Dreyfuss as ‘Mr. Holland’ Has All His Tear Ducts in a Row

It wasn’t students, of course, who scurried to the restrooms to mop their damp, puffy eyes after watching scene upon heart-wrenching scene of self-sacrifice, of small, private victories in the battle for the hearts and minds of youth, and of middle-age epiphanies. Some, in fact, were overheard to say it was “dumb.”

But others--even those who came reluctantly at their parents’ urging--were surprised to find they liked a story told from the teacher’s point of view.

“I wasn’t sure I wanted to watch something about teachers and all that,” said R.J. Cristiano, 11, of Irvine, whose arguments to see “12 Monkeys” were rejected by his mother. “Then I went in and it was, like, whoa, this is totally different than what I expected. . . . It’s much better.

“There’s some really happy parts and some really sad parts, like when they discover [Holland’s son] Cole is deaf. There were some parts when, well, I almost cried.”

The realization that the boy is deaf is conveyed through his mother’s face, when she reaches down to comfort the toddler in his stroller and sees he has slept through a siren that has made other children cry. The boy grows up angry that his distant and disappointed father dismisses his ability to love and appreciate music in his own way.

R.J. claimed he didn’t shed a tear, although he said, “I was really, really close. I didn’t want to admit it. I wasn’t giving up,” he said.

For his sister Gina, 8, the highlights were the funny parts. To make ends meet, Holland teaches driving to high-school students with predictably hilarious results. During the ‘60s, he teaches the marching band to play “Louie Louie.” To a student who asks to play electric guitar in the marching band, he replies, “The electric cord alone would kill us.”

Mostly, however, Mr. Holland is a serious man whose life at middle age exemplifies one of his favorite John Lennon lyrics: “Life is what happens to you while you’re busy making other plans.” Year after year, his ambitious symphony has had to give way to his students and family.

It is only when his career eventually succumbs to budget cuts that Mr. Holland realizes that his real work has been inspiring young people and guiding lives.

Melanie Hanley of Costa Mesa said her children Megan, 8, and Blake, 11, had many questions during the movie about the people and events in news clips, interspersed to show the passage of time from 1965 to the present.

Especially confusing for them was a funeral scene after one of his students had been killed in the Vietnam War.

“They had more questions than I could answer when the film was going,’ she said. “So we’ll probably talk about it a lot at home.”