-The dream.
I remember it as clearly
as if it were last night.
It was the first day
of school. I was late.
I found the class and went in.
I began to panic.
Maybe I'd come on the wrong day.
Maybe I'd come to
the wrong place!
Every time I opened a door,
there was another hallway.
I couldn't find the teachers.
I couldn't find the students.
And that's when it hit me.
This was high school.
And i... Was completely
and utterly...
Alone.
-♪ What would you do
if I sang out of tune? ♪
♪ Would you stand up
and walk out on me? ♪
♪ Lend me your ears,
and I'll sing you a song ♪
♪ I will try not to
sing out of key, yeah ♪
♪ Oh, baby, I get by ♪
- ♪ by with a little help
from my friends ♪
-♪ All I need is my buddies ♪
-♪ High with a little
help from my friends ♪
-♪ I'm sayin' I'm gonna get higher ♪ - ♪
try with a little help from my friends ♪
-♪ Whoa-oa-oa-oa ♪
-♪ Oh, oh, oh, oh ♪
-♪ Somebody who
knows quite sure ♪
♪ Baby ♪
-♪ By with a little
help from my friends ♪
-♪ Said I'm gonna make
it with my friends ♪
-♪ Try with a little
help from my friends ♪
-♪ Oh, I'm gonna
keep on trying ♪
-♪ High with a little
help from my friends ♪
♪ I'm gonna keep on
trying now, baby ♪
-♪ Ooh, ooh, ooh ♪
-♪ Eight miles high ♪
♪ And when you touch down ♪
♪ You'll find that it's
stranger than known ♪
-1971.
It was a crazy time.
People were on the
move, looking for answers,
Breaking new ground.
It seemed like everyone was
searching for a new identity.
-♪ ...just being their own ♪
-Me, I was breaking
some ground of my own.
That september, I entered
william mckinley senior high.
I was looking forward
to a new adventure.
My only hope was
They'd have something
besides jello for lunch.
Everything was different.
Minis had become micros.
Hippies had turned into "heads,"
And some of us were on the
road to political awareness...
Kinda.
But those weren't
the only changes.
My best friend, paul pfeiffer,
was off to prep school,
Which left me...
Completely on my own.
Yeah. This wasn't
gonna be bad at all.
-Kevin arnold? Stuart carpazian.
Remember me?
We both had miss
serita for fourth grade.
-Oh. Hi, stuart.
-Wow. It's good to see you!
You're probably wondering
what happened to me.
See, my dad got a job in
tucson when I was in fifth grade,
So we moved.
But I'm back now!
Jujube?
-No, thanks.
-So, how's your mom?
Hey, remember
when she chaperoned
Our field trip to the zoo...
And the elephants
started doing it?
-Geez. Was this kid blind?
Couldn't he see what
was happening here?
-Remember that time you came
down with the hong kong flu?
- Here she came.
- It was right after lunch.
Fish sticks and peas,
And you threw up
all over your desk.
-Stuart!
-Well, I got to go to class now.
It's been nice talking to you.
See you later!
-Oh, well.
One thing about a big
public high school...
With any luck, stuart carpazian
would be lost in the system.
-Hey, would you look
at this? Talk about luck.
Hey, you know what
I was thinking about?
That time we were
playing basketball,
You ran into the pole and
knocked a hole in your head.
-Stuart, class is gonna
start, okay? We'll talk later.
-Oh, yeah. Sure, sure.
Not to be obnoxious or anything,
But this was no time to
be reliving old memories.
This was high school...
The big leagues...
Education in the fast lane...
Once we got rolling.
-Buenos días. My
name is mr. Bottner.
And this is u.s. Government.
-Okay. Finally.
-So, here are the rules.
-Roman numeral "i"... Rules.
-Numero uno... Bottner's law.
At 8:25, the doors are locked.
No one gets in. No one gets out.
Numero dos.
Due to an inner-ear injury
Sustained at the
pusan beachhead...
We shall all refrain from
making any sudden noises
In the 2,000 kilocycle range.
That means, do
not... I repeat...
Do not rip the paper
from spiral notebooks.
Comprende?
-Hmm.
-Now... Can anyone
tell me the name
Of this country's
"living document"?
Anyone?
No one?
Gruntner!
-Um... Uh...
-Good job.
Callio!
-Uh... I'm not sure.
Perfect.
"Carpazon."
-Uh, that's carpazian, sir.
-What did you say?
-Uh, it's not important.
-The answer to the question...
Is the... Con... Sti...
Tu... Tion.
And speaking of
the constitution,
This might be a
good time to tell you
About meeting the 39th vice
president of the united states,
Spiro t. Agnew.
I was one of only 900 teachers
Selected to have
lunch at the white house.
The real white house.
-And there you had it.
It was pretty obvious
The man who was teaching
us all about freedom
Was nothing but
a petty dictator.
And that's when we realized...
For the next five months,
we'd be held hostage
While this guy
strutted and preened
And perpetrated
his little power plays
And told and retold his
crowning life achievement...
Meeting spiro t. Agnew.
- And then... During dessert...
Which included a generous
portion of cherries jubilee...
The vice president himself
came over to my table,
Shook my hand.
And do you know
what he said? Huh?
-Of course we didn't.
Still, it seemed like
some kind of response
Was called for here.
-"I can't believe I ate
the whole thing"?
-I see.
-And maybe right then
I should have known...
I... Was a dead man.
-That's it, amigos.
-Still, by the end of class,
I'd come up with a plan.
I figured I'd talk to
the guy, explain myself,
Offer the old olive branch.
-Mr. Bottner?
About your story about
vice president agnew?
Sorry I ruined it.
-So?
-So... I'll see you tomorrow?
-You bet.
-And that was that.
Piece of cake, right?
Wrong.
Okay, I'd learned
my first lesson.
In high school, one
had to be careful
When dealing with
authority figures.
-Hey, wart, looks like
somebody forgot to read
The scrote handbook.
-Get out of my way, wayne.
-Sorry, kev. Can't.
You're on the seal.
The sacred emblem
of our fine school.
-So?
-So? So only seniors are
allowed to walk on the seal.
-Yeah, only seniors are
allowed to walk on the seal.
-Now, coming from anyone else,
maybe I would have believed it.
But from these jokers?
-That's crazy! What
kind of rule is that?
-Kev. Kev, this seal is an
emblem for the school.
And protecting it is a
long-standing tradition
Passed from one
senior class to the next.
-Get out of my way, butt-breath.
Wha...
-Let me explain
something to you.
Maybe you were some kind
of hotshot in junior high,
But you're nothing here.
You're the lowest of the low,
The putridest of the putrid.
You're the stuff
that mom sweeps out
From underneath
the refrigerator.
And we're in charge here.
And if we catch you
walking on the seal,
You get... The "boosh,"
the royal flush.
-The boosh.
-Not that I knew what that was.
Still, the terminology seemed
pretty self-explanatory.
-Thanks for letting me know.
-You're my brother.
I care about you.
-Finally, something
familiar... Lunch.
The trick was to desperately
look for someone to sit with
Without anyone ever
knowing you were desperate.
And that's when I saw her.
Winnie... An oasis
in sea of strangers.
She looked so alone,
I thought I'd go over
And do the best I
could to console her.
-Hi, winnie.
Mind if we sit with you?
-Me and half the
varsity football team.
-Come on, kevin.
You can squeeze in.
-Uh, no, thanks.
See, I'm... I'm just gonna...
Walk around for a while,
And build up an appetite.
Okay?
-I mean, hey, I
didn't need charity.
I could manage on my own.
Plenty of folks
I could sit with.
Good folks. Honest folks.
Folks like, say...
-Mmh!
Hey, kev! Pretty
neat cafeteria, huh?
- Stuart.
-Remember that time you got
that pencil stuck up in your nose?
Hmm?
-I always had stuart.
-Huh? Oooh!
-One french class,
one biology lab,
And three major
social gaffes later,
I was just about
ready to call it a day.
On the other hand...
-All right, mis amigos.
This is study hall.
What you do in here is study.
You don't talk.
You don't doodle.
You keep your
faces in your books.
Comprende?
So, here are bottner's
rules. Numero uno.
-Oh, man.
-Oops.
-Arnold.
You have something to say?
-No. I-i...
-Oh, come on. Share
it with the class.
I'm sure it's pretty amusing,
your being such a funny guy.
Come on, arnold.
Don't you think you're funny?
-No. Not really.
-Oh, sure you are.
You're a real josé jiménez.
I'm sure the rest of the
class wouldn't mind waiting,
Even if we have to stay after
school to listen to your joke.
I'm sure it'll be worth it.
-And as bottner turned
An entire class of
10th graders against me,
I realized something... My
nightmare had come true.
It was the first
day of high school,
And I was completely
and utterly alone.
After the first day
at mckinley, I was lost.
But as the week wore on,
The true significance of high
school became more clear to me.
-Boy, you really flattened
that little kid back there.
That must have
cost you 10 points.
-I know, stuart. I know.
-For instance,
Where else would they
give you a backseat driver
For driver education?
-Boy, isn't high school great?
You know, they're gonna
have an assembly next week.
-Stuart, we're coming up
on a 4-way stop sign, okay?
Can we cut the small talk?
- Well, yeah, sure...
- Stuart!
-You might want to
watch out for that truck.
Whoa!
-But traffic wasn't
my only problem.
-Pathetic.
Fair.
Adequate.
Putrid.
Arnold.
You're gonna have
to do yours over.
Passable.
Marginal.
-Wait a minute. Wait a minute.
-You have a comment?
-Yeah. Why do I have
to do mine over again?
-I'm glad you asked
me that question.
I can't read your writing.
Your margins are off.
And you didn't put the date
in the top right-hand corner.
Bottner's rules.
-But I spent all
night on this report.
-Now, that's funny.
-My ego was taking a b*ating.
So there was only
one thing to do.
b*at the pants off my
best friend at basketball.
-3-Zip. Your ball.
-I can count, paul.
-Ungrateful dork.
- Hey, what's bugging you?
- Nothing.
Let's play!
-No way I was gonna to let
this bozo know I needed help.
I was gonna keep my
emotions to myself.
-That sweatshirt makes
you look like a geek.
-Yep, better I should
just insult the guy.
-4-Zip.
-I said I can count, okay?!
-Okay, okay.
No basket. Foul!
-What do you mean, foul?
-You charged.
-I didn't touch you!
-I'm taking it out of bounds.
-No way!
-Kev, a rule's a rule.
-God, paul. "A rule's a rule"?
You should hear yourself.
All I hear all day is rules!
Don't walk here,
don't... Don't be late,
Your margins are too wide,
Don't talk, don't
think, don't breathe.
-What are you talking about?
-I'm talking about...
High school.
Junior high used to
be so great, and now...
Now we're like that stuff
underneath the refrigerator,
You know?
-Okay, it just slipped out.
The way I saw it, I had a right
to expect a little sympathy,
A gesture of support.
-I don't know. I kind
of like my prep school.
-Really?
-Really.
5-Zip.
-So much for sympathy.
I hit the couch.
-It was the best
conversation I'd had in days.
Friday afternoon...
One week down, 600 to go.
- Kevin, wait up!
- Oh. Hi, winnie.
- Where have you been?
- Around.
-I'm sorry about
lunch the other day.
-That's okay. No problem.
-Are you all right?
-Yeah!
I just expected this place
to be different, you know?
-Give it some time.
It'll get better.
Trust me. It's gonna be great.
I'm going this way, so
I'll see you later, okay?
-Okay.
-And you know,
hearing that voice,
Seeing that smile,
For one moment I actually
felt a little twinge of...
-Oh, kevie?
- Absolute fear.
-You get the boosh.
-Hey! Hey!
-You heard it here.
I got the boosh.
-Hey, kev, wait up.
I wanted to know if you were
going to the football game tonight.
You know, afterwards, I hear they're
gonna toilet-paper cheryl manning's house.
- Go away, stuart.
- You remember her.
You hit her in the head
with the tetherball once.
- Go away!
- Gee, kev, your hair's all wet.
You know, speaking to you as
a friend, you should really...
-Look, stuart, don't you get it?
We're not friends.
Just 'cause you sat behind
me in the fourth grade
Doesn't mean we're friends.
We weren't even friends then!
So why don't you get someone
else to hang around with, okay?
'Cause I can't take it
anymore. You hear me?
-And so it came down to this.
I had acted like an idiot,
blown up at the wrong guy,
And now...
My only hope was that my
government teacher was dead.
-All right, here's the deal...
I just had to walk five
blocks out of my way
Because some substitute
choral director
Parked her pinto in my spot!
Comprende?!
-On further
consideration, though,
Death didn't seem
half good enough.
-Therefore, I suggest you open
your notebooks and write me,
Oh, let's say 500 words
On the meaning of property
rights in the u.s. Constitution.
Just for fun.
And no talking.
Especially you, arnold.
-Me?!
Look, I never said any...
-Ah-ah-ah.
I said no talking.
Sorry, buddy.
You're on detention...
The whole week.
Let's move it, amigos!
-And I don't know.
Maybe it was all that talk
about the constitution.
In any event, at that
moment, I made up my mind.
It was time for a declaration
of independence of my own.
-Who did that?
It was you, arnold, wasn't it?
-But sitting there,
holding that paper,
I just didn't care anymore.
If I was alone,
fine. I'd go it alone.
Only suddenly...
I wasn't.
Maybe it was futile, maybe not.
It really didn't matter.
For that one moment,
we'd found a common voice,
A common bond
against a common enemy.
And for that one moment,
it was a sweet victory.
That first week of high school,
As I watched our
class band together,
I realized something about
these strangers I'd just met,
Strangers I hardly knew,
Strangers who
were just like me...
We were all sharing the
same feelings, the same fears,
The same loneliness.
We were just starting out,
And there was only
one direction to go.
So we went... Together.