The Graduate

My latest lover said we have a Mrs. Robinson situation going on. She said it tongue in cheek, but even so, I knew I had to do more than listen to the Simon & Garfunkel song. The circumstances and behaviors of me and my lover are different than this in all the right ways, but the dominant theme is constant--pursuing meaning like nothing else because there is nothing else. You can play by the rules like Mr. Robinson or Elaine and wind up miserable all the same with it all failing anyway. Loved this. Lots to think about. Dustin Hoffman killed it. The scuba scene was cinematic brilliance. Maybe I'll even show this review to my lover someday, or maybe it'll remain a private journal entry hidden in the public. Or maybe I'll move on to someone I find more meaningful somehow. I don't know.

**Spoiler Alert****Spoiler Alert**The Graduate was a unique movie for its time because of when it was made, who the actors were, and how America itself was changing. The movie made during the Vietnam War, and agitators are mentioned a couple of times during the film. Anti-war demonstrations were being conducted on college campuses all around the United States, especially at Berkeley, the university highlighted through much of the film. It however must be said that the movie only touches upon this fact, the analysis of the movie goes into deeper historical context than just the war which was going on at the time the movie was filmed. So much culture was changing in America at that time. Some things that stand out in the movie are the generational gap, between the older people and the younger ones. The older more mature people whose lives are already defined, such as Ben's Parents represent an older America who represents old values, traditions, good morals and an old time America in which the father was the main provider for the family and knew what best for the family. The younger generation thought that the older was naïve, didn't understand them, and didn't get what was really going on. The older generation had a defined family setting, the nuclear family, again traditional that was to be seen as the best parts of that, however we can see that as Elain's father is divorcing her mother that this area in America is beginning to fail and more and more marriages are falling apart ending in divorce. Perhaps alluding to the "Free love" that was espoused during that period in history, to break the bonds of matrimony and live free, and just "shack up". This "Free love" might be able to possibly extend to Mrs. Robinson, the women whom seduced Ben. Women seducing men was unheard of during that time, let alone a woman of this age difference, yet so many things can be taken from the se4duction itself that lets us know how America is changing. Take a look at the naivety of Ben, as he drives her home, get out of his car, accompanies her to the door, goes inside, gets a drink, head up to her bedroom, helps her dress off, and all this time, not up until, the very end has he any idea whatsoever that she wants to seduce him. The seduction by women was unheard of in society, let alone a movie and repeated small brief flashes of her breast was unheard of at the time as well. The movie makers where testing the waters, and telling the ratings boards that America isn't this Naïve, that they can handle brief nudity in films and that they shouldn't have the belief that the culture isn't changing between the older and the younger, because it is. Even after the seduction by Mrs. Robinson Ben is still in the precarious situation of not knowing what he wants to be, though he does know what he don't want to be, and that is like his parents and the people of his parents' generation. The movie plays upon this as that they are not above their own faults; Mrs. Robinson has a long lived love affair with Ben, all the while cheating on her own husband with a boy half her age. Totally unheard of and still a very great fault portrayed by her that the older generation might not be so traditional in values after all, so who are they to tell the younger generation how to live, how to act, and what to say, especially so after they have succumbed to their own form of evil? However upon further inspection of Ben's character we can see that he thought of Mrs. Robinson as his only way out. One of the early scenes Mrs. Robinson throws Ben's car keys in the fish tank. This could represent several things. Firstly that Mr's Robinson was the key to what he wanted and the freedom he so much thought he deserved. He was just like a fish in the fish tank, caught in an area with very little move room and a go nowhere but in circles attitude unsure of what was happening or which way to go. We see this played out again as he is in a diving suit in the pool, he tries to come back up but his parents just push him right back down. Mrs. Robinson could be seen as his way out from a trapped existence, and she was the "key" to doing so. All in this entire movie is about a transitional change from a more conservative culture to a more liberal one. This stance is repeated many times throughout the course of the film. It plays upon the fact that love can be used for ill or for gain. The differences between right and wrong is not always clear, and that lust and love are two different things, and while the movie challenges us to think about it in terms of a changing America in an antiwar type of culture, it still manages to entertain and tell us things about the human condition in that we are all human and just as likely to fail as to win and the winds of cultural change will blow no matter how hard you hold out.

Classic.

My favorite comedy/drama of all time. To my fellow baby boomers: i think you'll love it. To everyone else: you'll have to decide for yourselves.

First of all, we must remember that this film is NOT simply about a sordid affair between 21 year old Ben and much older Mrs. Robinson. What this film is about is stated in the first line of the film, by the pilot of the plane: "We are about to begin our descent into Los Angeles". And by descent, director Mike Nichols meant that descent into the PLASTIC, decadent, consumer-oriented society of LA in the 1960's (although the film would still be valid for today).The film is about Ben (Dustin Hoffman) returning from the East Coast (college) back into the world of artificial, plastic people, and plastic realities, plastic hopes and plastic dreams. (Check out the first cut on Frank Zappa's "Absolutely Free" - called "Plastic people" - produced at the same time as the film).Ben states in the first full scene after the intro, that he is concerned about his future. He says, "I don't know, I wanted to be . . . different". That is, a real person, not the plastic people that make up the parents and the Robinsons and the others at Ben's party.If you watch carefully, Nichols has made what is essentially a black and white film (the colors of plastic). All throughout the first act, black and white themes of plasticity predominate. The Robinson's house, is black and white on the outside as well as on the inside, with the tacky black and white plastic bar stools, Mrs. Robinson dressed in black, etc. Yet outside the picture window (during the famous seduction scene), everything is green and alive, in direct contrast to the plasticity of the world inside, the world which Ben so desperately wishes to escape. The only time that there is any real color during Act I is when Mrs. R. invites Ben into Elaine's room to see her portrait. There is a soft pink glow superimposed over the black and white plasticity of the Robinson house.This black and white motif is continued in practically all the important scenes: Ben's room at his parent's house is wall-papered in black and white, with black stripes representing the bars of the cage within which Ben has found himself trapped. The room at the Taft hotel is in black and white; Ben in the diving gear is black and white.; Nichols is forcing upon the audience this concept of PLASTICITY of the society. Only when Ben first takes Elaine outmon a date is there any real sense of color, since she is the first REAL (non-plastic) person he has met. But black and white continues to dominate the first act until the end when we get the famous camera shot of Mrs. Robinson, soaking wet, dressed in black, standing in the corner of two white walls, saying "Goodbye, Benjamin". Act I constitutes Ben finding that there is a way out of this plastic world - but only through Elaine.Act Two constitutes the montage sequence, so masterfully done by Nichols with Simon and Garfunkel's "Scarborough Fair" background. Here color predominates as Ben carefully watches Elaine and begins to formulate his plan for escape - to escape with Elaine.Act III, the finale, is, like most sonatas, in presto agitato. It is Ben's desperate attempt to get to Elaine before she has a chance to get married to the "ape-man" (see the zoo scene) Carl. When Ben finally reaches the Church, guess what?, it too is in stark black and white, again representing the values of Ben's parents and friends. (Also, we never get the first names of the parents or the Robinsons).This is a film that explores the desperation of a young man attempting to escape from a phony and plastic life, but who almost gets drowned in that false-ness (the affair with Mrs. R.). The film is a classic: timeless, relevant, and naked in its message. If you have not seen it, DO SO! If you have seen it, watch it again; you'll be amazed at how well Mike Nichols incorporates the black/white/plastic theme on so many different levels. I could go on and on, so get the film (with the commentaries). You will not be disappointed.

Great story

I first saw this film...many years ago, and found the story to be very amusing and the sound track by Paul Simon, to fit in with the film very well.I think Anne Bancroft turns in a stellar performance as Mrs Robinson ( At the time Bancroft was only six years older than Hoffman). I think Hoffman was very fortunate to have Bancroft for his co-star, both deliver top bench mark performances. This film put Hoffman on the A List, I always thought they should have done a sequel...but it never did happen.

Gosh to think that this was once an x rated film...it is equal to our 12's now all inuendo ..excellent oldie - glad we moved on with quality of graphics & acting -but think we should go back to this level of content for young people - all left to the imagination - ahhh but so few children have that now..everything is spelt out in such graphic violent detail..yuk...

I enjoyed the music (Simon and Garfunckle) and the great acting. It is the story of a graduate who is seduced by an older woman and then falls for her daughter. It is amazing as you identify with the graduate when you watch this film in your twenties. When you watch it many years later, you find yourself nearer in age to the parents and it puts a different perspective on the film.

Fond memories, but slow to develop; script somehwat boring

Happy with majority of my buys. Delivery and return service excellent.