The Graduate

“There’s a great future in plastics”: Before college graduate Ben has to face up to his future, the 21-year-old would rather enjoy the Californian summer one last time. Thanks to wealthy parents, a swimming pool in the garden and even a sports car, this should be a breeze – until Mrs Robinson, the wife of a business associate of his father’s, snaps him out of his lethargy. He gets involved with her – but then meets and falls in love with her daughter Elaine … Whether this finely honed social satire would have become the cult film it remains to this day without the songs of Simon & Garfunkel, we will never know. In any case, their melancholic “Sound of Silence” lends a touch of nobility to the disorientation of a young man in whom so many believed they could recognise themselves.
(Florian Widegger)