Love Story (1970)

Saturday is "Take Out the Trash" Day. And it's the last day of the Valentine Month.

Love Story (Arthur Hiller, 1970) What can you say about a 50 year old movie that manages to stay alive, despite being so much of its time? That it's maudlin, and saccharin, completely apolitical in a time of radicals, shamelessly tear-jerky, and ridiculously dishonest in its treatment of disease? That its success was completely manufactured by a marketing strategy so Machiavellian that it belied any of the inspiration that might go along with a phenomenon? That, what looked like a delicate butterfly to those enthralled with it, actually more resembled one of Disney's hippoes in a tutu.

Yeah, yeah. But, damn it, it works. (sob!)

At least, it did on me when it was first released.

Truth is, Love Story started as a screenplay that Erich Segal sold to Paramount.  Producer Robert Evans (to whom the credit for its success must assuredly go, as it was, literally, "a labor of love" for his then girl-friend Ali MacGraw). It was a low-budget film with no "buzz" and Segal was encouraged to write a "tie-in" novel to help boost its caché. Released on Valentine's Day, and bolstered by studio-engineered "block-buying," it made the New York Times Bestseller List, and, being slight and written in a punchy, simple style, mushroomed to become a "thing." The success of the movie was almost a sure-thing.

With the passage of time, the "phenom" aspect of it has disappeared and one can look at it without much prejudice. Arthur Hiller's direction is largely inelegant, combining a "caught-on-the-fly" feeling that was popular in the motorcycle-wake of Easy Rider (but without the pretentious editing tricks) with television style blocking. The film hinges on a score by Francis Lai (A Man and a Woman) that is used for a few "frolic-in-love" scenes. The acting varies in quality from professional turns by veterans Ray Milland and John Marley to the "do as little as possible and just be sincere" performance by Ryan O'Neal, and a functional one by Ali MacGraw, that started to show the cracks in her abilities that weren't apparent in Goodbye, Columbus.* 

Still, it jerks tears...if one has lost or (and probably more importantly) if one has not.  Imagined grief can sometimes be more powerful than the actual if one lives in a fantasy-world. Anyone who has lost someone to a lingering disease will be a bit perplexed by this aspect of Love Story and could righteously yell "bullshit." Roger Ebert went so far as to call what heroine Jenny succumbs to as "Ali MacGraw Disease" ("Movie illness in which the only symptom is that the sufferer grows more beautiful as death approaches"). Movie Magic in Hollywood. "She's going. I need pancake make-up STAT"

But, the part the most galling aspect of Love Story—The Book! The Movie!  The Phenomenon!—to me, personally, is its bracketing tag-line—"Love means never having to say you're sorry"—which would make a great Hallmark card if it wasn't such crap.** It would be easy if love meant never having to say you're sorry (certainly, it would be nice if it meant never having to say you're sorry that you've loved!) But the fact of the matter is that, if you're doing it right...or wrong...love really means saying you're sorry. It's common courtesy. And hopefully, you learn from having to say it, to change the behavior that demands an apology. Love cares. Love accommodates. Love humbles. And ('cause the Bible tells us so) love never dies.

Not in the real world.

Sorry.

* MacGraw and O'Neal were nominated for Oscars for Best Lead Performances that season, which seems less to do with merit than with studio electioneering. The film was nominated for 7 Academy Awards, but only won one...for Lai's score. It was Patton's year that year (and I'd argue that Jerry Goldsmith's lean score for that film has had more importance, both to its film and the legacy of film music, than Lai's). But, in a year of Patton, Five Easy Pieces and M*A*S*H, Woodstock, Let It Be, The Great White Hope, Women in Love, and Ryan's Daughter, it's a little difficult to see how Love Story could compete on any level. 

** Just found an article where even MacGraw says "it makes no sense."

From Peter Bogdanovich's What's Up, Doc?

Goodbye, Columbus

Goodbye, Columbus (Larry Peerce,1969) In my early, stuttering days seeing as many movies as I could, I watched this Paramount production of Philip Roth's 1959 novella on television (ABC Network, I think). I remember it being a bit bewildering for there would be whole stretches of film that would be frozen on an image while the soundtrack remained intact. I don't recall hitting my portable television to see if there was a broadcast issue—in those days, I would have adjusted the "rabbit-ears"—but it was a little frustrating. Frustrating enough that I bought the book to see if I could find out what was going on (I should also mention this was pre-home video/VHS-Beta/DVD/streaming or any of that, which occurred with a big roll-out in 1980). "Buying the book" was what I did whenever these things happened, a tried-and-true researching method that I'd employed ever since watching 2001: A Space Odyssey bent my 13 year old brain into incomprehension.

For Goodbye, Columbus, however, the issue was ABC censorship, as those frozen scenes involved the lead characters—played by Richard Benjamin and Ali MacGraw—indulging in pre-marital sex and some rather PG-13-ish nudity (Benjamin's, actually). It made me read the book (which didn't explain what was going on but gave me more depth into the characters) and started my appreciation of the work of Philip Roth and I proceeded to binge his books like they were a tube of Oreo's.

This is one of the shots ABC censored

MacGraw was a big star at the time (but not at the time this movie was released) and Paramount was the King of Hollywood with The Godfather and Love Story being popular and critic-approved and it marshaled in the very good movie decade of the 1970's with some seriously good fare. Goodbye, Columbus did well for its time and it was MacGraw's very brush with stardom after modeling and her performance here is actually quite good and vulnerable, but Benjamin has the true actor honors in this one, with a good turn by Jack Klugman, as well.

This is another...personally, they're SFW

Goodbye, Columbus takes place over six months in New York as Neil Klugman (Benjamin—and no relation to Jack...), mid-20's and slightly adrift after graduating from college (English lit. major) and a military stint has taken a job at the New York Public Library (I'm going over the film scenario, not the novella as novella-Neil lives and works in Newark, New Jersey). Taking advantage of cousin Doris' membership at Old Oaks Country Club (Purchase, New York), Neil's life changes despite the non-New York-based pleasures of sun-bathing, swimming and scanning swim-suited bodies in the sunshine. It's a privilege for Neal to be among the privileged, and has no idea that he will be beguiled by the simplest of siren's songs—"Would you hold my glasses, please?"

The inquiry is made by Brenda Patimkin (MacGraw), who then jumps into the pool, while being bird-dogged by Neil, who is then swept away from him by a large male, who tell her it's time to go, takes her hand and accompanies her from the club. Neil finds out who she is (and, subsequently, that the guy who took her from is her brother) and he becomes obsessed with meeting her again and pursuing her. He gets her number and they have a meeting after her tennis match with a friend. And the next day, Neil gets invited to the country club as Brenda's guest.

Love blooms. Dates happen. Music-backed montages ensue (music by Charles Fox in his chirpy "Love, America-Style" mode). Brenda and Neil become a "thing." He gets invited to the Patimkins for dinner ("He eats like a bird!"). Dad Ben (Klugman—Jack) has a plumbing supply business that is doing very well, which is what has propelled the Patimkins into the lifestyle to which they become accustomed, but have not always enjoyed. Mother Patimkin (Nan Martin) is cordial, but a bit cold, especially given Neil's job—he's been at the Library for a year! But, Dad isn't concerned—"Leave her alone, she'll get tired of him."

He's so unconcerned that, at Brenda's request, Neil is allowed to stay with the Patimkins for a couple weeks, while the family is preoccupied with brother Ron's upcoming wedding. Mom is absolutely against the idea—she and Brenda have their mom-daughter conflicts and she's seen as spoiled. But, for Dad, things are going great and the kids are great, so why not? Brenda has Ben wrapped around her finger and so, Mom's concerns aside, Neil is welcomed. To a point.

For the lovers, this is a opportunity to take advantage of. They start to regularly sleep together under the Patimkins' collective noses. But, the differences between the two become apparent leading to conflict—Neil insists on some sort of birth control (for her, of course), while Brenda prefers nothing. In the novella written in the late 1950's, there was no "pill" but screenwriter Arnold Schulman takes care of the issue by having Brenda say that it makes her bloat "plus, you keep reading something bad about it everyday" (nice deflection that people could identify with and works well with her "princess" personality).

It's one of the areas where Schulman's updating for the fruging 60's works. No mention is made of Vietnam regarding Neil's military service, and the screenplay goes out of its way to stress the "generation gap" between the kids and the parents, sometimes uncomfortably so. One grating area is when Neil visits Ben at his company and the older man states that you need a little "gonif" to survive in business ("You know what that means, 'gonif?'" "Thief"). In the novella, that plays out with a mutual understanding of the ways of the world, but in the film, Ben then goes off on a bitter, deprecating "you kids, you think you have it so easy" speech that comes out of left field.

This little aberration from the novella's text—and intent—as well as the insistence to show the older generation in the worst satirical light (and given that everybody is Jewish gives a further suspicion of "prejudice" or "snobbery"—to be kind) makes one suspicious that the idea was not to follow Roth's work, but to present a box-office cousin to the previous year's The Graduate, with the cross-cutting dance sequences with fast-zooms (which don't communicate anything other than "this is frenetic, man" as opposed to picking out something in the wide shot or creating an emotional "realization" shot) and an exploitable soundtrack featuring a pop-group.

The soundtrack to The Graduate (featuring Simon and Garfunkle) was a best-seller, but I don't think anybody remembers—or bought—the soundtrack to Goodbye, Columbus, featuring The Association, a "safe" easy-listening vocal group (akin to the Four Freshmen) 180 degrees in opposition to the folk-rock harmonies of S&G, their only similarity being both groups played the Monterey Pop Festival in 1967. Where S&G voiced the angst of a generation, The Association could have played the Patimkin wedding, so unoffensive and mainstream was their music. Actually, the way Peerce goes over-the-top in the staging of thewedding sequence, unoffenisve might not be what they'd be going after.

My view of Goodbye, Columbus has changed over the years—actually it changed quite quickly after I saw the whole movie, given the reading of Roth's original story. What Roth was going for was a comment on assimilation and how the gentrification of class destroys common threads in people no matter how tightly bound. And he couched this in a love story—but is it really?—where privilege breaks down with the danger of losing it. I've always loved the final argument between Brenda and Neil that dances around the basic point that he's not a good match for her, given his lack of ambition, and the parental pressures put on her so that she can maintain her privilege. Princesses do not marry below their stature. It is just not done. But, that is never said. It all revolves around circumstantial evidence and past sins and is straight out of Roth. Summer love cannot stand the Winter chill. 

But, Benjamin is great in it, and he would become tagged as the actor to go to when portraying a Roth character. But, I was dissatisfied enough to want to see another adaptation that was more like the original story, maybe a period piece set in the late 1950's as it was written—its own thing and not a knock-off of passing trends.

MacGraw and Benjamin, already facing the other way.

* Wikipedia calls them "a sunshine-pop band from California." So, naturally that works for a movie set in New York. I don't think Paramount was so inspired by The Graduate that they said "Hey, The Graduate was set in California and used a duo out of New York! Let's use the same geographical inappropriateness!" They just wanted to sell records.