Director: Bryan Forbes
Cast: Katharine Ross, Paula Prentiss, Peter Masterson, Nanette Newman
Have I Seen it Before: Never. I have a vague memory of seeing the remake during one of those summers when I just ended up seeing everything, but only just now have come around to watching the original, and that DVD has been sitting on my shelf for 8 years.
Did I Like It: Okay, so it’s a little weird to write this review right now. I watched it yesterday, which was Election Day 2020. Today is odd. One would be forgiven if they read this in years to come, they might think that other issues are really at play here
But with that being said: white people are the worst. Issues of race are hinted at and alluded to by the end of the film, and Jordan Peele took the spirit of this film and ran with it in Get Out (2017), but the problems these characters face wouldn’t happen to anyone other than white people. We’re pretty terrible, and that doesn’t even begin to get into our voting behaviors*.
I don’t think anyone should be murdered and replaced by more docile robots, for the record, but I can’t help but find the protagonists of the story somewhat unsympathetic. They’re yearning for self-actualization at the forefront of second or third wave feminism is good, but with their upper-class trappings, are they not—to follow the film’s central metaphor all the way through—just as guilty of keeping people down?
That, combined with the schmaltzy, almost TV-movie-of-the-week milieu of the film, I can’t stop thinking about the film and its setting, even though it’s becoming increasingly clear I may have missed the point.
I think that’s actually a positive review, as it turns out.
*All right, so this will get a little into the election. Polling shows that 20% of Trump voters this cycle lied to their friends about voting for him. That means both you and I (assuming you were a Biden supporter—if you’re not, how the hell did you get here?) have friends who are far fascistic and racist (among other things) than they let on. Where’s the horror movie about that? Oh, right. Get Out. Withdrawn.