''A Safe Place'' is a 1971 American

drama Drama is the specific mode of fiction represented in performance: a play, opera, mime, ballet, etc., performed in a theatre, or on radio or television.Elam (1980, 98). Considered as a genre of poetry in general, the dramatic mode has b ...

film written and directed by Henry Jaglom and starring

Tuesday Weld Tuesday Weld (born Susan Ker Weld; August 27, 1943) is an American actress and model. She began acting as a child and progressed to mature roles in the late 1950s. She won a Golden Globe Award for Most Promising Female Newcomer in 1960. Over t ...

Orson Welles George Orson Welles (May 6, 1915 – October 10, 1985) was an American actor, director, producer, and screenwriter, known for his innovative work in film, radio and theatre. He is considered to be among the greatest and most influential f ...

, and

Jack Nicholson John Joseph Nicholson (born April 22, 1937) is an American retired actor and filmmaker. He is widely regarded as one of the greatest actors of all time. In many of his films, he played rebels against the social structure. He received numerous ...

Plot

A young woman, named Noah, lives alone in a small apartment New York City. She is a mentally disturbed flower child, who retreats into her past, yearning for lost innocence. She recalls her childhood, searching for a "safe place." As a child, whose real birth name was Susan, she met a charismatic magician in Central Park who presented her with magical objects: a levitating silver ball, a star ring, and a Noah's ark. In the present day, Noah is currently and romantically involved with two totally different men named Fred and Mitch. Fred is practical, but dull. Mitch is dynamic and sexy, her ideal fantasy partner. Neither man is able to totally fulfill her needs.

Cast

The cast includes: *

as Susan/Noah *

as The Magician *

as Mitch *

Philip Proctor Philip Proctor (born 1940) is an American actor, comedian and a member of the Firesign Theatre. He has performed voice-over work for video games, films and television series. Career Of the four members of Firesign Theatre, Proctor has had ...

as Fred *

Gwen Welles Gwen Welles (born Gwen Goldberg, March 4, 1951 – October 13, 1993) was an American actress. Early years Gwen Welles was born in Chattanooga, Tennessee, as Gwen Goldberg. She was the daughter of clothing designer Rebecca Welles and Barton ...

as Bari * Roger Garrett as Noah's Friend *

Francesca Hilton Constance Francesca Gabor Hilton (March 10, 1947 – January 5, 2015) was an actress and comedian who was the only child of Hilton Hotels founder Conrad Hilton and his second wife, actress and socialite Zsa Zsa Gabor. Early life and family Hi ...

as Noah's Friend * Richard Finocchio as Noah's Friend

Production

The film was "culled from 50 hours of footage." The work was a product of BBS Productions, a company formed by Bob Rafelson, Bert Schneider, and Steve Blauner, financed by their work on the TV pop group

the Monkees The Monkees were an American rock and pop band, formed in Los Angeles in 1966, whose lineup consisted of the American actor/musicians Micky Dolenz, Michael Nesmith and Peter Tork alongside English actor/singer Davy Jones. The group was con ...

. Other BBS films of the era include ''

Easy Rider ''Easy Rider'' is a 1969 American independent drug culture road drama film written by Peter Fonda, Dennis Hopper, and Terry Southern, produced by Fonda, and directed by Hopper. Fonda and Hopper play two bikers who travel through the American So ...

'', ''

Five Easy Pieces ''Five Easy Pieces'' is a 1970 American drama film directed by Bob Rafelson, written by Carole Eastman (as Adrien Joyce) and Rafelson, and starring Jack Nicholson, Karen Black, Susan Anspach, Lois Smith, and Ralph Waite. The film tells the s ...

'', ''

The Last Picture Show ''The Last Picture Show'' is a 1971 American coming-of-age drama film directed and co-written by Peter Bogdanovich, adapted from the semi-autobiographical 1966 novel ''The Last Picture Show'' by Larry McMurtry. The film's ensemble cast include ...

'', ''

The King of Marvin Gardens ''The King of Marvin Gardens'' is a 1972 American drama film. It stars Jack Nicholson, Bruce Dern, Ellen Burstyn and Scatman Crothers. It is one of several collaborations between Nicholson and director Bob Rafelson. The majority of the film is ...

'', ''

Head A head is the part of an organism which usually includes the ears, brain, forehead, cheeks, chin, eyes, nose, and mouth, each of which aid in various sensory functions such as sight, hearing, smell, and taste. Some very simple animals ...

'', and ''

Drive, He Said ''Drive, He Said'' is a 1971 American independent film directed by Jack Nicholson, in his directorial debut, and starring William Tepper, Karen Black, Bruce Dern, Robert Towne, and Henry Jaglom. Based on the 1964 novel of the same name by Jerem ...

''. All five of these films have been restored and released in DVD versions by

The Criterion Collection The Criterion Collection, Inc. (or simply Criterion) is an American home video, home-video distribution company that focuses on licensing, restoring and distributing "important classic and contemporary films." Criterion serves film and media scho ...

in a set called ''America Lost and Found: The BBS Story''.

Reception

Jaglom's directorial debut was a "critical and box-office disaster" ''

Time Time is the continued sequence of existence and event (philosophy), events that occurs in an apparently irreversible process, irreversible succession from the past, through the present, into the future. It is a component quantity of various me ...

'' magazine called the film "pretentious and confusing", a film that "suggests that the rumors of his expertise were greatly exaggerated, or at least that it does not extend to directing."

Vincent Canby Vincent Canby (July 27, 1924 – October 15, 2000) was an American film and theatre critic who served as the chief film critic for ''The New York Times'' from 1969 until the early 1990s, then its chief theatre critic from 1994 until his death in ...

described the film as a "superficial case history of a suicide" whose "narrative pretends to be a lot more complex"; Canby noted that the film "reveals the director's apparent adoration of his star eld whom he studies in every possible light and color combination, and in every possible camera setup, often orchestrated with fine, corny songs out of the 1940s and 1950s on the order of

Charles Trenet Louis Charles Augustin Georges Trenet (; 18 May 1913 – 19 February 2001) was a renowned French singer-songwriter who composed both the music and the lyrics to nearly a thousand songs over a career that lasted more than 60 years. These include ...

's ' La Mer' and 'Vous Qui Passez Sans Me Voir.'" ''

Variety Variety may refer to: Arts and entertainment Entertainment formats * Variety (radio) * Variety show, in theater and television Films * ''Variety'' (1925 film), a German silent film directed by Ewald Andre Dupont * ''Variety'' (1935 film), ...

'' said the film's "deliberate experimentation puts a heavy burden upon the viewer." Its writer-director "has plunged in over his own depth."

References

External links

* {{DEFAULTSORT:Safe Place 1971 drama films Films directed by Henry Jaglom American independent films American drama films Films about magic and magicians 1971 films 1971 directorial debut films 1971 independent films 1970s English-language films 1970s American films

Plot

Cast

Production

Reception

See also

References

External links