Goodbye, Columbus

Summary

“Brenda, I’d like to talk to you about nothing.”

Philip Roth is one of my favorite novelists. Considered to be one of the finest novelists of the Twentieth Century, Philip Roth detailed better than almost anyone the modern Jewish American experience. He was incredibly prolific and wrote twenty nine novels before his retirement in 2010. He passed away in 2018. He is probably best remembered for his Nathan Zuckerman novels, which rank as some of my favorite books, but he consistently crafted engaging novels throughout his career and even in his later years. Goodbye, Columbus was his first novella. It was released in 1959 and already showed his fearless exploration of the interplay between men and women in their relationships, both sexually and verbally. It won his first of two National Book Awards and gave flight to one of the great literary careers. It was my first Philip Roth novel that I read, and I decided to read it again for the first time in a decade just prior to watching Fun City Editions recent Blu-ray release of the 1969 film adaptation. I enjoyed seeing how director Larry Peerce, who had made the very solid thriller The Incident two years earlier, approached the material.

In the summertime, Neil Klugman (Richard Benjamin) meets a beautiful girl named Brenda Patimkin (Ali MacGraw) at a swimming pool. Neil is recently out of college and the army and has taken a job as a librarian. His parents have moved to Arizona and he lives with his Uncle and his Aunt whom is constantly worried about him. Brenda is home from college. She comes from a successful Jewish family. She has a brother named Ron who has recently graduated from Ohio State, and a little sister named Jenny who is still in her early teens. They are living their version of the American dream in the suburbs. Brenda’s father is an accomplished businessman, and her mother is somewhat suspicious of Neil’s seeming lack of career ambitions. As Neil begins to court Brenda, it becomes more obvious the differences between Neil and the Klugmans. As Neil and Brenda become more physical, complications in their relationship arise.

While I am not a full fledged expert on Philip Roth, I have read eighteen of Roth’s novels. In preparation for reviewing Goodbye, Columbus I reread the novella on which the film was based. The screenplay by Arnold Schulman follows the novella very well. It makes good sense that it earned Schulman an Oscar nomination for Best Adapted Screenplay, because it understands the source novel very well. Almost everything in the novella makes its way onscreen, including the minor interactions between Neil and a young black child at his job at the library. The picture is capably written and I was not surprised to hear that Roth completely approved of the screenplay.

The acting in the film is of solid quality, although I have one nagging issue that tugged at me regarding the leading man that I will discuss in a second. Ali MacGraw would steal the nation’s hearts the next year in Love Story, and this was her debut film. Ali MacGraw was certainly a beauty and it is not hard to understand why the character of Neil would immediately be drawn to her. Her casting makes perfect sense in the role and it is safe to say that she steals the film. Richard Benjamin on paper also makes good sense considering his dark hair and acting chops. He somewhat favored Philip Roth, although the pictures of Roth make him look more brooding and masculine than Benjamin. I found myself having issue with Richard’s casting slightly because he does not feel completely convincing as someone who would be able to charm a girl like Ali MacGraw. It is an odd coupling in terms of physical attributes and how the actors carry themselves. Brenda needed to be played by someone less attractive, or Neil by someone more traditionally masculine to make this story play better onscreen. I don’t find fault in Richard Benjamin as an actor so much as find fault with placing him in the role in the first place. The rest of the cast fit their roles well. For example, Jack Klugman is perfectly cast as Ben Patimkin. He could not have done better in that role.

Before I say anything else about opinions on the film, I should mention that I liked Goodbye, Columbus and think that for the most part it achieves its goals. Tonal shifts are somewhat interesting because the film has comedic and dramatic beats that are sometimes at odds with each other, but that is consistent with the source material.The direction by Larry Peerce is solid, and the pacing for the film is well maintained. That said, I could not help but feel that the picture suffers somewhat from the easy comparisons that can be made to the era-defining The Graduate which had come out two years prior in 1967. Ali McGraw was a great find, but she somewhat favored Katharine Ross. Is it crazy to think that Goodbye, Columbus would be an even better film if Dustin Hoffman had been cast in the role of Neil Klugman? I don’t think so. The music in the film by the era appropriate band The Association pales in comparison to the brilliant songs of Simon and Garfunkel (which is understandable given the beauty of those songs,) but something more sweeping like what would be used for the film Love Story the next year might have worked here to hit some of the dramatic notes of the picture. I don’t want to slight the music of composer Charles Fox because his compositions in the picture are pretty strong, it is just that the tonal shifts between Fox’s music and The Association’s music are noticeable.

The flow of the film really picks up in the final thirty minutes as the story reaches its natural conclusion. The only aspect of the finale that was missing, is that in the novel both characters accidentally say that they “loved” each other. I have always found that to be the most poignant part of the book, so that was a strange omission from a screenplay that was very good at keeping the most important parts of the book onscreen.

Overall – I thoroughly enjoyed getting to finally see Goodbye, Columbus after years of being a fan of the novella. The picture has a great screenplay, and some good performances (particularly Ali MacGraw and Jack Klugman.) While I don’t think the film quite reaches the level of profundity of the source novel, it was a noble attempt.

Video

Goodbye, Columbus comes to Blu-ray in 1080p in 1.85:1 aspect ratio with an MPEG-4 AVC encode from a brand new 4K transfer derived from the film’s original 35mm negative. Fun City Editions always works hard on the quality control of their releases. The grain is well resolved and color timing is natural looking. The film has been lovingly restored and appears to be in great shape. I didn’t notice anything glaring in terms of compression issues or other anomalies. In short, the movie looks great.

Audio

Fun City Editions has provided a DTS-HD MA 2.0 Mono track in English. The score by Charles Fox and songs by The Association sounded rich and vibrant. Dialogue is clear and the track seems to be a good representation of the original source material.

Supplements:

• Booklet – the essay by Jim Healy was fantastic. It confirmed my own thoughts on the picture mirrored Philip Roth’s who considered the picture a solid adaptation (his favorite film adaptation of his works) but also found Richard Benjamin somewhat “nebbish.” This was very well researched and enjoyable.
• 2016 post-screening on-stage conversation with cast and crew – This thirty minute feature is well worth your time. Featuring Ali MacGraw, Stan Jaffe, Charles Fox, Richard Benjamin, Arnold Schulman, and Larry Peerce, the conversation is illuminating. They all seem to have fond memories of the project and of their time working with one another.
• Commentary by Bill Ackerman – Host of the Supporting Characters Podcast Bill Ackerman enthusiastically discusses the film. He is very knowledgeable about the source material and is a good choice for this commentary track.
• Interview with composer Charles Fox – Charles Fox details the beginning of his career from listening to orchestras to learn how to compose, to his start composing on Larry Peerce’s The Incident, to working on Barbarella, and Goodbye, Columbus. Charles is a good storyteller and it was fun to see how his career began with a lift up from Henry Mancini.
• Image gallery

Overall Scores:

Video – 4/5

Audio – 4/5

Supplements – 4/5

Overall – 4/5

Goodbye, Columbus benefits from a very well written screenplay that adapts Philip Roth’s seminal debut novel capably. Larry Peerce’s direction is pretty on-point (despite some tonality issues inherent to the material,) and Ali MacGraw steals the film in what marked her true leading role debut. I like Richard Benjamin as an actor, but I found myself having difficulty picturing him in the role of Neil Klugman. I also think that this picture suffers a little bit by its proximity to the other classic bittersweet romances or comedies that came directly before and directly after it – The Graduate and Love Story. I enjoyed the film a good amount and I have to allow that I might be a little bit more critical of the picture than folks who come to the film without having read the novel. Regardless, as a fan of Philip Roth’s work, I am extremely grateful to Fun City Editions for taking the time to restore and release this adaptation that I have always been curious about. Philip Roth himself considered it the best of the adaptations of his work, which I think speaks volumes. Fans of the film will find that the technical merits are above reproach and the special features (including an excellently researched booklet) are of very high quality. Recommended!