I was senior in high school, it was 1967 and the movie the Graduate had been released, and at the time, no one exactly knew what genre this new movie, called The Graduate, fell under, or exactly how it could be described. 1967, however, was a year full of resistance, riot, and revolution. My generation it seemed had questions and DID not settle for the typical answers, and hardly believed anything the US Government provided as fact. Parents were not quite certain what their kids might be thinking, and for the first time in a long time, a generation known as the Baby Boomers, began to unravel the fine-tuned knitting of bull shit, that our nation, our government, and our Institutions of Culture/Religion/ and Community had so delicately woven after World War II. Protests, Patriotism, Promises, were all up for discussion, and this frightened many, many of the minions who had liked Ike, Believed Nixon, and once fell for the old Con of Fear of: “Are you now or have you ever been a member of the Communist party?” So when the movie The Graduate hit the Pittsburgh film market, theater owners were stymied as to who should showcase the movie, and exactly which demographic should see it. After all, there was this scene with Dustin Hoffman looking through the bent naked leg of Anne Bancroft, he a college graduate and she not only a married woman but a woman of a CERTAIN AGE! The Graduate ended up playing at the Guild Theater, which for the Pittsburgh community, and the very progressive Jewish neighborhood of Squirrel Hill, was considered and Art House, (not a porn palace, or XXX Adult showcase), and since only sophisticated people supposedly frequented The Guild, somehow The Graduate could play, without too much commotion. I am a man of a certain age and have witnessed change, chaos, consequences, and confusion. But in my life, I have never witnessed something gripping this nation so sinister and scary as the SEDUCTION, the simple sad, sordid SEDUCTION of a population of people! My mind immediately took me back to the Guild Theater, the Artsy Moviehouse, when I watched Mrs. Robinson, try her hardest, and almost succeeded in SEDUCING, one naïve lad named Benjamin Braddock!
Benjamin Braddock (Dustin Hoffman) has just finished college and, back at his parents' house, he's trying to avoid the one question everyone keeps asking: What does he want to do with his life? An unexpected diversion crops up when he is seduced by Mrs. Robinson (Anne Bancroft), a bored housewife and friend of his parents. But what begins as a fun tryst turns complicated when Benjamin falls for the one woman Mrs. Robinson demanded he stay away from, her daughter, Elaine (Katharine Ross). (The Graduate/Charles Webb/Calder Willingham/Buck Henry/Released December 22, 1967)
Benjamin: For God's sake, Mrs. Robinson, here we are, you've got me into your house. You give me a drink. You put on music, now you start opening up your personal life to me and tell me your husband won't be home for hours.
Mrs. Robinson: So?
Benjamin: Mrs. Robinson, you're trying to seduce me! Aren't you?
Mrs. Robinson: Well, no. I hadn't thought of it. I feel very flattered.
Benjamin: Mrs. Robinson. Will you forgive me for what I just said?
Mr. McGuire: I want to say one word to you. Just one word.
Benjamin: Yes, sir.
Mr. McGuire: Are you listening?
Benjamin: Yes, I am.
Mr. McGuire: Plastics.
Benjamin: Exactly how do you mean?
Mr. McGuire: There's a great future in plastics. Think about it. Will you think about it!
Benjamin: I've had this feeling ever since I graduated. This kind of compulsion that I have to be rude all the time...It's like I was playing some kind of game, but the rules don't make any sense to me. They're being made up by all the wrong people. I mean no one makes them up. They seem to make themselves up.
Here it is 2019, I am almost 70, no longer that High School Senior, yearning for a future in which the sky would be my limit, only limited by my own ability to reach. Donald Trump (Mrs. Robinson) and his empty promises, yet intriguing and almost alluring verbiage as he ran for President. Something different, something we thought we could never have, but also dreamed we wanted. The minions of lost souls, who never once looked in their own mirrors to be found voting for him, assuming (an ass out of you and me), all kinds of fantasies could be theirs, no consequences whatever (Benjamin Braddock.) Hey America, the Republicans said (Mr. McGuire) I have one word for you the ECONOMY, oh yeah and unbridled rules and regulations). Spoiler alert, in the end, the good guy gets the good girl…but this IS 2019, and God only knows what the fuck will happen in 2020!
