Mike Nichols directs this coming-of-age film, or rather a graduating-college-what-the-fuck-do-I-do-now story, either way we see Dustin Hoffman growing up and becoming a man. Some films from the late 60’s haven’t aged to well, such as Easy Rider (not to say that Easy Rider is a bad film, it’s just dated) but I think The Graduate has aged perfectly and is still fresh after forty-two years. This is the first time I’ve seen this film and life makes so much more sense now (that church was in Wayne’s World! I get the joke now!).

What I truly admire about this film is the character development of Ben. I’m not going to lie, at the beginning of the film Ben really annoyed me and I didn’t really like him at all. However, this all changed before the half way point, and even though he’s blunt and still kind of annoying, I was rooting for him the entire way. If there’s one thing that I will always remember about this film it’s the shot of Ben underwater in the scuba diver outfit, just standing on the bottom of the pool as the camera pulls away from him and he slowly starts to vanish in the surrounding water.

More on this later . . .