Campus ou C.Q.F.D.

OK. Mainly, if you want to see Ms. 10-cents-a-minute and (to a greater extent) Mr. Gould make fools of themselves, check this relic out. It's suffused with dated political jargoneering and tedious, tortured ruminations on the expediency of individual political action circa 1970. Historically interesting (maybe).

Mind you this film IS thirty years old and reflects what was "politically correct" for that era. We do see the early signs of the change from hippie to yuppie. Remember Jerry Rubin's conversion to capitalism? It doesn't wear well however, thirty years of wear at our ardor and idealism shows this film to be a faded glory. If a young person that wasn't around for the march from "the summer of love"; through "is Paul dead"; "Kent State"; and Watergate; and wants to see 1970 through a looking glass.. Just remember that you're looking at a different world.

Elliott Gould is bemused and colorful as a Vietnam veteran back in college, stuck between a rock and a hard place; he's working semi-seriously towards getting his teaching credentials, and yet is stymied both by his fellow classmates who want to protest the hypocrisies of the Establishment (with Gould's help) and also by his instructors, hypocrites in power who work by a double standard. Director Richard Rush occasionally does fluid work, and the film has fervently funny and thoughtful scenes, however Robert Kaufman's hot-headed screenplay, adapted from Ken Kolb's novel, is awash with half-realized ideas. The kids sound off violently against the university's directors, but we're never made aware of what they want done about their concerns. Made during an era wherein young people hoped to change the world (as well as get laid), the characters in this picture are nevertheless just sounding-boards for the writer. Topics are brought up not to be discussed but to be challenged--and in these cases, the kids are just as blind as their professional elders. Gould's shaggy character rants and raves, too, but his Harry Bailey presents a different problem: he cheats, he lies, he cuts corners, he heartily embraces his own set of values and yet is happily corrupt! A hypocrite himself, Bailey loves teaching, loves kids, but he doesn't see his own shortcomings...and I'm not sure the filmmakers do, either. Bailey is a one-sided writer's creation (and oddly, for a movie filled with so many liberal stances, Bailey--like many of the other characters--is anti-female and homophobic). Candice Bergen gives a wan performance as Gould's shiksa goddess girlfriend who doesn't like being called a WASP and who would give up everything to be a wife in the suburbs. Bergen is continually put down for that, as if she's a sellout, and yet how exactly would Gould live if he were to achieve his dream of being a high school teacher? As it is, he can't even pay the rent on his apartment. The riot sequences are staged for utter seriousness, filmed and edited with precision, and yet they don't come organically out of this story; they are interjected for shock value. The rage presented here is convincing, but the cause is confusing. These students don't seem to want peace at all, and neither does director Rush. The narrative is pushed towards violence for no other purpose except to vividly stage two movie riots. This is exploitation, and the crummy feeling one gets from the picture can be related right back to the people behind it: they're hypocrites, too. ** from ****

The first time I saw this movie was in a drive-in movie when I was in high school (just make a left turn at the submarine races and you'll find it). and the film opened uniquely enough to keep me from ignoring it for better things to do.

As the opening credits rolled, the students were tossing this nice red apple across the campus, looking at it, smiling or laughing, and tossing it on to someone else. This kept up all the way through the credits until it drove you nuts. What the hell was on that apple that was so damned fascinating?!?!? Just when the credits ended, the camera angle changed over this student's shoulder and you could see that someone had carved (very neatly, mind you) into the apple, the following message: "THERE IS NO GRAVITY--THE EARTH SUCKS" I have never forgotten that opening scene nor the message on the apple because as I got older, I found that indeed; the Earth does suck--I can see it in the mirror every day.

I think everyone should see where we came from and what historically we've lived through so I recommend this movie for when you're stuck inside on one of those dreary weather days when you've got nothing to do.

There is a good point and bad point to every argument and that's what this movie is all about and remember that if we don't learn from our past then we're doomed to repeat it.

Even for its period, I found this film's attitudes to women and gay men disturbing and this took away from my appreciation of it as a well-made film which, in many ways, has its heart in the right place. Women seem expected to serve their men both domestically and sexually and Candice Bergen's character puts up with some horrendous abuse from Elliott Gould's character - more so than most liberated educated women of that time would do. Then there is a crack early on about Arizona being a good place to live because of its low rate of homosexuality. And Nick tries to get out of the draft by pretending to be a stereotypically effeminate gay man, with Gould repeatedly using the 'F' word to describe him. And then there's the argument in the last scene. I suspect the writers just wanted the academic to say something absurd but the choice they made suggests that there is something inherently wrong in being gay and/or that academia has been taken over by gay men pushing their "homosexual agenda". Of course it is then up to our heterosexual male hero to violently protest against this. Perhaps the students' rights campaigns of this time were paternalistic and homophobic and this film just reflects that, but I hope at least some of the people at that time had a more progressive way of looking at the world.