Katherine

I saw this only once--when it was on TV in 1975. I was 20 years old. It left a powerful impact on me. I hadn't yet heard of Sissy Spacek or Henry Winkler. I deeply "identified" with Katherine as the movie began. I kept thinking "Yes, she's doing the right thing!" Then in the end... I felt the way a balloon must feel when it's popped. I realized the error of her ways--and mine. I realized I too could've been sucked right into all that. I've never, ever forgotten this story. Someday I'll try to get my granddaughters to watch it with me.

It's been many years since I saw this, but I do recall enough details to know this was not based loosely on the Patti Hearst case, as has been stated, but on Dwight, Illinois's Diana Oughton, who got involved with the Weathermen and was one of three "urban commandos" killed when a bomb they were working on went off in their NYC townhouse, in May of 1970. Diana was the daughter of an important landowning family, and was brought up in the "lap of luxury", such as it can be in rural Illinois, who became socially conscious while teaching school in Guatemala, circa 1962, then joined the SDS and its Weathermen offshoot in the late 60's.

Given that this is fictionalized, the performances are wonderful and the writing and direction (given that it's a TV movie) are above average.

"Inspired by true events, 'Katherine' documents the conversion (in flashback style) of a sensitive '60s activist to radical extremist. Played with great sensitivity, and foreshadowing the great roles that would come to characterize her career, Sissy Spacek delivers a nuanced and ultimately tragic performance as the title's lead. Spacek is ably supported in this drama by legendary actors Art Carney and Jane Wyatt as her parents, and Henry Winkler as a fellow activist and supportive boyfriend," according to the DVD sleeve.

Writer/director Jeremy Kagan's "ABC Sunday Night Movie" seems to have been loosely based on "Weather Underground" member Diana Oughton's life, and also followed the big media story involving "Symbionese Liberation Army" recruit Patty Hearst. At the time, the American TV viewing public would have been familiar with the stories involving young women who gave up affluent socialite status to join revolutionary militia groups. With everyone wondering "Why?", "Katherine" provides an answer.

Ms. Spacek's glasses and wigs look like props sitting on her head, even when meant to look real. Still, Spacek is a fine actress, and worth watching. Taking a "Happy Days" break, Mr. Winkler always shines in these 1970s roles; he is so unlike his "Fonzie" character. Mr. Carney, experiencing a career resurgence, was predictably Emmy-nominated for an "Outstanding Single Performance by a Supporting Actor in a Comedy or Drama Special". Television veterans Ms. Wyatt (once the mother on "Father Knows Best") and Julie Kavner (then little sister to "Rhoda") also appear. The song hits are not the original recordings.

***** Katherine (10/5/75) Jeremy Kagan ~ Sissy Spacek, Henry Winkler, Art Carney, Jane Wyatt

For a 70's TV movie, this is strong stuff. Katherine tells the story of a pampered, UMC, boomer-princess who gets the virus of guilt when she is confronted with injustices in the third world and, you guessed it, turns Marxist.

I sound flippant here, but you can just guess the depths of depravity Sissy Spacek's Katherine--within the bounds of TV sensibilities--goes in her radicalized zeal to tear down the capitalist, fascist, materialistic, racist, showered and shaved system. And yet, when she is confronted with her lover's (Henry Winkler) using of revolutionary principles to justify his banging other girls, you can see her losing her last shred of sanity, her desire to someday have marriage to enjoy and family to care for. The transformation of Katherine from seeker of justice to angry, depraved killer is heartbreaking.

Spacek shows the sort of talent that has made her such a seriously good actress, Winkler is a journeyman actor himself (and you learn to hate him as his idealism morphs into something darker), Art Carney and Jane Wyatt are excellent as Katherine's good Democrat parents who enable her radicalization by funding their daughter as she dives deeper into the underground, and the rest of the supporting cast enriches the story.

The only drag on Katherine is the fact that it is a TV Movie (although the version I saw had a few moments of violence, drugs, and semi-nudity added; presumably for a theatrical release in Europe?). The film just doesn't have enough time to completely tell the story of the radicalized 60's and early 70's. Even though it's told in flashbacks and documentarian interviews (and the interviews with Spacek are so chillingly peaceful, you suspect there's something really bad coming), the time constraints truncate the story. You're left with an almost-told story, not a complete one.

Yet, the strength of the performances and the topicality of the story keep Katherine alive, watchable, and ultimately, crushingly sad.

...even though this film is talking about events from roughly 1964-1970. So at the time this aired, nothing being shown here was more than ten years in the past. However, American culture had changed so fast that it really seemed like you were looking at an era that was just a blip on a very old radar, yet that brief era brought lasting change. Some people think this film was based on the story of Patty Hearst, but it was actually a very loose account of someone of similar age and life experience to Diana Oughton , who was one of the Weathermen, a domestic terrorist group.

The production boasts a top notch cast, including two veterans - Art Carney and Jane Wyatt as Katherine's upper class parents, an up and coming Sissy Spacek as Katherine, the sassy prep school student turned schoolteacher turned protester and ultimately turned violent revolutionary. Riding the crest of a wave of popularity at that time, Henry Winkler stars as Katherine's long time boyfriend, Bob, who in the end acts like most boyfriends in any era of time, except Bob uses revolutionary excuses to explain why he decides eventually to ghost on Katherine, not just that he is getting bored with her - that would be so bourgeoisie! You know, even though Henry Winker was as famous in the 70s as Bogey was in the 40s, that bushy haircut and mustache they planted on him made him completely unrecognizable to me at the time.

This is really well done as Katherine in present day - about 1970 - is talking about the evolution of her viewpoints. And you think from her very plain clothing and the stool she is sitting on she is probably in prison - I'll let you watch and find out what is really going on. At the same time you see her life unfold. After college she goes to South America to teach children and adults. The local landlord - rather like a feudal lord - objects to Katherine teaching the adults to read and has her kicked out of the country. He is afraid the peasants will become educated and revolt. Back in the states she teaches underprivileged African American kids at an alternative school. That's where she meets Bob. The white power structure strikes back by claiming the school is breaking zoning laws, but the black power movement also weighs in, telling Bob and Katherine that white people should never teach black kids, because it will take the hate out of them and "hate is the strongest weapon we have". So slowly Katherine reaches the conclusion that neither education nor peaceful protest will ever fix anything and takes up arms against "institutions of power". She seems to have forgotten that average Joes who have nothing to do with the power structure she wishes to destroy could get hurt in her revolution.

And then there are mom and dad. They are well off, the film never talks about exactly what Katherine's dad does for a living, and even Katherine has to admit her parents are good people, even though she often describes them as living off of other people's oppression. You can tell they want to help and understand their daughter, but she is just on a different wavelength from them. Tea and cookies are not going to fix this. Likewise Katherine's sister and best college friend take on the traditional 60's role of wife and mother and don't get her either.

I'll let you see how this all turns out, but I thought it was quite powerful, and I was only seventeen at the time it aired. I was somewhat disappointed when I discussed this film with my friends the next day and the only thing they got out of it was how pretty Katherine was at the beginning of the film and how used up she looked at the end. But it was the 70s, the Vietnam war was over, nobody's boyfriend was going to get drafted, and this just seemed like a story from a place long ago and far away to a bunch of teens in 1975.

I'm glad we don't have American young people blowing up buildings and robbing banks or kidnapping heiresses anymore, but it would be nice if they cared about more than the next Marvel comic movie and reality TV, if they weren't all just so passively resigned to their fates and hypnotized by their phones. There must be a happy medium.