Have you ever seen a high school yearbook from the 1940s or 1950s?
The graduates' photos make them appear to be in their mid-twenties. They look
much older at 18 or 19 than we did in our photos. That was the first thing I
noticed when I first saw director Mike Nichols' “Carnal Knowledge”
in the 1970s and was reminded of again now, with the
new 4K restoration now being shown at the Film Forum in New York City. The film traces the relationship between
former college roommates through 25 years, from the late 40s to the early 70s.
Jack Nicholson and Art Garfunkel, as roommates at Amherst College, look a
little too old to be students there. But we're eventually lulled in to
accepting them as such by the dichotomy of their personalities and their acting
abilities.
The film opens in the dark. Literally. We hear the voices of the
two roommates discussing women and sex in the dark of their dorm room. We never
see their faces until the next scene; at a college mixer where we followed
Susan (Candice Bergen) into the dance.Sandy (Art Garfunkel) is immediately attracted to her. Jonathan (Jack Nicholson)
coaches the shy, sensitive Sandy in what to do to break the ice. Seeing this
scene today made it impossible not to recall the villainous Joker grin on
Nicholson's face we would come to know well. Which works very well for the
character of Jonathan, the tough, aggressive misogynist who ends up cuckolding
his best friend and roommate.
When the film opened back in 1971 America was going through
societal changes. The Vietnam War was in full swing, and the youth of the
country were protesting. They were also embracing the sexual freedom boom. In
1969 "I Am Curious (yellow)," a Swedish erotic drama that opened
there in 1967,
made it to American shores. Nudity appeared on the Broadway stage
with "Hair" in 1968 and "Oh! Calcutta!" in 1969. Societal
mores were changing. The Sexual Revolution was in full attack mode with women
wearing miniskirts, see through shirts and hot pants. Woodstock. Flower Power.
Psychedelics. Hippies. "Foreign" films (read: obscenity to many) were
being banned in a number of states. The Generation Gap was being covered in
newspapers and news magazines. In the face of it all, never missing a beat, the
entertainment industry began to embrace counter-culture in way they never had before.
The cultural bandwagon that spawned the summer of love spread from Haight-Ashbury
to Greenwich Village, possibly in VW vans trailing
"aromatic" smoke clouds in their wake.
Jules Pfeiffer originally saw this as a play, but upon showing it
to friend Mike Nichols, was convinced it would be better made as a film. And as
a film it has grown better with age. Specifically, this reviewer's age.
Dialogue that went over my head, or that I had found both puerile and stuffy,
resonated clearer while they were dancing in my older brain. This film has a
lot to say about life and the relationships we allow ourselves to suffer
through.
Back to the film:
Sandy scores a date with Susan and the two shy virgins begin a
relationship. All the stupid, testosterone- fueled braggadocio that
rears its head in most adolescent (and collegiate) males arises like the mist
that surrounds the roommates as they walk to their dorm while Jonathan pumps
Sandy for information about his latest date with Susan. Even the shy Sandy
comes out of his shell to brag about how he got beyond the kissing stage of his
and Susan's relationship. This leads to Jonathan calling Susan and eventually
the two of them begin to sneak around behind Sandy's back.
Advancing
into Act II, sometime into the late 50s - early 60s, Sandy is married to Susan.
He meets Jonathan at an ice rink where they watch a beautiful skater (Ann-Margaret, in an Oscar-nominated performance)
from a distance and talk about, what else? Women. Jonathan's take: "You
think a girl goes for you, and you find out she's after your money or your
balls. Women today are better hung than the men."He continues to ramble, slightly to Sandy's
disgust. "It's not as easy getting laid as it used to be," Jonathan
complains, "I don't think I fuck more than a dozen new girls a year
now."
We
find Jonathan out with Bobbie, the gorgeous, redhead with the "tits"
and "ass" Jonathan's looking for in a woman. They eventually shack up together, at Bobbie's suggestion and Jonathan convinces
her to stop working. This causes the relationship to deteriorate as Bobbie
doesn't know what to do with herself all day long alone in the apartment and
Jonathan complains that the place is a pig sty. Sandy,
meanwhile, complains to Jonathan about his life with Susan: "It's funny,
Susan and I do all the right things. We undress in front of each other. We
spend fifteen minutes on foreplay. We experiment, do it in different rooms,
it's a seven-room house. We don't believe in making a ritual of it, we do it
when we feel like it. We don't feel like we have to be passionate all the time.
Sometimes it's even more fun necking," he goes on, finishes with:
"Maybe it's just not meant to be enjoyable with women you love."Jonathan replies: "Sandy, do you want to
get laid?"
No
surprise here; Sandy and Susan divorce. Sandy begins seeing Cindy (Cynthia
O'Neal), a modern, empowered, smart woman. The couples spend a lot of time
together. Things are nearing the end for Bobbie and Jonathan; he doesn't want
children and doesn't want to marry Bobbie. Before Cindy and Sandy arrive at
their apartment Jonathan and Bobbie get into a heated argument that finds
Bobbie not fully dressed in the bedroom. Things come to a head and a disturbing
end when, while at Jonathan's apartment he suggests to Sandy that they swap
women and Sandy goes along with it.
Advancing
to Act III, late 60s - early 70s, middle-aged Jonathan presents a slide show
"Ball-Busters on Parade," at his place showing the loves of his life
to a hippyish, middle-aged Sandi and Jennifer (Carol Kane), his eighteen-year-old
girlfriend. Jonathan mistakenly shows a slide of Susan, but Sandy notices.
Jonathan, showing a slide of Bobbie, "The king of the ball-busters. She
conned me into marrying her and now she's killing me with alimony." As he
continues his narration, he becomes angrier, vulgar and misogynistic. Then he
insults Jennifer and she and Sandy walk out without a word.
A
nighttime walk with the two old "friends" is the last time we see
them together. The conversation teeters between the then and now, the us and
them. Jonathan makes fun of Sandy's relationship with Jennifer. "She knows
worlds which I cannot begin to touch yet," Sandy tells him. "You give
up bad vibrations." "Sandy I love you," Jonathan retorts,
"but you're a schmuck." Sandy tells Jonathan he can find what he's
found. The last words we hear between the "friends" are Jonathan's:
"Don't make me insult you."
The
film ends with, after a time passage, Jonathan going to Louise's (Rita Moreno)
apartment. Louise is a prostitute for whom Jonathan is a regular customer.
Louise performs a monologue/dialogue that also seems to be part of their usual
routine. At one point she messes it up angering Jonathan. Obviously, it's
Jonathan's creation, and the only thing that can get him erect is to hear her compliment
his virility.
“Carnal
Knowledge” was so controversial in 1971 that, after a conviction of a theater
manager, Mr. Jenkins in Albany, Georgia for "distributing obscene
material" was upheld by the Supreme Court of Georgia, the US Supreme court
overturned the conviction: "Our own viewing of the film satisfies us that “Carnal
Knowledge” could not be found … to depict sexual conduct in a patently
offensive way. Nothing in the movie falls within … material which may
constitutionally be found … "patently offensive" … While the subject
matter of the picture is, in a broader sense, sex, and there are scenes in
which sexual conduct including "ultimate sexual acts" is to be
understood to be taking place, the camera does not focus on the bodies of the
actors at such times. There is no exhibition whatever of the actors' genitals,
lewd or otherwise, during these scenes. There are occasional scenes of nudity,
but nudity alone is not enough to make material legally obscene… Appellant's
showing of the film “Carnal Knowledge” is simply not the "public portrayal
of hardcore sexual conduct for its own sake, and for the ensuing commercial
gain" which we said was punishable…"[1]
The
film received mixed reviews. Roger Ebert called it "clearly Mike Nichols'
best film." Others were not so kind but there were more positive reviews
than negative. Vincent Canby: "a nearly ideal collaboration of directorial
and writing talents" that was "not only very funny, but in a casual
way—in the way of something observed in a half-light—more profound than much
more ambitious films."Gavin
Millar: "Though not the last word on the subject, it's still a telling and
unhysterical assault on male chauvinism; and if that's fashionable, it's not
unwelcome." "The iciest, most merciless and most repellent major (and
seriously intended) motion picture in a very long time." - Charles
Champlin. "Basically a one-note story ... The characters do not change or
learn; they do not even repeat their mistakes in very interesting ways." -
Gene Siskel. "This movie says not merely that there are some people like
these, but that this is it—that is, that this movie, in its own
satirical terms, presents a more accurate view of men and women than
conventional movies do. That may be the case, but the movie isn't
convincing." - Pauline Kael.
“Carnal
Knowledge” is sometimes referred to as a "coming of age film." But do
people actually come of age when they seem to be incapable of maturing? It's a
film that can make one examine and question the relationships in their lives.
How long does one put up with a toxic person? How bad is someone's insecurity
that they need constant, positive, reinforcement in their lives? “Carnal
Knowledge” is a great film but not necessarily a good story.
The
new 4K restoration will be running at the Film Forum in Manhattan from Sept. 2
- Sept. 8. Details on the Film Forum's website: