Rachel, Rachel

Joanne Woodward delivers a warm, sympathetic performance as a 30-something spinster small-town schoolteacher living with her mom (Kate Harrington) in rooms over the local funeral parlor. Said business used to be operated by Rachels' recently deceased father (Donald Moffat). Rachel despairs over the idea of her life possibly being at least half-over now, and yearns for something more. Possibly she may get a chance for love with a charming big-city teacher named Nick (James Olson).

Woodwards' husband Paul Newman made his creditable directing debut with this interesting choice of material (an adaptation by Stewart Stern of a novel by Margaret Laurence). It's first and foremost an excellent showcase for his wife, who hits all the right notes. Rachel is the kind of character who honestly earns rooting interest; the viewer does ultimately want her to be happy. She does have issues, of course, stemming from her childhood; her best friend Calla (Estelle Parsons) has her own issues as well.

The script truly allows us to get inside this lead characters' head by allowing us to hear her thoughts. We come to see that "reality" in this story is not always to be taken for granted, with some critical revelations along the way that illustrate just how strongly Rachel wants some change in her life. There are some true standout moments, such as Rachels' reaction to a memorable church service, presided over by a reverend (special guest star Geraldine Fitzgerald) and young preacher (Terry Kiser).

Marking the first noticeable movie roles for top character actors Moffat and Kiser, "Rachel, Rachel" does truly benefit from this impressive cast, with Woodward as the glue to hold everything together. It's extremely well shot by Gayne Rescher at some picturesque locations in Connecticut, and nicely scored by Jerome Moross.

This compassionate character study scored Oscar nominations, for Woodward, Parsons, Stern, and for best picture. It's a must if you're a fan of the cast and director.

Paul and Joannes' daughter Nell plays Rachel as a child.

Seven out of 10.

In the turbulent cultural and political year of 1968, movies hadn't quite yet figured out how they wanted to address current events, or indeed whether they wanted to address them at all. The year's Oscar winner for Best Picture was "Oliver!," an entertaining but utterly irrelevant big-budget musical; "Funny Girl," another stage-to-screen musical that hasn't aged at all well, was also among the nominees. "The Lion in Winter" found Peter O'Toole and Katharine Hepburn bickering in period costumes, while "Romeo and Juliet" gave Shakespeare a jolt of sexiness for the younger generation. Movies that actually felt like they had their finger on the uneasy pulse of the changing times, like "2001: A Space Odyssey," "Rosemary's Baby," "Faces," and "The Battle of Algiers," were nominated in lesser categories but none were up for the big prize. That fifth slot went to "Rachel, Rachel," in which Paul Newman directed his wife, Joanne Woodward, to a Best Actress nomination.

"Rachel, Rachel" certainly did not deserve a place at the Oscar podium above those titles just mentioned that weren't even nominated, but it does have much to recommend it, and the themes it's about speak more to a modern-day audience than those of many of its contemporaries, because they're both universal and timeless. Woodward plays a woman in her 30s, living with her annoying and needy mother and watching her life slowly drip away from her day by day. It's about that moment -- and I have to believe anyone over a certain age has experienced it at least to some degree -- where one realizes that he/she isn't so much living a life as dying a slow and inevitable death. What one does with the time in between suddenly becomes urgent in a way it hasn't ever felt before, and one understands how easy it would be to do nothing and let that slow death gradually come. Woodward's character, brought up in a mortuary and morbidly obsessed with death, doesn't exactly figure out what to do with the time left to her, but she does figure out that she needs to try something different, which is perhaps the best any of us can hope for. Woodward gives a beautiful and nuanced performance as a shy turtle coming out of her shell one painful inch at a time. The movie is melancholy and sad, but it's also hopeful in its conclusion that it's never too late to at least make a grab for, if not happiness, then at least contentment.

In addition to its nominations for Best Picture and Best Actress, the film also received nominations for Best Supporting Actress (Estelle Parsons, as Rachel's closet lesbian friend), and Best Adapted Screenplay (Stewart Stern). Newman himself was not nominated for Best Director, which doesn't really surprise me. The Academy has always shown a penchant for acknowledging the showy over the subtle when it comes to that particular category.

Grade: A

Both the camera and the man behind it were obviously in love with the actress on screen, and, that actress, Joanne Woodward, was arguably never better than she was in "Rachel, Rachel," husband-Paul-Newman's first directing effort. The low-key story involves a woman who reaches the middle of her life and realizes that she has yet to start living. Trapped in a small apartment above a funeral parlor with her whining possessive mother, Rachel is a schoolteacher with daydreams of having a life and children of her own.

Rachel's emotions are written on Woodward's face in a way few actresses have ever conveyed feeling. Words are superfluous, because the actress's subtle shifts of expression reveal the woman's raw vulnerability and, eventually, her sexual and emotional awakening. A course in film acting could be taught with this film as the primer. Although Kate Harrington, James Olson, and Estelle Parsons provide able support, the film is Woodward's showcase, and Newman's sturdy direction does not detract from his star. The shifts between Rachel's present and her memories and dreams are seamless, clear, and illuminating rather than distracting.

The film requires patience, but that does not imply boring, but rather leisurely paced, much like life in a small town that lies off the main roads. Getting to know another person requires time, and Rachel is worth knowing. "Rachel, Rachel" is a not to be missed minor masterwork with a performance that will haunt and linger in memory indefinitely. Newman never surpassed his directing here, and few actresses have surpassed Woodward's achievement either.

Based on the novel "A Jest of God" by Canadian novelist Margaret Laurence, "Rachel, Rachel" is the story of Rachel Cameron (beautifully played by Joanne Woodward), a middle-aged schoolteacher who tries to come out of her shell before it's too late. Her father, recently deceased, was the town's funeral director. She still lives at home with her demanding mother (Kate Harrington). Rachel's friend is Calla Mackie (Estelle Parsons), an equally lonely, repressed fellow teacher who has some issues in her life as well. Rachel has a chance on love when a man (James Olson) returns to the small town in Connecticut from NYC. Rachel has some difficulty handling emotions she's never felt before. She's still haunted by her past and has difficulty coping with reality and fantasy. As Rachel mentioned at the beginning of the film, she's middle-aged, she's lived half of her life, what can she do now?

This was Paul Newman's debut as director. He did a fine job directing his wife Joanne Woodward. He captured the loneliness of this woman without overdoing it as well as the atmosphere of living in a small town that is alternately comfortable and suffocating.

I was also impressed with the supporting cast. Including Estelle Parsons, Kate Harrington and James Olson, Donald Moffat as Rachel's very scary father and two very charismatic performances by Geraldine Fitzgerald as the local reverend and Terry Kiser as a traveling faith healer.

Although it received four Oscar nominations, "Rachel, Rachel" seems to have fallen off the radar screen. Some of the movies that were released in 1968 included "The Lion in Winter", "Funny Girl", "2001: A Space Odyssey", "Romeo and Juliet" and "Planet of the Apes".

"Rachel, Rachel", a mature, well-acted drama, certainly should be considered one of the more under-appreciated films of the late 1960s.

I saw "Rachel, Rachel" early one summer morning on cable. I woke up in the dark and turned the television on and the film began. I was hypnotized. The movie is so honest, and moving, and true that I thought I was still dreaming.

I grew up in Connecticut, and several of my aunts were schoolteachers, so I can tell you that every moment in the film is absolutely true. Paul Newman gets everything right... the repressed woman who is still under her mother's control, the judgmental small-town, the wild children, even the sound of the heat bugs on the country road! Joanne Woodward is absolutely mesmerizing as a woman lost in the shuffle, doing everything everyone wants her to and dying in the process...

This movie is not for everyone. There are no explosions or car crashes or digitally-animated comic book characters. But if you would like to see a genuine "slice-of-life" along the lines of "Midnight Cowboy" or even "The Graduate," then "Rachel, Rachel" is a film that will move you and make you think. Definitely worth seeking out.

Grade: A-