We are all alone

Rating: 8/10 (18 March 2012)

In the film The Graduate, the main character Ben Braddock, portrayed by a very young Dustin Hoffman, finds himself being seduced by the wife of his father's friend, Mrs. Robinson, portrayed by Anne Bancroft. Though Ben starts with good intentions and declines Mrs. Robinsons advances he soon finds himself very alone and reaches out to her for companionship. Ben soon becomes fixated on nothing but his artificial relationship with Mrs. Robinson and loses focus on everything else that he once thought was important. After Ben realizes that his relationship is no more than an affair and it is not fulfilling his needs for companionship he turns his attention to Elaine Robinson, portrayed by Katharine Ross, the daughter of his adulteress. As Ben continues to pursue Elaine the new of the affair emerges driving them apart. Despite Elaine's lack of interests for Ben he continues to pursue her with an unhealthy obsession including a valiant attempt to stop Elaine from getting married. Even though when Ben arrives at the church the ceremony has already taken place Elaine ignores convention and runs away with them both sitting in the back of a bus in the last scene of the movie.
The theme throughout the film focuses on ones need for companionship and encompasses how we can create artificial relationships in an attempt to make up for a lack of substantial ones. Ben has a very abrupt realization of this when Mrs. Robinson refuses to have a conversation with him during one of their evenings at the hotel, as Ben push's the issue he indicates that he has interest in Elaine which provokes Mrs. Robinson to reveal that she does not believe he is good enough for her daughter. At this point Ben realizes that he has no attachment to Mrs. Robinson and that he is utterly alone.
In that specific scene I though the use of lighting was very important, Mrs. Robinson desire to turn off the room lights leaving only the lighting from the windows have a true sense of distance between the two characters as Ben was pushing for an emotional connection and Mrs. Robinsons only desire was to disenfranchise herself from him in all but a physical manner. While Ben's numerous attempts to illuminate the room gave the viewer the sense that he had considered his affair to be an attempt at companionship even though it was in bad faith. I think that this is a universal truth that is portrayed in many films, American Beauty did a great job at this as well with the relationship between Lester Burnham, Kevin Spacey, and his daughters friend Angela Hayes, Mena Suvari.
The use of "Sound of Silence", by Simon and Garfunkel as a motif throughout the film was able to further drive home Bens loneliness, as it was used each time he had realized that what he had been striving for was a fabrication and that he continued to be nothing but himself. It was able to truly portray his feelings and give the viewer the sense that everything in his world had been a fabrication.
In the end, as the bus drove away we saw the excitement fade from Ben and Elaine's face and we were left with their disembodied feeling of regret. As they each realized that now that they were together they had no real substance to their relationship.