Taking Off **** (1971, Lynn Carlin, Buck Henry, Linnea Heacock, Georgia Engel) – Classic Movie Review 6935

Czech director Milos Forman’s highly promising 1971 American film debut is a fresh and funny, deftly handled and amusingly scripted generation-gap satire about a middle-aged couple Lynn and Larry Tyne (Lynn Carlin and Buck Henry) who follow in their daughter Jeannie (Linnea Heacock)’s footsteps when she runs off to become a hippy in New York.

Winning performances from a hand-picked cast and a witty screenplay by Milos Forman, John Guare, Jean-Claude Carrière and John Klein make this clever, engaging stuff, and Forman found his American career taking off. It was nominated for six BAFTA Film Awards, but did not win any, and was selected as an American entry to the 1971 Cannes Film Festival, where it was nominated for the Palme d’Or and won the Grand Prize of the Jury, tied with Johnny Got His Gun (1971).

Ike and Tina Turner play themselves as The Ike and Tina Turner Revue, while Carly Simon and Kathy Bates are among the audition singers.

Also in the cast are Georgia Engel as Margot, Tony Harvey, Audra Lindley, Paul Benedict, Vincent Schiavelli (in his film debut), David Gittler, Philip Bruns, Rae Allen, Frank Berle, Gail Busman, Corinna Cristobal, Barry Del Rae, Robert Dryden, Allen Garfield, Madeline Geffen,  Anna Gyory, Jack Hausman, Carrie Kotkin, Herman Meckler and Ultra Violet.

Taking Off is directed by Milos Forman, runs 92 minutes, is produced by Crown-Hausman, Forman Production, Renn Productions, is distributed by Universal, is written by Milos Forman, John Guare, Jean-Claude Carrière and John Klein, is shot in colour by Miroslav Ondricek, is produced by Alfred W Crown and Michael Hausman, and is scored by Robert Wightman.

RIP the irreplaceable Milos Forman (1932–2018), inspired director of The Loves of a Blonde (1965), The Firemen’s Ball (1967), Taking Off (1971), One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest (1975), Hair (1979), Ragtime (1981), Amadeus (1984), Valmont, The People vs Larry Flynt, Man on the Moon and Goya’s Ghosts.

© Derek Winnert 2018 Classic Movie Review 6935

Check out more reviews on http://derekwinnert.com