Here's To You

It was Dustin Hoffman's birthday last week.  He's 81.  By chance, during that time I was reading Beverly Gray's Seduced By Mrs. Robinson: How The Graduate Became The Touchstone Of A Generation.

Gray saw the film as a young woman and it resonated with her.  As it did with millions.  This small sex comedy that came out of nowhere was a huge hit--adjusted for inflation, its domestic gross was almost $800 million, placing it in the top 25 of all time. (And it's the only one in the top 50 that wasn't produced or distributed by a major studio.)

The book has three parts--how the film came about, the film itself, and the effect it produced.  The middle section, a full third of the book, is a mistake.  It's a lengthy summary of the plot.  Sure, it has musings from Gray, and backstage information, but we already know the story and don't need to hear it again at this length.  It feels like padding.  But the rest of the book is fascinating.

The film has become a classic.  Anne Bancroft, who died in 2005, played a lot of memorable roles, and was somewhat miffed that this was what people always brought up. (She was nominated for five Oscars, winning for The Miracle Worker.) Mike Nichols, who died in 2014, had a lengthy, diverse career, but never really topped it. Even Dustin Hoffman, who went on to be a major star and appear in at least a handful of classics has never done better work (though he may disagree).

How did all this happen?  Well, it began with Charles Webb's novel in the early 60s.  It didn't get much attention, but was optioned by wannabe producer Lawrence Turman.  He got top-flight Broadway director Mike Nichols interested.  Both of them saw something in the central character of Benjamin Braddock--the uncertainty at the beginning of adulthood, the wish to break away from what's expected without knowing how to do it.

The top studios all turned it down--they were still making Doris Day comedies and this was a film about a young man who sleeps with a friend of his parents.  Turman finally got independent producer Joseph E. Levine to put up some money.  Levine often distributed schlock like Hercules movies, but had also been associated with classy foreign films and was happy enough to be involved in a cultural event (which he thought could make a profit--little did he know).

The casting for the lead was difficult. No one seemed right.  Dustin Hoffman, then an unknown in movies, though he had a reputation as a stage actor, was called in.  But Hoffman himself thought he was wrong for the part, which, based on the novel, seemed to call for a tall, tanned, athletic WASPy type.  But Nichols (and Turman and screenwriter Buck Henry) saw themselves in Braddock--an outsider who didn't fit in, not a confident winner who beds women.  Indeed, Hoffman's success changed what a leading man could look like.

The film also reflected a new openness in Hollywood.  Benjamin has an affair with Mrs. Robinson, but then falls in love with her daughter, Elaine.  There's a complication rarely seen in classic Hollywood films.

The Graduate became a blockbuster, but received, then and now, plenty of criticism.  At the time there were traditional types who saw it as immoral, and not just the affair--don't forget Benjamin steals Elaine away only after she's taken her wedding vows.

But more criticism came from those who didn't think the film radical enough.  It was shot in 1967, during the Summer of Love, and came out in December.  So where's Vietnam?  Where are the riots, and the protests?  Benjamin seems to live in his own world, without any reference to what's going on around him.

This was a conscious choice. Buck Henry even had a mention of Vietnam in one draft of his script, but it was cut.  Though the film is set in 1967, it's based on a book set a few years earlier, and made by guys who faced Benjamin's situation ten years earlier than that.

Making it more specifically political would have weakened, perhaps ruined the film.  Ben is troubled, but it's never entirely clear what his problem is.  He comes back from college a star and has the world at his feet, seemingly.  So what's troubling him?  If the answer is too specific, then the film became less universal and potentially too polemical.

Nevertheless, The Graduate came out at the right time.  A young man who doesn't know what to do could have worked any time, but somehow it hit the zeitgeist in the late 60s, when the Generation Gap had opened up as never before.  Kids were questioning the goals of their parents and rejecting their materialism (somewhat).

Of courses, the film was a hit because it's hilarious, and features two great performances by Hoffman and Bancroft (some of the others are good, though the rest of the characters are ciphers or caricatures).  And the ending is exhilarating--though the final shot, featuring the new couple at the back of a bus facing an uncertain future, adds a note of uncertainty and is justly famous.

Another criticism is Benjamin is a spoiled brat who offers nothing--Mrs. Robinson, whose life has not turned out as she wished, is the sympathetic and wronged character, but the film treats her as the villain.  Well, she is the villain as far as she tries to prevent the lovers from getting together, but there is a reading where she's the tragic hero. It's just that the film is told from Benjamin's point of view.  And Dustin Hoffman is delightful and sympathetic in a part that could have fallen flat, so we root for him.

Some also criticize the movie's structure.  The affair with Mrs. Robinson is well-observed, but suddenly, and with little reason, Ben falls in love with Elaine.  Why?  Because she's young and her mom isn't?  Some felt the film sold itself out with a rushed Boys Meet/Loses/Gets Girl at the end.  It's true the movie doesn't have as much time to deal with that relationship, but Hoffman and Katharine Ross are appealing enough to put it over.

My problem with the film, and it's minor, is Nichols is too much into cinematographic tricks that draw attention to the director.  I don't think those have aged well.  And he also has one too many montages set to Simon and Garfunkel in the second half of the film.

But up against such wonderful comedy and the stirring ending, who cares?