The Graduate; 'Oh Noes!'

Ok, so I kind of goofed on up this post and I realized that only the title was posted and the text was not. so oh well, here is my 2 cents about the Graduate.

My first reaction to the opening of this film was 'WHOA! That's one YOUNG LOOKING DUSTIN HOFFMAN!' ha ha ha. That was definitely quite an experience. The opening of the movie was quite revealing about Ben's character throughout the film. He has just graduated, has won academic scholarships and the party is in HIS honor and the honor of his achievements, yet he seems apathetic about the party, the people and his achievements. Throughout the film, we see that Ben is pretty much detached from anything and everything. It was only until Mrs. Robinson threw a curve ball in his straight life that we see some emotion develop on Ben's part. During his 'first encounter', the fear of just being in a position in which if caught, could spell eternal doom on him wrenched out the emotion of fear. The second encounter was quite intriguing. Ben calls up Mrs. Robinson to meet him at a Bar, but does so at a point in time where he felt that it would not be possible for her to make it. Freud beautifully explained this phenomenon. Freud said our consciousness comprises of 3 components; the Id, the Superego and the Ego. The Id is blind desire, lust that is completely insatiable. The Superego is like a little God inside all of us. It has high morals and demands we stick to them. The Ego is the poor middleman that is stuck mediating between the blind demands of the Id and the unrealistic morality of the Superego. So Ben calling Mrs. Robinson for a late night shindig was him listening to his Id, at the same time, doing so at a weird hour was him bowing down to the whim of his Superego. I pity the ego.
Interestingly enough, Mrs. Robinson was his ‘first’, as depicted by the dialogue that follows once Ben and Mrs. Robinson are in the hotel room. But the mind-game Mrs. Robinson ensnares Ben into ends up with him insisting on them sleeping together. This brings us to the very interesting character of Mrs. Robinson. During the initial part of the movie, I kept wondering to myself as to why she was throwing herself on Ben. In fact, she doesn’t seem desperate, she just ‘commands’ it in such a way so as to make it seem like she is doing Ben a favor by sleeping with him. Even when Ben tries to call the affair off, she makes it seem like it was only going to be his loss. The woman is smart and very capable of playing with Ben’s head and his emotions. Mrs. Robinson’s personality takes a destructive turn when she threatens Ben to stay away from Elaine and you wonder why. She (Mrs. Robinson) isn’t emotionally attached to Ben ( as she clearly abuses him psychologically) and as it stands, Ben is quite a young man. So why would she threaten Ben to stay away from her daughter? Ben and Elaine get forced to go on a date and it is very clear from the beginning that Elaine likes Ben but Ben has to be a complete jerk to her because of Elaine’s mother. The fact that Ben succumbs to such pressure puts across the notion that he may not be a very strong individual, which is only obvious given the state his life was in - CONFUSION.
The story goes forward, Ben and Elaine get separated because Elaine gets to know of the affair between her lover and her mother (whoa there!) and how Ben makes up his mind to marry Elaine and we all know how the story goes.
Certain symbols used in the film left quite a strong impact on me. The strongest was of Ben in the pool. During his 21st birthday party, his dad dressed him up in a scuba diving suite and had him dip into the pool. However, the way the shot is filmed is through Ben’s perspective, as he looks out of the face mask. He hears nothing, but continues to move towards the pool. It’s like he blocks out all worldly expectations, all outside interference in his life and just goes ahead and ‘takes his leap of faith’ (it was after this scene that Ben called up Mrs. Robinson). Then in several scenes that follow, we find him submerging himself under water to cut away from the babble of his parents, who constantly demand an answer to questions which he refuses to acknowledge exist. Being submerged under water actually serves a sensory deprivation experience, where our hearing shuts down to a negligible, vision gets blurry, let’s not even try to find out what happens to the sense of smell, taste being that of water and touch being a more uniform feeling.
I think overall, the movie dealt with one of the most taboo issues, not only from the 60’s, but even of today. Seriously, which one of us can imagine having an affair with a married psycho-destructive woman and then dating and falling in love with her daughter? It is a commonly accepted fact that mental disorders (psychological disorders) can often (and in most cases are) passed down through heredity. So if the mommy is messed up, chances are the daughter would have a couple of psycho aces up her sleeve too. Jokes aside, the movie takes one of the dirtiest issues and plasters it ALL OVER the viewer’s face. It’s like the director (Mike Nichols) thought to himself ‘F sensitivity yo, I’m going to give them a shocker.’
For all those who have not watched this film, WATCH IT. And I am not talking about the remake. Watch the original 1967 version with a YOUNG DUSTIN HOFFMAN (Oh my god! He used to be young?) and several technical glitches like audio synch being off in the fight scene in a church (we all love violence in places of worship now don’t we) or several continuity problems, which I will leave you to discover on your own 