post sex musings: "all that poetry and all those songs, about something that lasts no time at all"
The Graduate (1967)
post-sex musings: "I don't know, Mrs. Robinson"
Director: Mike Nichols
Stars: Dustin Hoffman, Anne Bancroft & Katharine Ross
An Education
Director: Lone Scherfig
Stars: Carey Mulligan, Peter Sarsgaard & Alfred Molina
The comparisons between The Graduate and An Education are pretty obvious. Both are coming-of-age stories about young adults in the 1960’s (though one was made in the 1960’s and one was made 40—yikes—years later). Both protagonists are the heroes of their story who are constantly questioning a nonsensical status quo and controlled by the expectations and dreams of adults who can’t relate to them.
Yet The Graduate, a groundbreaking, award-winning, highly celebrated movie doesn’t age quite as well as you think it would. Although it remains a definite favorite of mine (probably at least top 20), one is left wondering at the end how much Benjamin actually grew up, and what exactly he learned from his experience.
Why an education is more important than graduating after the jump…
Drifting vs. Yearning
Benjamin, in my opinion, is a version of Holden Caulfield. For some reason people love these characters, these rascals, and relate to their adolescent ideals and cynical views of people that are based entirely on emotion rather than experience. You know what these characters are? They’re brats.
Ben’s stuck drifting after college. What was the point? What does it all mean? Why should he live up to so-and-so’s expectations and where should he go from here? It’s definitely something we all relate to in our early 20’s, and it’s the theme of the movie. We often see things from Benjamin’s perspective, which is a very effective story-telling device.
He has an affair with Mrs. Robinson, he lies around in his pool, and he smokes in his room— all because he’s bored with life. It’s boredom that drives him… he’s, as he puts it… “drifting.”
It takes the somewhat lifeless but young and pretty Elaine (Mrs. Robinson’s daughter, of course) to give him purpose and rock him out of his stupor. It’s not a bad story, it definitely mirrors reality to a strong extent, but at the same time you’re left wondering why Ben is so taken with this girl who has an affinity for fake eyelashes and cries at strip clubs.
At the end, they finally end up together, duh, but now that he has his girl, all that’s left for Benjamin is to… what? Fall into a career in plastics? Probably.
He may be relatable, but that doesn’t make him interesting or particularly deserving of anything amazing.
In An Education, Jenny is the very opposite of Ben. Bright, optimistic, and driven, Jenny yearns to “grow-up.” She wants sophistication more than anything in the world, and while more people can relate to Benjamin, I think there’s a large part of us that want what Jenny wants too.
Perhaps Ben is us at our worst, and Jenny us when we are our best.
That’s not to say Jenny is perfect. She is in fact so blinded by her ideals that she ignores common sense and warning signs all over the place. She allows herself to be taken by an older man who promises her the sophistication she craves. She lives out her fantasy life, at the age of 16, and who can blame her for going along with it?
The Power of Mrs. Robinson & David
You cheer for Jenny, who may have more potential then the world she lives in can offer her. Eventually she learns to reconcile her passions with her expectations, and as Jenny grows, the weaknesses of her older seducer become more and more apparent.
David is charming and smart, funny and cultured. He’s good looking and has a kind smile. He’s the ideal man, especially for a wide-eyed adolescence, and at the end of the movie it becomes clear why he’s so damn good.
But underneath his charming exterior is a lame, pathetic person. He is a coward, a fraud. Like Jenny, we soon realize he’s really not as amazing as he first appears.
In The Graduate, Mrs. Robinson, is actually the most captivating person on the screen, from beginning to end. The last third of the movie doesn’t really do her justice, attempting to turn an interesting character into nothing more than an obstacle for a trite “true love” story. But really, Mrs. Robinson is the character that has the real story, the real heartbreak and loss and tangible motivations for what she does.
Whereas David was exposed as a fraud, Mrs. Robinson is a truly tragic human being. I found myself staring at her in every shot she was in, trying to interpret what her facial expression showed about her and what it added to the situation.
In her earlier life, she was probably more of a Jenny than a Benjamin.
You’re never really certain why enigmatic Mrs. Robinson seduces Benjamin, but she becomes all the more interesting because of it, especially compared to the dull protagonist (perhaps only saved by Dustin Hoffman’s excellent performance).
The Graduate is a great movie, though it only remains believable as long as you believe that a shitty life can be revived with the entrance of a pretty girl. An Education may be an idealized lesson learning tale, but it still eclipses its predecessor, perhaps for that very reason. It’s beautiful, young and hopeful in a way that makes you believe growing up may not be such a bad thing.
