1971 love story
Rating: 16/20
Plot: A drug addict falls in love with a future drug addict, and the pair are about as good for each other as you might imagine.
Al Pacino's first starring role, and he comes out firing, entering the scene with this gum-chomping swagger and fueled by go-powder and greasy electricity. What's a dude in this particular situation thinking he's got the right to swagger anyway? Once Pacino meets Kitty Winn and realizes that she can keep up with him, his character turns into a goofy child. I love these little looks he gives to Winn to catch her reaction to his shenanigans. There's really no doubt that Pacino's character loves Kitty Winn's character. You can see it in his eyes. You can also here desperation in his screams. Pacino's just so good here, darting between vulnerable and aggressive.
Director Jerry Schatzberg brings a gritty style to match the grittiness of his sort of anti-romance love story. It's sans score unless you count the music of the city--the car horns, the subway rumbles, the pedestrian chatter--as a score. I probably would. I also liked these shots of all these auxiliary weirdos--a nodding guy on a subway, a guy with a hurt arm, an elevator guy, some random pimps. It all helped me feel this particular scene in this particular time.
Should this movie remind me of The Graduate as much as it does? I'm not even sure I can articulate why the relationship in this movie reminds me of the relationship in that movie.
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