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''Getting Straight'' is a 1970 American satirical and romantic
comedy-drama Comedy drama (also known by the portmanteau dramedy) is a hybrid genre of works that combine elements of comedy and Drama (film and television), drama. In film, as well as scripted television series, serious dramatic subjects (such as death, il ...
motion picture directed by Richard Rush, released by
Columbia Pictures Columbia Pictures Industries, Inc., Trade name, doing business as Columbia Pictures, is an American film Production company, production and Film distributor, distribution company that is the flagship unit of the Sony Pictures Motion Picture Group ...
. The story centers upon student politics, protest, and relationships during the height of the
counterculture A counterculture is a culture whose values and norms of behavior differ substantially from those of mainstream society, sometimes diametrically opposed to mainstream cultural mores.Eric Donald Hirsch. ''The Dictionary of Cultural Literacy''. Ho ...
era at a US university amid the turbulent times around the late 1960s, seen through the eyes of non-conformist graduate student Harry Bailey (
Elliott Gould Elliott Gould (; né Goldstein; born August 29, 1938) is an American actor. Gould's breakthrough role was in the film ''Bob & Carol & Ted & Alice'' (1969), for which he received a nomination for the Academy Award for Best Supporting Actor. The ...
). Also featured in the cast were Candice Bergen as Bailey's girlfriend,
Jeff Corey Jeff Corey (born Arthur Zwerling; August 10, 1914 – August 16, 2002) was an American stage and screen actor. He was blacklisted in the 1950s and became an acting coach for a period, before returning to film and television work in the 1960s. ...
as Bailey's professor, Robert F. Lyons as his draft-avoiding friend Nick, and
Harrison Ford Harrison Ford (born July 13, 1942) is an American actor. Regarded as a cinematic cultural icon, he has starred in Harrison Ford filmography, many notable films over seven decades, and is one of List of highest-grossing actors, the highest-gr ...
as a fellow teaching student and his girlfriend's neighbor. ''Getting Straight'' was released during an era of change and unrest in the United States in the late 1960s and early '70s, and was in a long line of films that dealt with these themes. Other films of this period with similar themes were '' Medium Cool'' (1969), '' R. P. M.'' (1970), and '' The Strawberry Statement'' (1970).


Plot

Harry Bailey, a former student activist,
Vietnam War The Vietnam War (1 November 1955 – 30 April 1975) was an armed conflict in Vietnam, Laos, and Cambodia fought between North Vietnam (Democratic Republic of Vietnam) and South Vietnam (Republic of Vietnam) and their allies. North Vietnam w ...
veteran, and graduate student, returns to college to complete a
master's degree A master's degree (from Latin ) is a postgraduate academic degree awarded by universities or colleges upon completion of a course of study demonstrating mastery or a high-order overview of a specific field of study or area of professional prac ...
so he can become a teacher. He does his best to avoid the increasing student unrest that has surfaced at his university and in the country as a whole. However, he finds this difficult as his girlfriend, Jan, is a leader in these protests. Over time, student demonstrations bring police to the campus to quell the unrest, and the ensuing clashes lead to a heavy police presence. Harry is forced to question his changing values. At the height of the rioting, he comes to agree with Jan that "getting straight" is more important than the unquestioning acceptance of the educational establishment.


Cast


Production


Original novel

In February 1967, Mike Frankovich, head of Columbia Pictures, announced he had bought the rights to the novel ''Getting Straight'' by Ken Kolb. Richard Rush described the original novel as "a nice novel about a graduate student taking his orals to get his teaching credentials. The administration of the college is like a medieval torture chamber, and the oral exam is like the
Salem witch trials The Salem witch trials were a series of hearings and prosecutions of people accused of witchcraft in Province of Massachusetts Bay, colonial Massachusetts between February 1692 and May 1693. More than 200 people were accused. Not everyone wh ...
. He barely escapes with his sanity." The novel was published in early 1968. The ''
Chicago Tribune The ''Chicago Tribune'' is an American daily newspaper based in Chicago, Illinois, United States. Founded in 1847, it was formerly self-styled as the "World's Greatest Newspaper", a slogan from which its once integrated WGN (AM), WGN radio and ...
'' called the book "very funny".


Richard Rush

Director Richard Rush had impressed with his AIP films '' Hells Angels on Wheels'' (1967) and '' Psych-Out'' (1968) and was signed to an independent deal with Columbia. They offered the book to him, and he said he would do it if they let him make a contemporary film about kids at college rebelling against the draft and the war. He wrote a treatment and they eventually agreed. Rush's signing was announced in June 1968. "To me the whole 'revolution' is not a political revolution but a personal one", he said. "It is the result of the inability of an entire generation on a personal, individual level to accept the disparities in the morality at the foundation of our society." Rush says the studio gave him a list of writers to do a screenplay and he picked one, but was not happy with the result. Rush then hired someone not on the list, Robert Kaufman, who Rush had known at AIP. Rush called Kaufman "a brilliant, vicious intellectual, total amoral comic. He could make me laugh. He was a bright, funny man." Kaufman signed in December 1968. "All my films are about commitment", said Kaufman later. "Somehow. The moral was, love is better with a monster who'll make a commitment than with a nebbish who won't. " Rush says Kolb later did some work on the script. "It was risky material because the war was still going on and students were at the barricades and Hollywood movies weren’t really addressing this stuff yet head-on", Rush says.


Casting

Elliott Gould had just made '' M*A*S*H'' and was going to make ''
Move Move or The Move may refer to: Brands and enterprises * Move (company), an American online real estate company * Move (electronics store), a defunct Australian electronics retailer * Daihatsu Move, a Japanese car * PlayStation Move, a motion ...
'' when Columbia came to him with ''Getting Straight''. "Columbia said if I didn't take the part they'd drop it", he said. "I was the only actor they'd go with. I was never so flattered in my life." Gould says when he met Rush the director asked him, "'Can you get angry?' Because I had never been in the Army, nor had I ever gone to college, nor am I an angry person. I said, 'I believe I can show you some passion and emotion for this character.' " Gould said "it's an almost classical part, a fantastic character." Rush had made several movies with
Jack Nicholson John Joseph Nicholson (born April 22, 1937) is an American retired actor and filmmaker. Nicholson is widely regarded as one of the greatest actors of the 20th century, often playing rebels fighting against the social structure. Over his five-de ...
and offered him a role but the actor had to decline when deluged with offers post-'' Easy Rider''. "I guess I've lost my standing with him", said Nicholson of the director. Candice Bergen was cast in July 1969.
Harrison Ford Harrison Ford (born July 13, 1942) is an American actor. Regarded as a cinematic cultural icon, he has starred in Harrison Ford filmography, many notable films over seven decades, and is one of List of highest-grossing actors, the highest-gr ...
had been under contract to Columbia, which had expired. However he was brought back to the studio for a role in this film. Richard Rush signed Max Julien to a three-picture contract over two years.


Filming

Filming started July 7, 1969 in
Eugene, Oregon Eugene ( ) is a city in and the county seat of Lane County, Oregon, United States. It is located at the southern end of the Willamette Valley, near the confluence of the McKenzie River (Oregon), McKenzie and Willamette River, Willamette rivers, ...
, with Lane Community College standing in for the fictional university. Rush later said Gould "had complete abandon. Elliott did a hell of a job." He said the actor was "incredibly inventive, tremendously flexible" and that Bergen was "a genuine dedicated, bright human being" who made "an extraordinary breakthrough." Candice Bergen said the film took her career in "a new direction... my first experience with democratic, communal movie making." When filming ended Kaufman wrote "we have sought to record, with a sense of humor, the reality of today's student protest, campus riots, and establishment reprisals. We will undoubtedly be charged with
sensationalism In journalism and mass media, sensationalism is a type of editorial tactic. Events and topics in news stories are selected and worded to excite the greatest number of readers and viewers. This style of news reporting encourages biased or emoti ...
but anything less than a straightforward depiction of these events would be ludicrously false." Rush says when he got to the location he saw it was full of glass walls. "We had to suit what was happening inside with what was happening outside, and it opened up enormous opportunities", he said. "Also, I'd never shot a riot before with tear gas and policemen beating up people. When I suddenly had the equipment to do that, with the tear gas and the paddy wagons and the helicopters, it became a different version of the movie than I had originally pictured in my head as I had written it." Rush used a lot of rack focus on the film. He later said he did this because he felt the script was very verbal and needed to "make it visual." Rush says "We shot the film on a very long lens, so we could peer inside and outside of the classrooms on the campus to gather relevant information, and get interesting angles in order to create a mood of tension or unpredictability. And this is where we really started using the rack focus technique. This type of shooting draws the viewer into the shot on an emotional level."


Reception


Box office

The film grossed $13.3 million at the domestic box office, earning $5.1 million in US theatrical rentals. It was the 21st highest-grossing film of 1970. The film was one of a number of movies made about campus unrest at this time, others including '' The Strawberry Statement'', '' The Magic Garden of Stanley Sweetheart'', '' The Pursuit of Happiness'', '' The Revolutionary'', '' Up in the Cellar'', '' Zabriskie Point'' and ''
RPM Revolutions per minute (abbreviated rpm, RPM, rev/min, r/min, or r⋅min−1) is a unit of rotational speed (or rotational frequency) for rotating machines. One revolution per minute is equivalent to hertz. Standards ISO 80000-3:2019 def ...
''. ''Getting Straight'' was the only one that was commercially successful. "We were one of Columbia's biggest grossers of the year, and critics were very supportive", says Rush.


Critical reaction

Howard Thompson of ''
The New York Times ''The New York Times'' (''NYT'') is an American daily newspaper based in New York City. ''The New York Times'' covers domestic, national, and international news, and publishes opinion pieces, investigative reports, and reviews. As one of ...
'' wrote, "A brilliant, mercurial performance by Elliott Gould steadies and vivifies but cannot save 'Getting Straight' ... A serious-minded, freewheeling comedy, pivoting on student unrest and rebellion on the contemporary campus scene, succumbs to theatrics and, structurally, the very conventions it deplores." Also writing in ''
The New York Times ''The New York Times'' (''NYT'') is an American daily newspaper based in New York City. ''The New York Times'' covers domestic, national, and international news, and publishes opinion pieces, investigative reports, and reviews. As one of ...
'', Dwight Macdonald called it "a bad movie" that "reminds me of a grunt-and-groan wrestling match that tries by overemphasis to make the customers forget it's fixed." However, Arthur D. Murphy of '' Variety'' declared, "'Getting Straight' is an outstanding film. It is a comprehensive, cynical, sympathetic, flip, touching and hilarious story of the middle generation—those millions who are a bit too old for protest, a bit too young for repression. Elliott Gould's third smash performance in a year, herein as a disenchanted college student-teacher, makes him an undeniable screen star. Ditto for Candice Bergen, in a role that at last befits both her dramatic and physical talents."
Gene Siskel Eugene Kal Siskel (January 26, 1946 – February 20, 1999) was an American film critic and journalist for the ''Chicago Tribune'' who co-hosted a movie review television series alongside colleague Roger Ebert. Siskel started writing for the '' ...
of the ''
Chicago Tribune The ''Chicago Tribune'' is an American daily newspaper based in Chicago, Illinois, United States. Founded in 1847, it was formerly self-styled as the "World's Greatest Newspaper", a slogan from which its once integrated WGN (AM), WGN radio and ...
'' gave the film one-and-a-half stars out of four and wrote that it "fails because no meaningful conflict is established until late in the film", and that every character except Bergen's was "one-dimensional, a thin symbol to be placed wherever the box office dictates." Gary Arnold of ''
The Washington Post ''The Washington Post'', locally known as ''The'' ''Post'' and, informally, ''WaPo'' or ''WP'', is an American daily newspaper published in Washington, D.C., the national capital. It is the most widely circulated newspaper in the Washington m ...
'' called the film a "thoroughly equivocal mishmash" that "politicizes everyone and everything. This includes the love affair, which is thwarted by some of the worst dialogue I've ever listened to." Richard Combs of ''
The Monthly Film Bulletin The ''Monthly Film Bulletin'' was a periodical of the British Film Institute published monthly from February 1934 until April 1991, when it merged with '' Sight & Sound''. It reviewed all films on release in the United Kingdom, including those wi ...
'' wrote, "Perfectly maintaining the balance between acute exasperation and a vivid intellectual energy, Elliott Gould manages to endow Harry with something of the air of a prophet returned from the wilderness, certain of his personal truth although by no means certain of achieving it, and not to be goaded into becoming the spokesman for a new generation of icon levellers."
Leonard Maltin Leonard Michael Maltin (born December 18, 1950) is an American film critic, film historian, and author. He is known for his book of film capsule reviews, '' Leonard Maltin's Movie Guide'', published from 1969 to 2014. Maltin was the film criti ...
's movie guide awarded two-and-a-half stars out of four and noted that the film essentially was a "period piece" but that its "central issue of graduate student (Elliott) Gould choosing between academic double-talk and his beliefs remains relevant." Steven Scheuer, however, wrote that the film was reflective of "
hippie A hippie, also spelled hippy, especially in British English, is someone associated with the counterculture of the 1960s, counterculture of the mid-1960s to early 1970s, originally a youth movement that began in the United States and spread to dif ...
dom alienation at its shallowest."
Stanley Kauffmann Stanley Kauffmann (April 24, 1916 – October 9, 2013) was an American writer, editor, and critic of film and theater. Career Kauffmann started with ''The New Republic'' in 1958 and contributed film criticism to that magazine for the next 55 ye ...
of
The New Republic ''The New Republic'' (often abbreviated as ''TNR'') is an American magazine focused on domestic politics, news, culture, and the arts from a left-wing perspective. It publishes ten print magazines a year and a daily online platform. ''The New Y ...
wrote- "Getting Straight is a very ambitious film that is too small for its britches". John Calley of Warners wanted to hire Kaufman, Rush and Gould to make a film of
Bruce Jay Friedman Bruce Jay Friedman (April 26, 1930June 3, 2020) was an American novelist, screenwriter, playwright, and actor. He was noted for his versatility of writing in both literature and pop culture. He was also a trailblazer in the style of modern Ameri ...
's '' Scuba Duba'' but no film resulted. Rush wanted to follow the film with '' The Stunt Man'', but that film was not made until 1980.


See also

*
List of American films of 1970 This is a list of American films released in 1970. Box office The highest-grossing American films released in 1970, by domestic box office gross revenue as estimated by '' The Numbers'', are as follows: January–March April–June Jul ...


References


Bibliography

*Greenspun, Roger (1970)
Getting Straight
' New York Times, May 14, 1970. (accessed 9 July 2007) *Maltin, Leonard (1991) ''Leonard Maltin's Movie and Video Guide 1992'', Signet, New York. *Scheuer, Steven H. (1990) ''Movies on TV and Videocassette'', Bamtam Books, New York.


External links

* * * {{Richard Rush 1970 films 1970 comedy-drama films 1970s American films 1970s English-language films American comedy-drama films Columbia Pictures films Films based on American novels Films directed by Richard Rush Films scored by Ronald Stein Films set in universities and colleges Films shot in Eugene, Oregon English-language comedy-drama films