Let's be realistic.

There is just so much movie here. For some it may be too much. But in the same secretly sarcastic way most telemarketers say the phrase, the title of this one is particularly apt.

One of those movie experiences that is so good it makes you realize you've been grading everything else on a curve.

This is a small, humorous movie in some ways, but it has a huge heart. What a nice experience.

"The Sterile Cuckoo" is one of those bizarre titles which appears to have nothing to do with the film to which it is attached; in the novel of the same name by John Nichols, which I have never read, the title is apparently explained, but the explanation was omitted from the film. In the UK the film was originally released as "Pookie", after one of the main characters, but today it is normally shown on television under its American title. (Perhaps someone pointed out that, in Malay, the word "puki"- same pronunciation- means something obscene. My Malaysian-born wife was baffled why a film with that title should have been released in Britain).The film tells the story of Mary Ann Adams and Jerry Payne, two teenagers who meet one another while waiting for a bus. Mary Ann is generally known by the nickname "Pookie". (I hope she never travels to Malaysia). They discover that they are both on the way to university and that their colleges are near each other. They begin dating, and slowly fall in love, but their relationship is a difficult one because of their very different personalities. Jerry is a shy, studious boy whose main interest in entomology. Pookie is, on the surface, more outgoing- during their initial encounter it is she who makes most of the running- but she is also an oddball eccentric. Both are loners, but for different reasons, Jerry because of his shyness, Pookie because she regards virtually everyone who does not share her eccentricities as a "weirdo". (Or as she would spell it, "wierdo")."The Sterile Cuckoo" is a coming-of-age film with certain similarities to "The Graduate" from two years earlier. Both films were made early in their careers by rising new directors; "The Graduate" was the second film to be directed by Mike Nichols, whereas "The Sterile Cuckoo" marked the directorial debut of Alan J. Pakula. (He had, however, already had considerable experience as a producer). It is very different in style to the sort of political and crime thrillers ("Klute", "All the President's Men", "Presumed Innocent", "The Pelican Brief") for which Pakula was later to become famous. It is told in a simple, lyrical style with plenty of long, lingering shots. There are relatively few close-ups; characters are often viewed from a distance. There is some striking photography of the North-Eastern scenery (most of the movie was filmed in upstate New York), although the views we see do not always correspond to the ostensible time of year- trees in full leaf at "Christmas", autumn colours in "spring", etc. I presume that the film was shot over a much shorter period of time than the full academic year during which the action is supposed to take place.Liza Minnelli was hitherto best known to me for "Cabaret" and for her insistence that her name is spelt with a "zee". (I always used to wonder how else her name could be spelt, until I learned that in America, unlike Britain, the name Lisa is occasionally pronounced "Lyza" rather than "Leeza"). If one excludes those films in which she appears as herself, her filmography is a short one; apart from "Cabaret" and "Arthur" I don't think I had previously seen any of them. "The Sterile Cuckoo" is one of her earliest films and the first one in which she has a starring role. She received a "Best Actress" nomination, which in my view was well-deserved. The strange, fey teenager Pookie is, on the surface at least, very different from Minnelli's vampish Sally Bowles character from "Cabaret", yet both women have at the heart of their existence an emotional vulnerability which they try to hide from the outside world in different ways, Pookie by difficult, unconventional behaviour and Sally by an outward show of seductive glamour. Wendell Burton, an actor with a filmography even shorter than Minnelli's- most of his subsequent work seems to have been in television- is also very good as the quieter, more conventional Jerry.Another striking feature is the film's theme song, the Sandpipers' "Come Saturday Morning", with its simple lyrics and haunting folksong-like melody. It fits perfectly with the mood of the film, and reminded me of some of the songs of Simon and Garfunkel (which were such a feature of "The Graduate"), especially "Scarborough Fair" which was of course based upon a real folk-song. (It received an Oscar nomination for "Best Song" but lost to "Raindrops Keep Falling on My Head", which I was surprised to learn was specially composed for "Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid"- I had always assumed the makers of that film had simply used a much older song).This is not a well-known film, but in my view it deserves to be. It is a neglected gem of the late sixties, a gentle, elegiac and moving coming-of-age story and a reminder that not every college student of that period was an angry young radical. 8/10

This was another movie that I saw as a high school student in the Philippines back in 1970 while we were stationed at the Subic Bay Naval Base. We always went to the movies. There were 5 movie theaters on the base and each one was free to get in. We didn't have English speaking TV stations in the Philippines at the time I was there. I saw this movie 4 or 5 times. It was a time when we were getting ready to head off to college and many of the films we saw dealt with the California college scene. This one took place in the New England rural area in the small college town setting. The movie was enjoyable for the setting, the characters, and the music. Liza Minelli did a great job as the lonely, confused, student who didn't fit in with the crowd. This movie is in the same category as The Graduate, The Paper Chase, and Love Story. Of the four it is the most simplistic but provides another look at the love relationships between college students in that time period. All these movies made an impression on me at the time as I was young and just getting ready to begin my college years. The song "Come Saturday Morning" provided a good background balance to the movie as it played throughout the movie in various versions. It had a very similar feel to the way "Scarborough Fair" was used in The Graduate. As we lived with the heat and the jungle as my environment for 2 years; this film reminded me of the wonderful seasons of fall and winter that I remembered when I lived in New York and would go upstate to visit friends. One side track here..... As I think of the 4 movies mentioned, songs played a key element in the movies. For some reason The Paper Chase had no theme music or any songs that I recall. The movie was fantastic but I am a musician and with all the great songs of that era it would have, in my opinion, made the movie better. It was a great time to be young back in the late 60's and early 70's. These movies made the experience a little more enjoyable and I enjoy watching them when they are on the tube.

I saw this movie so many years ago when it was first released with a great deal of fanfare featuring Liza Minnelli's virtuosic portrayal of a heartbreakingly lonely, vulnerable and impossible young coed. Seeing it again, some 30 years later, it continues to resonate with its beautifully drawn characters and their painfully real relationships. Love, desire, passion, confusion, post-adolescent yearnings- -these strong emotions and feelings are present in every scene of this film which has not aged one single bit in those 30 years. This movie is a gem.

Liza Minelli plays neurotic "Pookie" who falls in love with a conservative, bookish college freshmen whom she meets riding a bus. And how neurotic (and irritating) she is!! Her schtick is to act out outrageous pranks in order to grab his attention (like sitting cross-legged on his roof). The theme to the movie, "Come Saturday Morning", sung by the Sandpipers on massive doses of seconal, plays repetitively in the background of this movie. Liza is an overbearing misfit, who clings to her serious, no-nonsense boyfriend like the lingering smell of nauseating incense after it has been burning in a room. In a long and painful monologue over the phone-- a tour-de-force for Liza Minelli--she begs him to let her come and spend time with him alone in his college dorm room. Boyfriend Burton is the "strong, silent type."When she shows up, her boyfriend totally ignores her and instead they spend the days in nerve wracking silence. One is therefore led to believe that Burton the boyfriend felt compelled out of sympathy and compassion to let her stay. Poor Pookie--she plays every trick in the book to grab his attention but to no avail. While he studies, she asks him--suggestively--if he "wants to peel a tomatoe?" She serves him lunch and pours him soda out of a bottle with a three foot long neck. She has masking tape over her mouth(get the picture?). To the viewer, this either creates sympathy for her character or you find her pranks irritating--why doesn't she just go away and leave him alone so he can study? You never really know if her schtick irritates or amuses him, or if he just stoically accepts it. In as much as they don't seem to really "connect"--(or really communicate well, is what the director is trying to convey here) he suggests that they spend some time apart, oh, say three months-- before they contact each other again. She agrees, one assumes--because she doesn't protest; she just nods and drives off. When she drives off in her Volkswagen, the viewing audience can't help but breathe a sigh of relief. (Gee, is this called letting someone down "gently"?) One would naturally expect this to be the logical "ending" to this movie, (Sandpiper's theme playing in the background) but it isn't. Inexplicably, Burton's character spends the rest of the picture trying to locate her! After the complete lack of chemistry between the two, one has to wonder: "why would he want to?" Perhaps Pookie's kind of like someone who hangs around and you take for granted, and then, when they're gone, you finally notice them missing, or begin to miss them, anyways. Or maybe he needs someone to cook and wash his clothes for him while he studies.