, but the movie has it´s merits.I knew Brendan Fraser could kick ass and look hot but I was pleased to see him act.
It's a very "carpe diem" experience ;) It's also a perfect mix of comedy and drama, Patrick Dempsey and Joe Pesci kept the laughs coming.
Basically, Monty is a Harvard student who thinks he knows it all and is writing his senior thesis but while running to make a copy of it (cliche, his computer crashed and he only has one copy) he slips and his work falls into the hands of Harvard bum Simon.
You can really FEEL the portrayal of the characters from Pesci and Fraser, but adding Patrick Dempsey, Moira Kelly, and Josh Hamilton completes the group.
So i caught this movie in the store and thought I'd give it a go because of Joe Pesci and Brendan Frasier.
Brendan Frasier plays Monty who is obsessed with making it at Harvard, spending most of his time working on his thesis.
In the story, Frasier and housemates (a great bunch, I might add) meet Simon, a sick homeless man who is living in a broken down van in the backyard of the group's house.
The acting is great, the movie is beautifully shot, and as I said before, the story is just perfect.
Like many or any good movies it has a great cast, excellent dialogue, and a small percentage of charm.
With four students and a bum, a college setting and a warm and interesting feeling, "With Honors" becomes a very realistic movie.
Joe Pesci brings the best out of this film.
Brendan Frasier is also good as the college harvard who find Simon and makes the plot go around.
The film with honors is a movie about the troubles of life and how we can't judge people the second we see them, since everybody always has a story.
This movie really touched me and made me see people differently, one of Joe Pescis line's really touched me.
I like almost everyone in the cast, especially Patrick dempsey, and I can't think of any other movie I like ANY of them in.I think Brendan Fraser has real acting talent and gives a very subtle intelligent performance in this movie.
he begins the movie obsessed with his classes, thinking that receiving his "honors" diploma was all that was important in life for him.
when joe pesci's character gets his hands on the only copy of the thesis, though, frasier is forced to focus on other things.
he's a great actor who is probably the reason this movie is labeled "comedy." pesci is seen as a pain by frasier and his roommates for a while, as they see him as being a bum and not an equal to themselves.
however, through his kind nature and wisdom from living a very difficult life, he earns their respect and makes them realize that some things are more important than graduating college with honors.
pesci's character undergoes his own transformation as he goes from an unlikeable, greedy man to an honorable man with good friends who have great admiration for him.
this movie told me that one (like Monty) can be so obsessed with what he thinks matter in his life (his papers and such).
There wasn't much of famous names involved (other than Joe Pesci & Brendan Fraser) to divert the audiences' attention to the main storyline.Even the music by Patrick Leonard blended nicely together with the main theme of "I'll Remember" by Madonna.
I mean this movie was really really good.Anyhow, here's my favored list of categories that WITH HONORS deserved to receive:Best Picture
The film tries to tells us that not all the knowledge in life comes in the way of a university education, but by experience and hard knocks, as is the case with Simon Wilder, a homeless man, who has more knowledge than the young people that befriend him."With Honors" is a film with good intentions.
At the end, Monte, who has been a student expected to graduate suma cum laude, realizes he has learned an important lesson in his meeting that strange man, and how his life has taken a different turn.Mr. Keshishian got good acting in genera.
That's what happens to him in the film before finding portions of the paper in the basement to homeless man Simon (Joe Pesci) where a deal is made by the sheltered bum that if he helps him out, he'll give him the thesis paper along with helping him out on the report.
Monty and Simon become pals where they know each other quite a bit about themselves; the homeless man tells Monty everything about life from wooing women to telling him the back story on what he used to do.Some parts of the movie are too cliché for a drama and some of us know what's going to happen in the end, but a scene between Monty's professor and Simon in the classroom is a true highlight to make students and fans alike raise their eyebrows.Not a bad movie..
He learns about life from a "bum" played masterfully by Joe Pesci.
Bad movie wrongly casts Joe Pesci as a bum living under a library at Harvard where he takes Brendan Fraser's senior thesis and holds it ransom in exchange for food and shelter from Fraser and his friends.
This is a touching little film with very good performances by Joe Pesci (showing some surprising versatility with his character),  Brendan Fraser and the supporting players.
(Especially Moira Kelly who is just lovely.)The welfare of a person who occupies even the lowest station in life (homeless & broke) outweighs such things as turning in your thesis on time and graduating Harvard with honors.And if you don't find the bitter-sweet ending moving you haven't lived..
The up and down times the kids face which actually develops them/prepares them for the future.Well Monty plays an impressive role in bringing out a university student from Harvard that takes in a bum.
Monty learns wisdom and life from the bums perspective and the pesci learns that life is not supposed to quit upon no matter what the situation is.I work in a shipyard, i understand the problems that people encounter when they are exposed to asbestos.
It recalls my memory with my best friend in US, much older than me and showed the great wisdom as Simon did in the movie.
I love the line "I'm ending our friendship," and "I've never wanted to be a razor so badly in my life."I suppose there is a reason number three too, because I think that it is a great flick for college students (of which I was just one) to get rid of their self-centeredness, and to realize that there are other people in the world than just them and their circle of friends!
Pesci, who plays a homeless man, finds college student Brendan Fraser's senior thesis and works out a deal with him:he'll return the thesis one page at a time in exchange for food, room, and board per day.
What a great film was this.I saw it like a year ago and i wish it will be broadcasted again soon.It's a pretty dramatic movie with moments of comedy about some Harvard-students and a homeless man who have nothing in common at first sight, but they are starting to like each other during the movie.
Great cast too;i really liked both Joe Pesci and Moira Kelly.The others were also pretty nice.
I t is the best  I now own this  movie***10+ The story is great,  funny  and a tear jerker as well RENT IT TODAY...
Question: How do you screw up a movie with a cast of Brendan Fraser, Patrick Dempsey and Moira Kelly?
I hope no one actually associates the way Pesci (as Simon Wilder) acted in the movie with real homeless people.
Sure I knew that Joe Pesci played a bum attempting to show Brendan Fraser what life is all about, but that was pretty much it.
The acting is great and the story, while maybe a tad too sentimental and emotionally manipulating, is enthralling enough to stick with the characters and feel for them and their plight in getting through college with an education, along with their souls intact.A film like this makes you think about how good Joe Pesci used to be and regret that he has been out of the business for a while now.
He plays Simon Wilder with heart and realism, a homeless man who has regrets, but also piece of mind, knowing what went wrong and living life for meaning not materialistic necessity.
As for the others, Moira Kelly makes you wonder what ever happened to her as far as film goes, Patrick Dempsey gives a performance with meaning while still keeping with his image of the day, and Josh Hamilton is entertaining enough to have made me see what else he's done since, surprising me to find he was one of my favorite roles in last year's comedy gem Diggers.Throughout the film, you know that tragedy will soon hit and the tears will flow, however, that knowledge never detracts from what is happening on screen.
Joe does some of his best work in this one.One of the few movies that I actually bought and watched over again.
Its the first film that i've cried in everytime i've watched it, well the second, the first being My Girl (bows head in shame) Yes anyway, Brendan Fraser's character is a pompus brain, from Harvard, expected by all to end up becoming a high ranking government official.
Joe Pesci has some of the funniest lines I've heard in a movie..
With Honors (1994) *** 1/2 (out of 4)Brendan Fraser plays Monty, a Harvard student who believes that his thesis is going to send him into the perfect life with the perfect job.
The only problem is that the papers fall into the hands of a homeless man named Simon (Joe Pesci) who plans on using them to get things that he needs.WITH HONORS was released to some really horrible reviews and I still remember going to see it on its opening weekend and leaving the theater wondering what everyone had missed.
Of course not but it's certainly a very good, heart-warming and funny picture.One thing that the film deserves credit for is taking a serious look at being homeless.
I thought the film was very intelligent when it came to the subject matter and unlike so many other movies this one here at least had something to say on its subject.The best thing about the movie were the performances with Pesci leading the way in a very good role.
Fraser is also very believable in his role and we get some nice support from Moira Kelly, Josh Hamilton and Patrick Dempsey.The film certainly does a very good job at mixing the laughs with the drama and to me WITH HONORS remains a film that never got its due..
Although Moira Kelly, Brendan Fraser and Joe Pesci are charming and talented, this movie flat out sucked.
Brendan Fraser plays "Stuck Up But Finds Out What Really Matters In Life", which I have seen a bajillion times before.
This is a good movie, but not great.The movie does have a nice message and all, and it has A-list actors (Joe Pesci and Brandon Frasier), but this movie was never monumental, and I am pretty sure it never will be.
Today I saw it again as a young adult and while the film-making doesn't shine and the acting isn't as top notch as I had remembered it, the movie still delivers a warm feeling.
Homeless man Joe Pesci blackmails Harvard student Brendan Fraser into giving him anything he wants after Pesci obtains pages from one of Fraser's major assignments.
Eventually they develop a father-son relationship and Fraser lets Pesci move in with him and his three college friends (Moira Kelly, Patrick Dempsey and Josh Hamilton).
The acting was terrific, by all the actors, especially Joe Pesci, and Brendan Fraser.
With Honors is not a great movie.
Nor is it a good movie at that, but I found the film to be a satisfying experience for one or two reasons.
Their acting really "makes" the movie cause the story is not really believable, if you really think about what is going down on screen.Second, the film delivers a good message, even if it gets lost at times during the movie's sappiness.
The movie tries to be a comedy, then tries to be a drama and then the process repeats itself so you really don't know what the movie is until the last few minutes.With Honors is messy, but some pretty good acting and interesting messages save the movie from being a mess, and although it's by no means a great film, it's an OK one..
She understands the term "love" better than Kessler and hence Joe Pesci's plug for her towards the end.Patrick Dempsey does an excellent job as Everett Calloway, the school's radio talk show host while Josh Hamilton plays an antagonistic role as Jeffrey Hawks, the spoiled insensitive preppie who is by far the least spiritually developed of the group.Gore Vidal is excellent as Professor Pitkannen and is part of a priceless sequence in the movie.
It's fun to examine the countenances of those sitting behind Fraser and Pesci during the scene.With Honors teaches us to not pre-judge others as time and experience on this earth may equal great wisdom.
It was only nominated for Best Original Song ("I'll Remember", performed by Madonna).The film centers on Montgomery 'Monty' Kessler (Brendan Fraser) a government senior student at Harvard University, who thinks his life depends on his thesis.
But on the way to the copy shop, he has an accident and the thesis falls into the boiler room of the library and into the hands of Simon Wilder (Joe Pesci), a homeless man who has made a makeshift home in there.
The relationship between Monty and Simon develops into a strong friendship and Monty soon learns that there is more to life than graduating with honors.I am always moved by the beautiful story and the incredible acting in this film.
The transition in the character of Monty, from a young man that considers grades and recognition to be the most important things in the world, to a man, touched by the life of a "bum"  as Simon refers to himself  who is intelligent and good-natured, and knows the meaning of love.The last few lines in the movie always bring tears to my eyes, as Monty reads Simon's self-written obituary: "He is survived by his family: Jeff Hawks, who always remembers to flush; Everett Calloway, who knows how to use words; Courtney Blumenthal, who is strong, and also knows how to love; and by Montgomery Kessler, who will graduate life with honor, and without regret.".
Brendan Fraser, Moira Kelley and the great Joe Pesci.
Joe Pesci plays Simon Wilder, a homeless ex-merchant marine, who teaches Montgomery, played by Brendan Fraser, generosity and compassion.
With Honors - A movie our representatives should watch.
In the process, the college student learns more about the realities of life.This movie could change your attitude about how you view people on the streets.
But as I said I do think this movie has a good message, which is pretty much about finding out what's really important in life, and there really are some touching moments..
Harvard punk (Brendan Fraser) helps a homeless dude (Joe Pesci) in exchange for lost thesis papers.It's a series of revelations that change the political views of a selfish Ivy-leaguer as he learns from the 'wisdom' of a bum who has all the appeal of a rat-dropping.
With Honors tells a tale about a homeless man who meets a group of Harvard students and this leads to an awkward relationship wherein he becomes their new professor about the real world and life in general.
The homeless man is portrayed by Joe Pesci while Brendan Fraser,Moira Kelly,Patrick Dempsey and Josh Hamilton were cast as the students.