The Graduate
is a 1967 American comedy-drama film directed by Mike Nichols, based on the 1963 novel The Graduate
by Charles Webb, who wrote it shortly after graduating from Williams College. The screenplay is by Calder Willingham and Buck Henry, who makes a cameo appearance as the hotel clerk. The film tells the story of Benjamin Braddock (played by Dustin Hoffman), a recent university graduate with no well-defined aim in life, who is seduced by an older woman, Mrs. Robinson (Anne Bancroft), and he then proceeds to fall in love with her daughter Elaine (Katharine Ross).
In 1996, The Graduate
was selected for preservation in the U.S. National Film Registry by the Library of Congress as being "culturally, historically, or aesthetically significant". It ranked as the seventh greatest film of all time on AFI's 100 Years... 100 Movies, and placed #18 on the list of highest-grossing films in the United States and Canada, adjusted for inflation.
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THE GRADUATE TICKETS
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Plot
Benjamin Braddock returns home, shortly after earning his
bachelor's degree from an unnamed college in the northeast United States, to a party celebrating his graduation at his parents' house in
Pasadena, a satellite city of
Los Angeles. Benjamin is visibly uncomfortable at the party attended by his parents' friends. He remains aloof while his parents deliver accolades and neighborhood friends ask him about his future plans. Benjamin escapes from each person who comes to congratulate him, exposing his seeming embarrassment at all the honors he had won at college. Mrs. Robinson, the wife of his father's law partner, asks Benjamin to drive her home, which he reluctantly does.
Arriving at her home, she pleads for Benjamin to come inside, saying that she does not like to enter a dark house. Once inside, she forces a drink on him, opens up about her private life, exposing herself to him and offering to have an affair with him. Initially flustered, he is immediately shocked by her advances and flees the house. A few days later he calls her, and their affair begins. Benjamin is clearly uncomfortable with sexuality, but he is drawn into the affair with the older, but still attractive, Mrs. Robinson. Their affair appears to last most of the summer.
Meanwhile Benjamin is hounded by his father to select a
graduate school to attend. Benjamin, clearly not interested in pursuing his studies, shrugs off his father's wishes and spends his time lounging about and sleeping with Mrs. Robinson. His affair may serve as an escape from his lack of direction or ambition, and his fear and anxiety of his impending future. Mr. Robinson (
Murray Hamilton), unaware of his wife's budding affair, encourages Benjamin to call on his daughter, Elaine (
Katharine Ross), and Benjamin's parents repeatedly encourage him to date her. During one liaison, Mrs. Robinson forces a promise from Ben to never date Elaine. Whether out of fear of Mrs. Robinson, or sensing that getting involved with the daughter of his lover could be disastrous, he tries to avoid it. Due to the other three parents' persistent intervention, he is essentially forced to date her. Therefore, he tries to ensure his date with her will be a disaster so she would not want to pursue
courtship with him. He drives recklessly, practically ignoring Elaine, and then takes her to a
strip club where she is openly humiliated and silently begins to cry. After she storms out of the establishment, he is overcome with guilt and pursues her, apologizes, and then kisses her. What follows is a
courtship with the younger Robinson: exactly what Benjamin and Mrs. Robinson were trying to avoid.
From here, Benjamin's life falls apart. He confesses the affair to Elaine (under threat of exposure by Mrs. Robinson), and she angrily tells him to never see her again. Although he follows Elaine to
UC Berkeley, where she is a student, he is barred from seeing Elaine any further. She proceeds to become
engaged to another man (Brian Avery), one her parents find acceptable. However, Benjamin, believing (with some justification) that she loves him, refuses to give up hope, despite warnings and threats of arrest from Mr. Robinson, who has learned of his wife's affair.
Benjamin undertakes a desperate drive across a distance of many miles to somehow head off Elaine's wedding in
Santa Barbara. He is forced to stop for directions, his car, an
Alfa Romeo Spider, runs out of gas, and he is ultimately forced to run the final few blocks. He arrives just as the bride and groom are about to kiss, and stands looking down at the couple from an upper window. He fears for a moment that he is too late, but begins pounding on the glass anyway screaming "Elaine! Elaine!". This does not garner much response at first, but when Elaine gives the return cry "Ben!", mayhem ensues.
After a violent struggle with Elaine's parents and wedding guests (Ben armed only with a large
cross), Ben and Elaine escape on a public bus. The escaping couple sits smiling at the back of the bus, the other passengers stare at them in mute disbelief. As the film ends, Ben's smile fades to an enigmatic, neutral, somewhat uncomfortable expression as he gazes forward into the bus. While Elaine looks at Ben's expression, she takes on a similar gaze.
Cast
- Dustin Hoffman as Benjamin Braddock
- Anne Bancroft as Mrs. Robinson
- Katharine Ross as Elaine Robinson
- William Daniels as Mr. Braddock
- Murray Hamilton as Mr. Robinson
- Elizabeth Wilson as Mrs. Braddock
- Buck Henry as Room Clerk
- Brian Avery as Carl Smith
- Norman Fell as Mr. McCleery
also (uncredited):
- Mike Farrell as a bellhop at the hotel
- Richard Dreyfuss as Boarding House Resident
- Ben Murphy as the shaving student in the fraternity house
- Kevin Tighe as Carter, Carl Smith's fraternity brother
Production
Filming
Many of the exterior shots of Benjamin on the campus were actually filmed on the brick campus of
USC in Los Angeles, as the UC Berkeley campus features buildings with gray
granite exteriors. Other scenes were filmed on the Berkeley campus, on Durant Avenue in Berkeley, and on
Telegraph Avenue. In one shot, the red
Alfa Romeo Spider is traveling across
San Francisco Bay on the upper deck of the
suspension section of the
Bay Bridge; this is actually westbound into
San Francisco, although Ben is supposed to be on his way to Berkeley, which would be eastbound on the lower deck.
The "Taft Hotel" scenes were filmed at the famed
Ambassador Hotel, the same hotel in which U.S. Senator and Presidential candidate
Robert Kennedy was assassinated less than six months after the film's release.
The church used for the wedding scene is actually the
United Methodist Church in
LaVerne. In a commentary audio released with the 40th anniversary DVD, Hoffman revealed that he was uneasy about the scene in which he pounds on the church window, as the owner of the
church had been watching the filming disapprovingly.
The residence used for the Robinsons' house was located on North Palm Drive in
Beverly Hills.
There are repeated subliminal shots of Mrs. Robinson's bare breasts and midriff in the scene in Elaine's room when Benjamin has been trapped by Mrs. Robinson.
One of the Campus Loop buses at
Kent State University in the 1970s had a plaque in it identifying it as a "movie star" and stating that it was the bus Benjamin and Elaine escape on at the end of the film.
Music
The film boosted the profile of
folk-rock duo
Simon & Garfunkel, whose
soundtrack album (The Graduate Original Soundtrack), on the strength of the hit single "
Mrs. Robinson", rose to the top of the charts in 1968 (knocking off
The Beatles'
White Album
). However, the version that appears in the film is markedly different from the hit single version, which would not be issued until Simon and Garfunkel's next album,
Bookends
. The actual film version of "Mrs. Robinson" does appear on the "Graduate" soundtrack LP.
According to a
Variety
article by
Peter Bart in the
15 May 2005 issue, Nichols had become obsessed with Simon & Garfunkel's music while shooting the film.
Lawrence Turman, his producer, made a deal for Simon to write three new songs for the movie. By the time they were nearly finished editing the film, Simon had only written one new song. Nichols begged him for more but Simon, who was touring constantly, told him he didn't have the time. He did play him a few notes of a new song he had been working on; "It's not for the movie... it's a song about times past — about Mrs. Roosevelt and
Joe DiMaggio and stuff." Nichols advised Simon, "It's now about Mrs. Robinson, not Mrs. Roosevelt."
Reception
A.D. Murphy of
Variety
and
Roger Ebert of the
Chicago Sun-Times
praised the film upon its release with Murphy describing it as a "delightful satirical comedy-drama"
[1] and Ebert claiming it was the "funniest American comedy of the year".
[2]
For the film's thirtieth anniversary reissue, Roger Ebert reversed his opinion on the film.
[3] He, along with
Gene Siskel, gave the film a mediocre review on the television program
Siskel & Ebert
.
[4]
Awards and honors
Dustin Hoffman earned an
Oscar nomination for his performance as did Bancroft and Ross.
Along with the acting nominations, the film received nominations for Best
Cinematography, Best
Adapted Screenplay, and
Best Picture. Mike Nichols won the
Academy Award for Best Director.
The film won the
BAFTA Award for Best Film, as well as the
BAFTA Award for Best Editing (to
Sam O'Steen).
In 1996,
The Graduate
was selected for preservation in the U.S.
National Film Registry by the
Library of Congress as being "culturally, historically, or aesthetically significant", and placed #18 on the
list of highest-grossing films in the United States and Canada, adjusted for inflation.
American Film Institute recognition
- 1998: AFI's 100 Years... 100 Movies #7
- 2000: AFI's 100 Years... 100 Laughs #9
- 2002: AFI's 100 Years... 100 Passions #52
- 2004: AFI's 100 Years... 100 Songs:
- *"Mrs. Robinson" #6
- 2005: AFI's 100 Years... 100 Movie Quotes:
- * "Plastics." #42
- * "Mrs. Robinson, you're trying to seduce me. Aren't you?" #63
- 2007: AFI's 100 Years... 100 Movies (10th Anniversary Edition) #17
Stage adaptation
John Reid produced a play in 2000, adapted from the movie, which was a hit both in
London's
West End and on
Broadway and has toured the United States. There is a
Brazilian version adapted by
Miguel Falabella. Several actresses have starred as Mrs. Robinson, including
Kathleen Turner,
Lorraine Bracco,
Jerry Hall,
Amanda Donohoe,
Morgan Fairchild,
Anne Archer,
Vera Fischer and
Linda Gray. The Broadway production in 2002 starred
Kathleen Turner,
Jason Biggs, and
Alicia Silverstone.
The play often receives media attention due to a sequence that requires the (often notable) actress playing Mrs. Robinson to disrobe and act a scene in the nude. Some productions of the play incorporate an on-stage topless love scene involving the Mrs. Robinson character.
Possibility of sequel
Charles Webb has written a
sequel to his original novel titled
Home School
, but initially refused to publish it in its entirety because of a contract he signed in the 1960s. When he sold
film rights to
The Graduate
, he surrendered the rights to any sequels. If he were to publish
Home School
,
Canal+, the French media company that owns the rights to
The Graduate
, would be able to adapt it for the screen without his permission.
[5] Extracts of
Home School
were printed in
The Times
on
May 2,
2006.
[6] Webb also told the newspaper that there was a possibility he would find a
publisher for the full text, provided he could retrieve the film rights using French intellectual property law.
[7] On
30 May 2006 The Times
reported that Webb had signed a publishing deal for
Home School
with
Random House which he hoped would enable him to instruct the French lawyers to attempt to retrieve his rights. The novel was released in Britain in 2007.
[8]
In
Robert Altman's Hollywood satire
The Player
(1992),
Buck Henry, co-writer of
The Graduate
, plays a
screenwriter (himself, in fact, as Buck Henry was a screenwriter on the original film) attempting to pitch a sequel to
The Graduate
to a Hollywood producer. Henry's character reminds the producer that the leading actors are all still alive and envisages a scenario in which Ben, Elaine and Mrs. Robinson live together in a
ménage à trois
.
Notes
- [1] - A.D. Murphy, ''Variety'' review, December 18, 1967.
- [1] - Roger Ebert, ''Chicago Sun-Times'', December 26, 1967.
- [1] - Roger Ebert, ''Chicago Sun-Times'', March 28, 1997.
- [1] - ''Siskel & Ebert'' review, 1997.
- http://books.guardian.co.uk/news/articles/0,,1446288,00.html {{Retrieved|accessdate=2007-10-12}}
- http://www.timesonline.co.uk/article/0,,7-2160200,00.html {{Retrieved|accessdate=2007-10-12}}
- http://timesnews.typepad.com/news/2006/05/stuck_in_a_lega.html {{Retrieved|accessdate=2007-10-12}}
- http://www.timesonline.co.uk/article/0,,2-2202109,00.html {{Retrieved|accessdate=2007-10-12}}