In a Nutshell Masterpiece: "The Graduate" 1967 (8/10)

Rating: 8/10 (8 December 2010)

The Graduate...Here's to you Mrs. Robinson!
40 years ago they made a romantic drama as fast paced as 21st century sci-fi action blockbusters. Starring Dustin Hoffman in his late 20s, The Graduate is a story of Ben Braddock (Hoffman), a recent college graduate who gets involved in an affair with Mrs Robinson, a family friend. Later on, Ben also falls in love with her teenage daughter Elaine, and there starts the complications.
In many ways, the significance of this movie lies mostly in acting and dialogue. Having said that; there are three main characters that contribute to more than 80% of it; first of all, there's Dustin Hoffman who plays the lead role of Ben Braddock, picturing the ultimately realistic confusion of a recent successful college graduate, unsure of what to make up of his life. His tone, his gestures, his actions, his reactions, all showed worthy enough to gain his first of seven Oscar nominations in his career.
Secondly, there's Academy Award winner Anne Bancroft, who plays sort of the center piece of the movie, in other words "Mrs Robinson"; a hot, rich and strong woman in her 40s who finds satisfaction in trapping Braddock (Hoffman) in an affair. Anne Bancroft, a much bigger name then than Dustin Hoffman himself, was a necessary base for the whole acting cast to be built on, especially that the other two pillars of the movie were recent talents at that time. Bancroft has later earned a Female Lead nomination for her role in The Graduate.
Last but not least, there is Katharine Ross who portrays Mrs. Robinson's teenage daughter Elaine; a young naive extraordinarily beautiful girl, who instantly strikes the liking of her mother lover Ben Braddock. Katharine Ross here excels in presenting the female equivalent of Hoffman's character, planting thoughts in the viewers' minds of what should and should not happen if they both had existed in a perfect world.
Needless to say that if a movie's main reason of success is good acting, that we can only relate to a strongly genuine script. The Oscar nominated screenplay provided not only the complex reality in similar real life situations but also the blatantly realistic conversations that come with it. Now take that script, those actors and hand them over to Mike Nichols who's just made his directing career debut with "Who's afraid of Virginia Wolf", a picture that earned no less than 5 Oscars. If the first movie you direct earns you an Oscar nomination and wins another five, it's only fair that you win one on your second film, and that's what happened when Nichols walked away with his first Oscar for directing The Graduate and the only one won for the movie out of 7 nominations.
The Graduate's identity is finally perfected by a soundtrack that spices its visual entertainment and takes it to a deeper dramatic level. Folk- rock duo Simon & Garfunkel's music fills up the film with various songs and background music from beginning to end. "The Sound of silence" has become a constant reminder of the picture for whoever watched it and the hit single "Mrs Robinson", which knocked off The Beatles from the top charts in 1968, forces whoever comes across it to recollect the whole Graduate experience, especially its ending.
In a nutshell, The Graduate is a cinematic landmark of the 1960s with a directing Oscar win and 6 other nominations, and with a lead acting debut for legendary actor Dustin Hoffman. It is, without a doubt, an acting, writing and directing cinematic icon.